Posted: 9/26/2006 11:08:53 AM EDT
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Actually got this from www.volokh.com Apparently they were stifling free speech within the organization. [Jonathan Adler, September 26, 2006 at 8:55am] 2 Trackbacks / Possibly More Trackbacks "Save the ACLU" Campaign: A group of former American Civil Liberties Union officials, employees, and longtime supporters are caling for the ouster of the ACLU's current leadership and a renewed focuson the organization's founding principles. As the New York Times reports The new group is made up of donors, former board and staff members, and the lawyer who won what was perhaps the A.C.L.U.’s most famous legal battle, its defense of the right of Nazis to march through a predominantly Jewish suburb of Chicago. According to the missoin statement posted on the group's website, SavetheACLU.org: We believe strongly in the ACLU and believe the ACLU is especially important now during a time of grave and systemic attacks on civil liberties by the national government. But an ACLU compromised by its repeated failures to practice what it preaches will be unable to resist these attacks for long. Our credibility and effectiveness depend upon our consistency of principle. We come together now, reluctantly but resolutely, not to injure the ACLU but to restore its integrity, and its consistency of principle and remedy its failure to apply to itself core civil liberties principles that it insists everyone else observe. The failure to practice what we preach– until publicly embarrassed– has already done grievous injury to the ACLU and ultimately threatens its historic mission. We applaud the ACLU’s recent fundraising successes , but they cannot compensate for or justify persistent breaches of principle or the abandonment of honesty when those breaches are revealed. The ACLU now stands exposed, and widely ridiculed, for repeatedly acting in contempt of its own core principles, and for chilling and even attempting to prohibit dissent within its own ranks. Over the past three years, these breaches of principle include the ACLU’s approval of grant agreements that restrict speech and associational rights; efforts by management to impose gag rules on staff and to subject staff to email surveillance; a proposal to bar ACLU board members from publicly criticizing the ACLU; and informal campaigns to purge the ACLU of its internal critics. All of these breaches, as well as others, violate the ACLU’s historic commitment to free speech. We take little comfort from the fact that some were reversed after bad publicity and donor complaints. According to Ira Glasser, one of those listed on the protest site We’re not starting a new organization . . . “We’re a protest group, trying to get the board to exercise its fiduciary and governing responsibility in a way that it has not. We’re loyal to the existing organization and above all to the principles it is intended to advance. Learning about the ACLU's efforts to protect free speech, including their work in Skokie, inspired me as a child. As an adult, however, I've often felt that the organization had lost its way. Maybe this protest will serve as a useful corrective |
| There are what, 500,000 members of the ACLU? There are about 4 million members of the NRA and more in other groups. If over 500k hardcore gun owners joined the ACLU we could make them change their position on the 2nd amendment and turn them into a part of the gun lobby. |
I think they either have a poison pill clause or have elected an "Ayatollah"-like leader for life, like in Iran. But it is an intriguing idea, a hostile take-over of the ACLU. Maybe a movie.? |
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The ACLU itself is an okay, even admirable, organization. But the problem is that it's been hijacked by people with an agenda. It is, at the core, a libertarian organization - freedom for everyone. But it seems like it goes more to the left every year. They shy away from traditionally 'conservative' issues and focus more on 'liberal' issues. Basically what I'm trying to say is that the only reason I'm not a member is because the ACLU won't take a clear position on the 2nd Amendment. |
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Check out this fine example of ACLU hypocrisy. They oppose requiring national voter ID cards because: Reason #1: A national ID card system would not solve the problem that is inspiring it. Reason #2: An ID card system will lead to a slippery slope of surveillance and monitoring of citizens. Reason #3: A national ID card system would require creation of a database of all Americans Reason #4: ID cards would function as "internal passports" that monitor citizens' movements Reason #5: ID cards would foster new forms of discrimination and harassment Yet they are not opposed to national gun registration.  See www.aclu.org/privacy/gen/14898res20030908.html |
The ACLU doesn't "go more to the left every year." It started on the far left and has stayed there. The founder of the ACLU, Roger Baldwin, stated "Communism [was] the goal toward which his efforts were directed." Corliss Lamont, great-uncle of would be Ct. Senator Ned Lamont, ran the ACLU for 20 years while personally funding/organizing "The Friends of the Soviet Union." The ACLU has always been honest about their positions yet they're still defended as having noble goals. |
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Which brings me to my question:: Why is the liberal position not "every citizen who wants a gun and can afford that gun, should be able to get a gun, and use it in a responsible manner"? |
 I think they get stuck at "can afford that gun". They always want things equal.
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There are some hard-core biz owners on the NRA BoD. Several know more than a thing or two about hostile takeovers. I'd appoint one of them as the point person. |