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Supreme Court Rules Connecticut Firefighters Unfairly Denied Promotions Because of Race (6/29/2009)
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the city of New Haven, Connecticut wrongly threw out a promotion examination for the city's firefighters, saying there was not sufficient evidence that the exam's impact on minorities violated the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
> Press Release
ACLU Halts Fraudulent Anti-Affirmative Action Ballot Initiative (6/27/2009)
A Missouri circuit court judge late Friday struck down a proposed ballot initiative aimed at amending the state's constitution to outlaw equal opportunity programs in the state. The American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit last December charging that an anti-affirmative action ballot initiative proposed by Timothy Asher and the Missouri Civil Rights Initiative should not be circulated for signatures because it violates the Missouri Constitution by seeking to trick and defraud the state's voters in attempting to ban an array of equal opportunity programs.
> Press Release ACLU Contributes to Website Aiming to Ensure Equitable Economic Recovery
The American Civil Liberties Union Racial Justice Program is pleased to announce the launch of an invaluable new website - www.fairrecovery.org - to help citizens, civil rights advocates and policy makers assure an equitable and fair recovery. The website provides a series of tools and resources that map the uneven impact of the economic crisis on marginalized groups and communities and helps advocates promote an equitable recovery. The ACLU has contributed legal memoranda to the website, which show that policy makers can distribute stimulus funds in ways that account for existing racial inequalities without infringing on constitutional rights.
> Fair Recovery Website
> For a brief explanation and walk-through of the website, visit the Webinar (only your name is required to login)
State Department Agrees to Fair Issuance of Passports to Mexican Americans (6/26/2009)
The U.S. Department of State (DOS) has agreed to implement new procedures designed to ensure the fair and prompt review of U.S. passport applications by Mexican Americans whose births in Texas were attended by midwives. Under the agreement, no eligible applicant should be denied a passport.
> Press Release
ACLU Files Lawsuit Charging Police and School Officials In Mississippi with Racial Discrimination and Excessive Force Against School-Children (4/9/2009)
The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Mississippi has filed a federal civil rights lawsuit charging Southaven, Mississippi police and DeSoto County school officials with assaulting and racial discriminating against a group of school-children riding home from school on a school bus. The bus's video camera captured footage of two officers responding to a verbal argument between three students by arresting half a dozen black students, choking and tackling a black female student when said she would be calling her mother, and threatening to shoot the 30 students on the bus between the eyes.
> Press Release
> Complaint ACLU Report Reveals Breakdown In Mississippi Alternative Schools
Alternative schools in Mississippi are not adequately helping struggling students to succeed academically, leaving too many of the state's children to drift toward dropout and failure, according to a new American Civil Liberties Union report.
> Press Release
> Report: "Missing the Mark: Alternative Schools in the State of Mississippi"
Juvenile Justice System Failing Ohio's Children, Investigation Finds (2/10/2009)
A report card issued by the the ACLU, ACLU of Ohio, Children's Law Center, Inc. and the Office of the Ohio Public Defender, finds that the Ohio juvenile justice system is failing the state's children by permitting children to be routinely shackled, mandating that children accused of certain crimes be charged as adults and by not ensuring that all children accused of crimes get lawyers.
> Report Card: Evaluating Juvenile Justice in Ohio
> Press Release ACLU Report Reveals Arrests At Hartford-Area Schools On Rise
A recently released report by the ACLU and its affiliate, the ACLU of Connecticut, has brought to site the unusual number of police arrests of children in the Hartford area. According to this new study, the trend is one that disproportionately impacts children of color. The report shows how the use by school districts in Hartford, East Hartford and West Hartford of school resource officers who are not adequately trained and whose objectives are not clearly defined leads to the criminalization of students at the expense of their education.
> Report: Hard Lessons: School Resource Officer Programs and School-Based Arrests in Three Connecticut Towns
> Audio: ACLU Attorney Jamie Dycus on WNPR-CBPN
> Hartford Courant Coverage Nov. 18, 2008
> Hartford Courant Coverage Nov. 29, 2008
> New York Times Coverage Jan. 5 2009 NYCLU, ACLU Warn NYPD about Illegal Arrests of Schoolchildren (10/8/2008)
The New York Civil Liberties Union and the American Civil Liberties Union have demanded that NYPD Commissioner Raymond Kelly immediately end the unlawful practice of arresting children in New York City public schools who have not committed crimes.
> Press Release
> School-to-Prison-Pipeline ACLU Challenges State Department's Refusal To Issue Passports To U.S. Citizens (9/9/2008)
The ACLU, the ACLU of Texas and cooperating attorneys have sued the federal government on behalf of nine American citizens who have had their applications for U.S. passports denied because of their race and ancestry and because their births were attended to by midwives.
> Press Release
> Podcasts and Other Materials Locking Up Our Children: ACLU Issues Report on Unjust Detention of Youth in Massachusetts (5/12/2008)
A widespread practice in Massachusetts of locking up youth accused of minor offenses and who pose little or no danger to their communities is unfair, threatens public safety and wastes public money, according to a report released in May 2008 by the ACLU and the ACLU of Massachusetts. The report documents the use of detention by state judges as a rehabilitative tool to frighten youth never convicted of wrongdoing. The report also addresses the woeful lack of placement availability in the state's child welfare and mental health systems that leave detention as the only viable option for youth who cannot safely be returned to their homes. Locking Up Our Children is a follow-up report to a 2003 report by the ACLU, which documented the disproportionate representation of youth of color in Massachusett's juvenile justice system. New Agreement in Hartford Desegregation Case (4/4/2008)
The ACLU, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, the Center for Children's Advocacy and cooperating attorneys have struck an agreement with the state of Connecticut to implement compliance with a longstanding order from the state Supreme Court to desegregate Hartford public schools. The agreement, the latest stage in the case of Sheff v. O'Neill, for the first time requires the state to create a detailed roadmap to follow in its effort to end the racial segregation faced by Hartford's minority schoolchildren. The settlement has been approved by the Connecticut legislature and awaits approval by the judge in the case.
> ACLU Press Release
> The Hartford Courant 's call to actionSchooltoPrison.org
If you are a legal advocate working on challenges to the school-to-prison pipeline, please visit SchooltoPrison.org, sponsored by the ACLU Racial Justice Program and several of our allies.
Visit SchooltoPrison.org > > |
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ACLU Sues Over Failed Privately-Run Alternative School In Atlanta (3/11/2008)
The ACLU filed a class action lawsuit against the Atlanta Independent School System and Community Education Partners for violating students' constitutional right to an adequate public education. CEP is a for-profit corporation paid nearly $7 million a year by the city to run its alternative school, which is among the most dangerous and lowest performing schools in Georgia.
> More About Harris et al. v. Atlanta Independent School System
> More About the Kids At Risk | 
