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Leading cause
In November 1919 and January 1920 known as the “Palmer Raids,” Attorney General Mitchell Palmer began rounding up and deporting so-called radicals. Thousands of people were arrested without warrants and without regard to constitutional protections against unlawful search and seizure. Those arrested were brutally treated and held in horrible conditions. https://www.aclu.org/about/aclu-history -
Establishment
Because of these events, the ACLU was formed shortly after WW1 ended -
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ACLU History
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Scopes Trial of 1925
After the state of Tennessee passed a law banning the teaching of evolution in schools, John T. Scopes challenged the law by teaching evolution to his students. After he was prosecuted, the ACLU partnered with attorney general Clarence Darrow to defend him. Though eventually Scopes was found guilty, the trial made national headlines and helped persuade the public on the importance of academic freedom. -
Japanese Americans denied rights
Shortly after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, President Franklin Roosevelt ordered all people of Japanese descent, most of whom were American citizens, be sent to war relocation camps.Eventually, more than 110,000 Japanese Americans were sent to these internment camps. The ACLU, led by its California affiliates, stood alone in speaking out about this atrocity. https://www.aclu.org/about/aclu-history -
Combating against racial discrimination
The ACLU joined forces with the NAACP to challenge racial segregation in public schools. The resulting Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education that ended the era of “separate but equal” was a major victory for racial justice. -
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 -
Taking a stand for free speech on Stokie
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 it has come to represent our unwavering commitment to principle. -
Internet Free Speech
In ACLU v. Reno, the Supreme Court struck down the 1996 Communications Decency Act, which censored the Internet by broadly banning "indecent" speech. Since then, Congress has passed numerous versions of the Child Online Protection Act (COPA), a federal law that would criminalize constitutionally protected speech on the Internet. Each time the law has been challenged by the ACLU and declared unconstitutional. https://www.aclu.org/about/aclu-history -
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. https://www.aclu.org/about/aclu-history -
Protecting the right to privacy
In Safford Unified School District v. Redding, the Supreme Court ruled that school officials violated the constitutional rights of a 13-year-old Arizona girl when they strip searched her based on a classmate's uncorroborated accusation. https://www.aclu.org/about/aclu-history
