A New Congress,
A Time for Change
Bush
Pushes to Open Mail Without a Warrant
Government
Backs Down from Attempt to Seize "Secret" Memo from ACLU
FBI
Ignored Agents' Eyewitness Accounts of Guantanamo Abuse
Free
CD: The ACLU Presents “inSECURITY,” from Steve Connell &
Sekou (tha misfit) 
YOU CAN HELP PROTECT OUR BASIC FREEDOMS by joining with over 550,000 card-carrying
members of the ACLU. Our rights as individuals—the very foundation
of our great democracy—depend on our willingness to defend them, and
as an ACLU member, you'll be doing your part.
Click now to safeguard our Bill of Rights by becoming an ACLU member.
IN THE STATES:
New Jersey Supports Civil Unions for Same-Sex Couples
Last month, in an important step for civil rights, the New Jersey Legislature
passed a civil unions bill that will ensure that gay and lesbian couples
are afforded equal treatment under the law. The ACLU expressed pleasure
that same-sex couples will now have access to hundreds of family protections,
but we will continue to press the state to pass a marriage bill.
Deborah Jacobs, Executive Director of the ACLU of New Jersey, called
the vote “a giant step toward greater fairness for same-sex couples.
Same-sex couples throughout the state will now have access to hundreds
of family protections that were previously available only to straight
couples. But civil unions are a temporary fix," Jacobs continued.
"We are going to keep pressing until same-sex couples and their families
have access to the dignity and respect that only comes through marriage."
The bill passed by sweeping margins in both bodies of the New Jersey
Legislature. The governor is expected to sign the bill soon.
"I hope that the New Jersey legislators who pushed for civil unions
rather than marriage will think hard about their motives," said Matt
Coles, Director of the ACLU Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Project.
"If their goal truly was to put same-sex couples on equal footing
with married couples, why did they take the much more complicated step
of creating civil unions when they could have simply amended the state's
marriage laws? The only possible explanation is to send a clear message
that the commitments and families of lesbians and gay men in New Jersey
are less worthy."
Learn more about the fight for marriage rights at: http://www.aclu.org/getequal/ffm
Georgia School Board Drops Defense of Anti-Evolution Stickers
The ACLU of Georgia has reached an agreement with the Cobb County School
Board to keep controversial “Evolution Disclaimer” stickers
out of biology textbooks in public schools, ending a legal challenge that
began in 2002.
The anti-evolution stickers singled out the theory of evolution from
all other scientific theories included in the textbooks. In 2005, the
district court sided with the ACLU, stating that “the sticker sends
a message to those who oppose evolution for religious reasons that they
are favored members of the political community, while the sticker sends
a message to those who believe in evolution that they are political outsiders.”
As part of the agreement, Cobb County school officials also agreed not
to take other actions that would undermine the teaching of evolution in
biology classes.
After the Cobb County School Board passed the sticker policy in 2002,
school district parents, represented by the ACLU of Georgia and attorney
Michael Manely, sued the school board, arguing that the policy promoted
a particular religious belief in science classrooms and therefore violated
the religious freedom of students. In early 2005, U.S. District Judge
Clarence Cooper agreed and ordered the school district to remove the stickers
from its 35,000 biology textbooks.
The controversial stickers read, "This textbook contains material
on evolution. Evolution is a theory, not a fact, regarding the origin
of living things. This material should be approached with an open mind,
studied carefully and critically considered."
For more information on the teaching of evolution and the separation
of church and state, go to: http://www.aclu.org/evolution.
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January
12, 2007
A
New Congress, A Time for Change
The American people voted for change last November when they elected the
newly seated 110th Congress. That change should start with a commitment
from our elected officials to stand up for the American people by defending
the Constitution.
For the past five years, the Bush administration has run roughshod
over our rights and the rule of law, and it’s up to the new Congress—and
each of us—to make sure these abuses of power are investigated
and stopped.
We are urging the new leadership in Congress to protect the freedoms
and values enshrined in our Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Specifically,
we’re calling on lawmakers to:
- Restore habeas corpus and due process rights, which were gutted in
the Military Commissions Act,
- Investigate and stop the warrantless NSA surveillance program,
- Take steps to better protect the privacy of all Americans,
- Investigate and stop the administration’s policies of torture,
abuse and rendition, and
- Curb overuse of the state secrets privilege and Sensitive Security
Information classification
The ACLU will also continue to work with Congress on issues such as
racial profiling, lesbian and gay rights, immigration, the Real ID Act,
reproductive rights and protecting the First Amendment, among other
important civil liberties issues.
While we’re optimistic that the new Congress will provide better
oversight into the actions of the Bush administration and enact legislation
that protects freedom and privacy, we also acknowledge that our lawmakers
have not always stood up against this administration’s dismantling
of civil liberties. That’s why there’s never been a more
important time to let Congress know that the ACLU and its members are
going to be holding their feet to the fire to protect freedom.
Last week, we ran print advertisements in targeted congressional districts,
calling on the 110th Congress to restore the constitutional freedoms
lost in recent years. The ad outlined a wish list of four New Year’s
resolutions for the new Congress to restore our lost liberties. While
issues like these aren’t necessarily the ones Congress plans to
address in their first 100 hours, it’s up to each of us to pressure
our elected officials to hold the President accountable and protect
the Constitution. View our ad that ran in newspapers across the country:
http://action.aclu.org/site/PageServer?pagename=Jan_ad
To help build on that momentum, we launched a nation-wide effort this
week, asking people across the country to resolve to Move Freedom Forward
by signing our New Year’s resolutions. The resolutions will be
presented to Members of Congress after President Bush delivers his State
of the Union address on January 23.
Add your name to the resolutions at: https://secure.aclu.org/site/SPageServer?pagename=Move_Freedom_Forward
This new Congress must show real leadership and restore fundamental
due process—because the only thing scarier than a government that
would take away our basic freedoms is a Congress that would let it happen.
Bush
Pushes to Open Mail without a Warrant
Last week, the country learned that President Bush signed a statement
giving him authority to open people’s mail without a warrant in
emergency conditions.
The ACLU will soon be filing a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request
demanding details from the Bush administration. We’re also calling
on Congress to exercise its oversight function and to require the Postal
Service to report to Congress annually and publicly about how often
each year it opens mail without a warrant.
The December 20 “signing statement” issued by President
Bush leaves many questions unanswered, including the number of times
this power has been used, whether people who are searched are notified
after the fact, and what policies are being put in place to conduct
the searches.
The Bush signing statement appears to directly contradict the bill
the president signed, which states that First Class Mail cannot be opened
without a warrant. In his unilateral claim to this executive power,
the president does not specify whether there are special circumstances
beyond those already established in the law that would allow him to
open mail without a warrant and if so, what they may be. Such deliberate
ambiguity raises a red flag, given President Bush’s history of
asserting broad powers to spy on Americans.
Read more: http://www.aclu.org/safefree/nsaspying/27843prs20070104.html
Government
Backs Down from Attempt to Seize "Secret" Memo from ACLU
Last month, after the ACLU moved to quash an unprecedented government
grand jury subpoena demanding "any and all copies" of a previously
"secret" memorandum, the government backed down from the fight,
asking a judge to withdraw the subpoena and saying that the document
in question has been declassified.
"The Bush Administration's attempt to suppress information using
the grand jury process was truly chilling and is unprecedented in law
and in our history as an organization. We could not be more pleased
to have turned back the government from its strong-arm tactics, which
were clearly aimed at silencing critics—both those from within
the government and those outside, such as the ACLU and members of the
media," said ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero.
The document at issue was a December 2005 memorandum, marked "Secret,"
with the subject line: "The Permissibility of Photographing Enemy
Prisoners of War and Detainees." The memorandum concludes that
the news media and members of the Public Affairs Office are allowed
to photograph detainees "so long as the photography is done in
such a manner that cannot be interpreted as holding the EPWs and detainees
up to public curiosity." U.S. soldiers, the memorandum says, are
prohibited from photographing detainees and EPWs except as part of their
official duties.
The memorandum was issued more than a year after the infamous Abu Ghraib
photos came to light but raises the question of whether the guidelines
were in place prior to the Abu Ghraib scandal and if not, why it took
more than a year after the scandal to issue a policy.
The designation of the document as "Secret" is a striking
example of the Bush administration's rampant use of claims of "state
secrecy" and overclassification of documents and information to
hide its actions.
Legal documents in the case, including the now declassified secret
memorandum, are online at: http://www.aclu.org/subpoena
FBI
Ignored Agents' Eyewitness Accounts of Guantanamo Abuse
Guantanamo, After Five Years: This week, in 2002,
the first detainees arrived at Camp X-Ray in Guantanamo
Bay, Cuba. For lawyers’ commentary on the continuing battle
for human rights and due process at Gitmo, go to http://blog.aclu.org.
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The ACLU has released more than 200 pages of FBI documents, detailing
eyewitness accounts from 26 agents of detainee abuse, 17 of which the
Bureau apparently chose not to investigate further.
These documents include new accounts of abuse related to the detainees'
religious beliefs: Investigators wrapped a detainee's head in duct tape
"because he would not stop quoting the Koran;" another agent
said an interrogator bragged about making a detainee listen to "satanic
black metal music for hours and hours." According to the same report,
the interrogator later "dressed as a Catholic Priest and baptized
the detainee in order to save him." In another incident observed
by an FBI agent, a Marine captain squatted over the Koran during an
interrogation of a Muslim prisoner, which the prisoner found extremely
offensive.
The FBI received these responses from its own personnel describing
detainee abuse by military interrogators and military police, but the
agency apparently made a deliberate decision not to conduct follow-up
interviews, citing the fact that the techniques reported were expressly
authorized by Defense Department policies. Of the 26 responses, only
nine were slated for further investigation.
"The FBI appears to have turned a blind eye to the very abuses
that most need investigating— those abuses that were expressly
authorized by Defense Department policy," said Jameel Jaffer, an
attorney at the ACLU.
The documents came as a result of the ACLU's Freedom of Information
Act lawsuit, which to date have uncovered more than 100,000 pages of
government documents detailing the torture and abuse of detainees. The
ACLU has created a search engine for the public to access the documents
at: http://www.aclu.org/torturefoiasearch
In seeking accountability for detainee abuses, the ACLU and others
have turned to the courts. In March 2005, the ACLU and Human Rights
First filed a lawsuit charging then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld
and other top officials with direct responsibility for the torture and
abuse of detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Further information about the case, Ali v. Rumsfeld, is online
at http://www.aclu.org/rumsfeld
Free
CD: The ACLU Presents "inSecurity," from Steve Connell &
Sekou (tha Misfit)
"All this talk of safety...has me feeling unsafe..."
New from the ACLU and slam poets Steve Connell and Sekou (tha misfit),
“inSECURITY” is a CD that features original work from these
award-winning spoken word artists. Recorded live at the ACLU's 2006
Membership Conference, this dynamic, empowering poetry speaks out for
civil liberties and slams the Bush administration's abuses of power.
If you couldn't attend the Washington, D.C. conference this past October,
you can now see and hear video and audio clips, check out performance
photos, and order the free CD at: http://www.aclu.org/insecurity.
Steve Connell and Sekou (tha misfit) have been featured on such diverse
media outlets as ABC World News, Good Morning America, MSNBC’s
Hardball, HBO’s Def Poetry Jam, Showtime’s Crossover, MTV’s
Battlegrounds, BET’s Lyric Café, and have appeared at Oprah
Winfrey’s celebration of Maya Angelou’s 75th birthday, and
P. Diddy’s White Party. They have participated in multiple national
spoken word tours, including Declare Yourself—the voting initiative
founded by legendary TV and film producer Norman Lear. They were also
invited by HBO to perform together at the 12th Annual U.S. Comedy Arts
Festival in Aspen, CO, this past March.
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