Tag Archives: Group: American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)

Lufkin Daily News: The American Civil Liberties Union sent a letter to the Lufkin Independent School District Wednesday suggesting school functions held at local churches violate the constitution.

BastropEnterprise.com: For the first time ever, prayer will not be part of graduation ceremonies Friday night at Bastrop High School. Principal Stacey Pullen said the school received an e-mail on Tuesday from a student who identied themself as an atheist.

S. Florida Times: Blanche Ely High School principal Karlton O. Johnson, accused of “outing” a gay student and threatening to suspend her and her gay friend for holding hands on campus, is coming under fire for his actions.

ACLU: Lightspeed Systems, which produces software used for website filtering in thousands of public schools across the U.S., confirmed today that it will update its software to remove a filter that blocked websites with content geared toward the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) communities . . .

Paul Kengor at Townhall: “The ACLU’s early atheism is no surprise; its founders’ sympathies toward Bolshevism and the Soviet state are not disconnected from that atheism. Yet, most interesting, and unexpected, is how the ACLU’s founders’ views on the Leninist-Stalinist state’s advancement of abortion and birth control are connected—symbolically, at the least—to the organization’s advancement of abortion and birth control today.”

ACLU: The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Massachusetts filed a lawsuit in federal court today challenging the suspicionless search and seizure of electronics and personal data belonging to activist David House. The lawsuit charges that the government targeted House solely on the basis of his lawful association with the Bradley Manning Support Network when it seized House’s laptop, USB drive and camera, and proceeded to copy and possibly disseminate their contents.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Florida has hired two more lawyers and is planning to add another to help handle an expected workload increase resulting from the Republican-led Legislature’s recently ended session.

NBC New York: More than 100 parents and alumni of Neptune High School in New Jersey turned out for a meeting Wednesday night after learning this year’s senior class may not be able to graduate in an historic auditorium in Ocean Grove because it features religious symbols

ACLU: The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Alaska filed a motion for summary judgment in a lawsuit challenging the state’s tax-assessment rules, which discriminate against same-sex couples by denying them equal access to a property tax exemption for senior citizens and disabled veterans.

ACLU: The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Arkansas sent letters today to the Little Rock School District and eStem Public Charter Schools demanding that the schools cease viewpoint-based censorship of web content geared toward the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) communities. The organization has sent demand letters to school districts across the country as part of the organization’s national “Don’t Filter Me” initiative, which seeks to combat illegal censorship of pro-LGBT information on public school computer systems.

The Tennessean: Cchools in White County, Tenn., will ban the Gideons from distributing Bibles to students in classrooms, according to a deal announced Monday by the American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee.

Attorneys with ADF available for media interviews following hearing to decide whether ACLU, AU can force censorship of prayer before public bodies

AP: A federal judge on Tuesday blocked a new Utah immigration law that would have allowed police to check the citizenship status of anyone they arrest.

Asbury Park Press: A potential American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit against the Neptune school district could lead to the end of a 60-year-old tradition – graduation commencement at cross-bedecked Ocean Grove’s Great Auditorium. School administration officials said they first received a First Amendment complaint about mixing church with state shortly after a nonresident attended the 2010 ceremony.

ACLU press release: The American Civil Liberties Union and the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) filed a brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit late Monday, urging the court to uphold a ruling that blocked implementation of a discriminatory and unnecessary Oklahoma state constitutional amendment that prohibits courts from applying – or even considering – what is broadly described as Islamic “Sharia law” and “international law.” . . .

Religion Clause Blog: In ACLU-TN v. Sumner County Board of Education, 2011 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 47977 (MD TN, May 3, 2011), a Tennessee federal district court rejected the ACLU’s emergency motion for a temporary restraining order in a case alleging that the Sumner County schools violate the Establishment Clause by a series of practices that promote and endorse religion . . .

LifeNews: The Senate is expected to vote early next week on another pro-abortion judicial nominee President Barack Obama put forward for the federal courts, Edward Chen.

ACLU Exec. Directory Anthony Romero has forward a letter to the NY Times that begins: Re “How the Law Accepted Gays” (Op-Ed, April 29): Dale Carpenter says correctly that the American Civil Liberties Union failed to challenge sodomy laws in the 1950s. That was a regrettable mistake, but hardly tells the story.

KOB.com: Clovis Municipal Schools has approved an application for a gay-straight alliance club.

Deseret News: Although the country’s longest wait bill was signed nearly two months ago, none of the state’s pregnancy centers have stepped forward to register with the state as required by the law.

MN Independent: The American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota is demanding that the Northfield School District stop filtering LGBT internet content on the district’s computers. Calling it unconstitutional . . .

Stamford Advocate: The American Civil Liberties Union of New Mexico is asking Clovis Municipal Schools to approve a Gay-Straight Alliance club at Clovis High School before the school year ends May 24.

LifeSiteNews: Ohio’s “Heartbeat Bill,” which would ban abortion from the moment of a detectable fetal heartbeat, is gaining support from U.S. presidential hopefuls as it advances through the State legislature.

ADF attorney Matt Bowman at Human Events: The American Civil Liberties Union and its “pro-choice” allies want to force all hospitals in the country to perform abortions. They are claiming that a bill being debated in the U.S. House this week should be defeated or amended simply because it shores up existing federal conscience protections. HR3 . . .

Press-Citizen.com: “Tonight, the ACLU of Iowa is presenting the 2011 Louise Noun Award to these three former justices, Marsha Ternus, David Baker and Michael Streit. They were removed from the bench because they acted like true professionals. They courageously performed the job we hired them to do, even when they knew they might be fired as a result.”

Detroit Free Press: The American Civil Liberties Union today asked a federal appeals court to revive its lawsuit that claims Walmart wrongfully fired a Battle Creek employee who used medical marijuana to treat a brain tumor and cancer.

AP: A federal judge says the U.S. Justice Department can join a lawsuit challenging a South Carolina jail’s policy barring inmates from any reading material other than the Bible.

The Hill: On Friday, SBA answered Driehaus’s complaint and filed a separate brief in Ohio federal court seeking to overturn the state’s “false statement” law. The group says it’s buoyed by a recent decision by the Eighth Circuit Court that overturned a similar law in Minnesota.

Tennessean.com: The American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee (ACLU-TN) filed a lawsuit in federal court on Monday claiming a widespread, unconstitutional pattern and practice of religious activities in the Sumner County school system. | ACLU press release and complaint

WMFD.com: The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio sent a letter to school superintendents around the state Thursday, urging them to adopt proactive bullying prevention plans. | ACLU Press Release | ACLU Letter

APB: The following year the same school district was sued by the Alliance Defense Fund after students at Lakeview Elementary were ordered to remove religious language like “In God We Trust” from posters promoting a “See You at the Pole” prayer rally. The school board lost that case, also, when a judge sided with students and ordered school officials to stop suppressing religious speech that is “reasonable” and “in accordance with federal law.”

The Republic: Curriculum-based student clubs to meet at Clovis High School during the school day — a policy change the American Civil Liberties Union of New Mexico said raised concern because it was done at the same time students proposed forming a Gay Straight Alliance.

Tennessean: A complaint made by American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee on behalf of three Sumner County families accuses the county school board of promoting Christianity in violation of the U.S. Constitution.

Eugene Volokh has this post at the Volokh Conspiracy: Harvey Silverglate on the ACLU and Free Speech [Bumped to Include Response from ACLU’s Steve Shapiro, and Reply from ACLU Critic Wendy Kaminer].

Wall Street Journal: Now, the law firm representing Jones, the conservative Thomas More Law Center, says it will file an appeal tomorrow challenging the court verdict as unconstitutional. Richard Thompson, chief counsel of the Thomas More Law Center, said the verdict amounted to a prior restraint of Jones’ First Amendment rights.

ABC (includes video): The students took their complaint to the The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Texas, who sent the school a request on April 14 to review its policy. This week, after consulting with attorneys, the school district changed its policy and it will no longer require students to stand during the Pledge.

Christian Newswire: Planned Parenthood and the ACLU have filed an appeal to the State Supreme Court against Mississippi’s Personhood Amendment, Amendment 26, despite numerous rulings against them.

TwinCities.com: A federal judge on Wednesday shot down a Twin Cities charter school’s bid to dismiss an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit claiming it promotes Islam, clearing the way for a summer trial.

Detroit Free Press: The ACLU of Michigan and others are slamming local authorities for trying to deny Pastor Terry Jones the right to protest outside the Islamic Center of America in Dearborn.

Paul Greenberg at Townhall: Now we seem to live in a biblically illiterate era, and it shows. Not just in the quality of the prose that crosses an editor’s desk every day, or in the junkspeech that politicians and educantists mouth as a matter of course, but in the paucity of thought behind their tinny catch words.

Jordan Lorence at Human Events: The Supreme Court’s decision to throw out the challenge to Arizona’s tuition tax credit plan gives needed breathing room to that state’s emerging and innovative school-choice system. It also imposes common-sense requirements on opponents of school choice, including the American Civil Liberties Union, which now must come to court with people who have been actually harmed by the tax credit plan, and have more than just generalized complaints against it based on extreme notions of “separation of church and state.”

ACLU: The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court today ruled in an American Civil Liberties Union case that the mere smell of marijuana no longer justifies a search or seizure, because the possession of a small quantity of marijuana is no longer criminal in Massachusetts.

PNJ.com: Mediation is scheduled to begin Wednesday between the Santa Rosa County School District, the American Civil Liberties Union and a Christian legal group over the controversial agreement that ended prayer in school. Liberty Counsel . . .

Seattle PI: “Following a letter from federal prosecutors to Gov. Chris Gregoire which said Uncle Sam could and would go after medical marijuana users and providers, the ACLU of Washington sent a fact sheet to state senators saying such claims are not backed up by the federal government’s behavior.”

ACLU: “A letter to principals and educators explaining the Day of Silence, ways to support students who are participating and obligations schools have to protect students’ safety and freedom of speech.” | The Letter

AnnArbor.com: Wa[r]d lost in the lower courts, but Ward and her attorneys, the Alliance Defense Fund, a legal organization that works to uphold the rights of religious college students and faculty, have asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth District to step in.

PNJ.com:  Legal fees in the federal prayer-in-schools fight in the Santa Rosa County School District have topped $700,000, according to School District figures. And they’re climbing. The American Civil Liberties Union sued the district in 2008 . . .

ACLU: A landmark bill was introduced in the Senate today that would, for the first time, make workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity illegal in most workplaces. The Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) was introduced by Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Mark Kirk (R-IL), Tom Harkin (D-IA) and Susan Collins (R-ME). A companion bill, introduced by Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), was formally introduced last week in the House.

AP: School officials in eastern Pennsylvania will appeal a federal judge’s ruling that allows students to wear breast cancer fundraising bracelets that say, “I (heart) boobies! | ACLU information and link to court documents

Christian Post: The U.S. Department of Justice joined in on a 2010 lawsuit on Tuesday against a South Carolina jail that bars prisoners from receiving any reading materials other than the Bibl

NewRiverValley.com: A Giles County parent wants schools to display a collection of founding documents that includes the controversial biblical list that has caused a stir.

AP: A federal judge in Pennsylvania says the popular “I (heart) boobies!” breast cancer fundraising bracelets aren’t lewd or vulgar, so it’s OK for public school students to wear them.

WHSV.com: The American Civil Liberties Union is asking Prince William County public schools to stop restricting access to educational Websites about gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender issues.

TheTownTalk.com: Concerned about legal ramifications, the Rapides Parish Police Jury voted down a proposal to place a display of the Ten Commandments in the parish courthouse by a 2-to-1 margin Monday.

ADF attorney Doug Napier on Coffee with Creamer. | MP3 audio 24:15 mins

ACLU: The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Louisiana called on the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals (DHH) today to clarify that new mothers do not have to disclose private medical information before a birth certificates are issued for their newborns.

Examiner: A New Jersey school district has removed filters that blocked lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender-related websites after the American Civil Liberties Union began asking questions.

New American: . . . Babione said the court’s decision tells individuals that “you can go shack up with your boyfriend or girlfriend and that if you decide that you want to play house and have kids, the state has to allow you to come in and seek a child.” He added that it is “mind-boggling that we’ve come to a point in our society where you have a state Supreme Court basically saying that adult sexual desires and wants are the chief end of civil government at the expense of the best interests of children.”

The ACLU has posted this press release and it has also posted a map showing “Schools and Web Filtering State by State.”

The Chronicle of Higher Education: David A. French, who, as senior counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, helped represent Mr. Adams in the case, on Wednesday cheered the Fourth Circuit’s ruling as “a ringing victory for academic freedom,” with language that “is very clear, and not only binding in the Fourth Circuit but, I hope, quite persuasive to the other circuits.” The ruling “deals a real blow to the idea that professors’ speech is somehow wholly owned by the university. It is not,” said Mr. French, whose organization, an Arizona-based alliance of Christian lawyers and like-minded groups, took up the case partly because Mr. Adams had accused the university of religious discrimination.

Stop the ACLU: The Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) was thrilled to hear the decision. “Parents should be able to choose what’s best for their own children. This ruling empowers parents to do just that,” said ADF Senior Counsel David Cortman. “Parents should decide what schools their children attend and where their money goes. The ACLU failed in its attempt to eliminate school choice for hundreds of thousands of students nationwide and also failed to demonstrate that it had any constitutional basis for its clients to file suit in the first place.”

ADF attorney Erik Stanley writes at the Speak Up Movement Church Blog: My colleague David Cortmanposted a blog about the recent Supreme Court victory in ACSTO v. Winn.  As he points out, there are many great things to celebrate about that case.  I thought I would highlight one other positive development from that case . . .

ACLU: “Unfortunately, today’s decision may encourage state legislatures seeking to subsidize religion without judicial review,” said Paul Bender, a law professor at Arizona State University’s law school and former U.S. Deputy Solicitor General who served as lead counsel for the plaintiffs and argued the case in the Supreme Court.

ACLU RI: The Rhode Island ACLU today filed a federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of a prayer mural addressed to “Our Heavenly Father” that is displayed in the auditorium of a Cranston public high school . . . Read the complaint for this lawsuit here.

ACLU: on, Public Patent Foundation (PUBPAT) and U.S. Solicitor General Neal Katyal were in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington, D.C. today urging the court to uphold a lower court ruling that patents on two human genes are illegal.

Boston Globe: A federal judge says she needs more information to make a decision in a lawsuit brought by parents of Pawtucket school students against the city’s top parks and recreation official over claims he gave preferential treatment to a Catholic school.

Pioneer Press: As they head to a summer trial, the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota and a metro-area charter school it accuses of promoting religion disagree whether a jury or judge should get the 2-year-old federal case. The ALCU wants a bench trial, in which a judge would decide whether the Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy blended public education and religion in violation of the constitution.

Paul Kengor writes at the NC Register (3/04): Even then, I often get asked why something I’ve found in communist archives from, say, the 1920s, pertains to America right now in the 21st century. Well, indeed, past is often prologue, as what happened a century ago is hardly irrelevant to today’s political stage. That certainly seems the case with what I’ve found on the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), from its challenging of Christmas carols in public schools seven decades ago to its recent actions trying to compel Catholic hospitals to do abortions and denouncing the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops for opposing birth control and contraception in “health care” reform legislation. Few organizations have been as consistently radical in advancing abortion as the ACLU, to such a degree that Alan Sears and Craig Osten, authors of The ACLU vs. America, refer to “the ACLU’s crusade against the unborn child.”

HoumaToday: “Terrebonne Parish school officials said Monday they are backing off enforcement of a school-based rule — also contained in policies at the district’s other three high schools — that mandates tuxes for boys and gowns for girls.”

Religion Clause Blog: Yesterday’s Las Vegas Sun reports that the ACLU of Nevada has filed a lawsuit in federal court against the state of Nevada and Clark County (NV) challenging the constitutionality of the state law that limits the issuance of state certificates to perform marriages to clergy, judges and commissioners and deputy commissioners of civil marriage.

ACLU: The American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Michigan and the ACLU of Kansas and Western Missouri sent letters to public high schools today demanding that the schools stop viewpoint-based censorship of web content geared toward the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) communities. The ACLU was notified that the schools were censoring material after teaming with Yale Law School to launch the “Don’t Filter Me” campaign, which asked students to check to see if their school was blocking content

WLAJ.com: “It seeks to overturn a state law that permits law enforcement officials to remove a child from parents’ custody without proving the child is in immediate danger.”

ADF attorney Byron Babione appeared on the Mary Reichard Show to discuss this: Ark. Supreme Court showdown Thursday over law protecting adopted, foster children. | MP3 mins 8:15 mins

Fox News: An Alabama superintendent is denying allegations that a fifth-grade teacher and a librarian distributed Bibles during class at a public school, saying the claims are either “inaccurate or false.”

Times Daily: A parent is accusing staff members at Blue Springs Elementary School of violating the constitutional rights of students by distributing Bibles and avoiding lessons on evolution.