Home : Racial Justice

Report: Turning a Blind Eye to Racial Discrimination in America
The government report failed to level with the international community about the U.S.'s human rights record when it comes to racial injustice. The ACLU's report details police brutality and racial profiling, voter disfranchisement and skyrocketing rates of incarceration, and wide, corrosive effects of racial discrimination.
> Report: Race & Ethnicity in America
> 12/10/2007: New ACLU Report Details Pervasive Racial Discrimination in America
> 6/13/2007: ACLU Calls State Department Report a "Complete Whitewash"

Audio: Human Rights Program Staff Attorney Chandra Bhatnagar talks about the CERD report with Tavis Smiley

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ACLU Fights to End Racial Inequity and Harshness in Cocaine Sentencing (10/26/2006) The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 established mandatory minimum sentencing policies that subject people who are low-level cocaine users to the same or harsher sentences as major dealers. The Act also established a 1-to-100 sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine, making the minimum sentence for 500 grams of powder cocaine - a more expensive drug primarily used by affluent whites - the same as that for just 5 grams of crack - a drug whose primary users are low-income people, many of whom are African American. This discrepancy remains although there is no medical basis for the difference, and despite repeated recommendations by the U.S. Sentencing Commission to Congress to reconsider the penalties. The ACLU is working to educate the public about these discrepancies and to change these racist and draconian drug policies. Read more at the website of the Drug Law Reform Project >>  A Blueprint for Meeting the Needs of Texas Girls in Custody Drawing on intensive on-site research, this report describes the conditions of confinement experienced by girls in the custody of the Texas Youth Commission (TYC). In TYC's massive juvenile prisons, a harsh regime of control and punishment not only fails to rehabilitate girls, but exacerbates past trauma and inflicts additional damage on confined children. Learn More >> Report: A Bond Forged in Struggle A Bond Forged in Struggle: The ACLU's Historic Alliance with African-Americans in the Quest for Racial Justice The report recounts the ACLU's ongoing efforts seeking racial equality in America. The ACLU’s decades-long racial justice docket has included victories in many important areas, from discrimination in housing, education and access to public services, to racial profiling and prisoners’ rights. Significant progress has been made, to be sure. But after Katrina’srains subsided, no one could deny that there was still much left to be done. > Report: A Bond Forged in Struggle: The ACLU's Historic Alliance with African-Americans in the Quest for Racial Justice

"Driving While Black" in Maryland ()
ACLU Lawsuits Against the Maryland State Police

Harris et al. v. Atlanta Independent School System (03/11/2008)
A class action lawsuit against the Atlanta Independent School System and Community Education Partners (CEP) for violating students’ constitutional right to an adequate public education.

Oklahoma Anti-Affirmative Action Initiative (03/07/2008)
A challenge in the Supreme Court of Oklahoma to the certification of signatures submitted in support of an anti-affirmative action initiative.

Missouri Anti-Affirmative Action Initiative (07/26/2007)
Challenges to the title and description of a misleading ballot initiative that seeks to ban affirmative action in Missouri. The cases were rendered moot when backers of the initiative failed to garner enough signatures to make it to the ballot.

Colorado Anti-Affirmative Action Initiative (07/16/2007)
A challenge to a misleading, far-reaching anti-equal opportunity measure in Colorado. The petition considered in this case is one of a series of anti-affirmative action initiatives being forwarded in 5 states for the fall of 2008, and is deceptively billed by its sponsors as a ban on "discrimination" and "preferences."

Sheff v. O'Neill (02/09/2007)
A groundbreaking school desegregation case in Hartford, Connecticut.

Cantrell v. Granholm (12/19/2006)
A federal judge dismissed this lawsuit, which challenged Michigan's Proposal 2. Prop 2 amended the state constitution to bar the consideration of race, sex, ethnicity or national origin in public education, employment and contracting, and has been cited as the basis for dismantling affirmative action and other race- and gender-conscious programs in public institutions throughout the state.

Antoine v. Winner School District (03/28/2006)
The ACLU recently settled this lawsuit, which alleged discrimination against Native American students in a mostly-white school district in South Dakota. The ACLU is now working with the community and the defendant school district to implement changes in the district's schools.