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ACLU ACCOMPLISHMENTS
Keeping America Safe and Free: Asserting that America can be both safe and free, the ACLU has led the fight to protect our rights and our Constitutional values in the post 9/11 environment.
2006 to present: Challenging Warrantless Spying: The ACLU quickly filed a lawsuit following revelations in January 2006 about the National Security Agency’s illegal spying program. The government ultimately discontinued the program while continuing to seek broad authorization to spy on Americans. Unfortunately, Congress granted that authorization when it passed the FISA Amendments Act, giving the government nearly unfettered access to Americans’ international communications. In response, the ACLU filed a new lawsuit challenging this latest invasion of privacy on behalf of a group of prominent journalists and non-profit organizations. The case, entitled, Amnesty International USA vs. McConnell, is still pending.
2003 to present: Ending Torture: Through ongoing Freedom of Information Act litigation, the ACLU has brought to light the mistreatment and torture of prisoners in U.S. detention facilities in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Guantánamo Bay. The ACLU has also helped to expose and challenge torture policies approved at the highest levels of the Bush Administration. The ACLU’s John Adams Project is assisting in the representation of detainees facing the death penalty at Guantánamo Bay in trials before military commissions that due not meet basic due process standards. And, our Close Gitmo campaign is building grassroots pressure for President-elect Obama to sign an executive order closing the infamous prison on the first day of his presidency.
2003 to present: Challenging the USA PATRIOT Act: The ACLU brought a series of successful lawsuits challenging the National Security Letter (NSL) provision of the Patriot Act. NSLs allow the FBI to obtain sensitive information on innocent people, including the web sites a person has visited and the addresses of email that a person has either sent or received. In addition, the Patriot Act allows the FBI to impose a “gag” that prevents anyone who receives an NSL from speaking about it. In Doe v. Mukasey, a federal court ruled that the “gag” was unconstitutional and struck down the NSL provision in its entirety. The case is currently on appeal.
2004 to present: Protecting the Privacy of Travelers: The ACLU was instrumental in persuading Congress to adopt legislation that required aviation security measures such as CAPPS II to meet effectiveness and civil liberties tests. CAPPS II would have allowed the government to conduct a background check on every person flying to, from, or within the United States, and then make a judgment based on that information about the risk individual travelers supposedly pose to aviation. The ACLU continues to challenge the government’s massive and growing Terrorist Watch List, which now includes over one million names, doing more harm than good by interfering with the travel of innocent people and wasting huge amounts of the government’s limited security resources.
A TIMELINE OF ACLU ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
The ACLU has been at the center of nearly every major civil liberties debate for nearly 90 years.
2008: Equal Rights Under the Law: A Florida court struck down a state law barring lesbians and gay men from adopting, granting adoptions to the ACLU’s client, a gay man who has been raising two foster children since 2004. The court ruled that the ban violated the equal protection guarantees of the state constitution because it singles out for different treatment gay people and the children they raise for no rational reason. The Florida law barring lesbians and gay men from adopting, passed in 1977 in response to an anti-gay crusade led by former Miss America and Florida orange juice spokesperson Anita Bryant, was the most expansive anti-gay parenting law in the country.
2005: Keeping Religion Out of the Science Classroom: In Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, the ACLU represented a group of parents who challenged a public school district requirement for teachers to present so-called “intelligent design” as an alternative to evolution in high school biology classes. In a decision that garnered nationwide attention, a district judge ruled that “intelligent design” is not science and teaching it violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.
1997: Internet Free Speech: In ACLU vs. Reno, the Supreme Court stuck down the 1996 Communications Decency Act, which censored the Internet by broadly banning “indecent” speech. Today the ACLU is actively defending freedom of speech online from further assault.
1996: LGBT Rights: In Romer v. Evans the Supreme Court invalidated a state constitutional amendment, passed by public referendum in Colorado that prohibited the state and its municipalities from enacting gay rights laws.
1990: Right to Privacy: In Cruzan v. Director of the Missouri Department of Health, the Supreme Court's first right-to-die case, the ACLU represented the family of a woman who had been in a persistent vegetative state for more than seven years. Although the Court did not go as far as the ACLU urged, it did recognize living wills as clear and convincing evidence of a patient's wishes.
1981: Creationism in Arkansas: Fifty-six years after the Scopes trial, the ACLU challenged an Arkansas statute requiring that the biblical story of creationism be taught as a “scientific alternative” to the theory of evolution. A federal court found the statute, which fundamentalists saw as a model for other states, unconstitutional. That fight continues today as we take on the “intelligent design” movement with cases like our 2005 victory in Dover, Pennsylvania.
1978: Taking a Stand for Free Speech in Skokie: The ACLU took a controversial stand for free speech by defending a Nazi group that wanted to march through the Chicago suburb of Skokie—where many Holocaust survivors lived. The notoriety of the case cost the ACLU dearly as members left in droves, but to many it was our finest hour and has come to represent our unwavering commitment to principle.
1973: Reproductive Rights: After decades of struggle, the Supreme Court held—in Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton -- that the constitutional right to privacy encompasses a woman’s right to decide whether she will terminate or continue a pregnancy. But the fight still continues and the ACLU struggles to protect women’s right to reproductive choice.
1960s: Protecting Free Speech: In Tinker v. Des Moines, the ACLU won a major Supreme Court victory on behalf of public school students suspended for wearing black armbands in protest of the Vietnam War, a major First Amendment victory.
1957: Curbing the House Un-American Activities Committee: In Watkins v. United States the Supreme Court limited the investigative powers of HUAC on First Amendment grounds when the Court reversed a labor leader's conviction for refusing to answer questions about membership in the Communist Party.
1954: Brown v. Board of Education: The ACLU, having long supported the legal battle for equal education, celebrated a major victory when the Supreme Court declared that racially segregated schools were in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment in a case brought by the NAACP.
1947: Separation of church and state: In the case of Everson v. Board of Education, Justice Black's pronouncement that "In the words of Jefferson, the Clause was intended to erect a 'wall of separation' between church and State" was the Court's first major utterance on the meaning of the Establishment Clause.
1942: Fighting for the Internment of Japanese Americans: The ACLU stood almost alone in denouncing the federal government’s internment of more than 110,000 Japanese Americans in concentration camps.
1925: Defending Religious Liberty: In State of Tennessee v. John Thomas Scopes, biology teacher John T. Scopes was charged with violating a Tennessee ban on the teaching of evolution. The ACLU was there to defend his case.
1920: Palmer Raids: In its first year, the ACLU championed the targets of Attorney General A Mitchell Palmer, including politically radical immigrants. We also supported the right of trade unionists to hold meetings and organize, and secured the release of hundreds of activists imprisoned for their anti-war activities.
These are only a handful of the cases in which the ACLU has successfully defended our most basic civil liberties. For a more comprehensive history of the ACLU and civil rights, please click here.
The ACLU does its important work through its two component organizations, the American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU Foundation. To learn more about the distinction between these two components, click here.
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