News & Commentary

Fans of free speech can breathe a sigh of relief, as the State of Michigan has backed off of an unconstitutional policy preventing sitting U.S. Representative John Conyers from being on the August ballot. This comes as a victory for many who felt that the removal of Rep. Conyers from the ballot was unfair and a hindrance to the right of everyone to participate in the political process. This entire debacle stems from a heated situation in which hundreds of signatures that petitioners collected for Conyers’ re-election campaign were invalidated on the grounds that several of the petition circulators were not registered voters required by a Michigan statute. There is no practical need to restrict petition circulators to registered voters and doing so only serves to curb our free speech. The foundation of our political system is rooted in the need for open political processes and communication. An essential part of our political process is that everyone has the ability to be heard. Thankfully, however, Federal Judge Leitman ruled in favor of allowing John Conyers onto the August Primary ballot.  Happily, the state announced that “...based on the facts of the judge's order, the state has decided not to appeal in the Conyers case.” Here at the ACLU of Michigan, we're dedicated to the idea that everyone should have a fair and equal say in government. Hooray for another victory for open communication in politics! James Hendrikson, ACLU of Michigan Intern

Coming home to Detroit after my first year in college at Tufts University near Boston has been made all the more insightful and interesting by having the opportunity to work at the ACLU of Michigan. In my first week here as a Communications Intern, I have been overwhelmed in the best possible way by all of the amazing work being done that remains critical in the fight to protect civil liberties and preserve democracy for all of us. I’d be remiss to pretend as though I was at all aware of the legal battles being fought across the state or what their significance is to the lives of every Michigander… and even at the end of stint here come mid-August, I doubt I will have done much more than scratched the surface of a truly inimitable organization. That said, I hope to document my journey here taking into account not only my unique perspective but more so the common perception of what it is the ACLU actually does, and perhaps more critically: why? I’ll be sharing blogs, photos, legislative snapshots and updates on important work being done by incredible people here at the ACLU of Michigan, all flavored with who I am and what I hope to gain (and give) during my time here. To start this endeavor off, I thought I’d share a few things about myself and what has brought me here to the ACLU, as well as what I’ve managed to digest thus far!

When the rights of one group are threatened by government intrusion, all our rights are in peril.

The Oakland County Sheriff’s Office recently became the first in Michigan to purchase a Hailstorm device, an incredibly powerful surveillance tool typically used by the NSA and CIA which allows police to routinely spy on thousands of people without them ever knowing.

“Substantial staffing reductions.”

When the ACLU of Michigan Flint Branch held a panel discussion on emergency management last week, activist Claire McClinton pointed out that the event was being held at a site where autoworkers staged a landmark sit-down strike in the 1930s. That action – with workers asserting their rights and making sure their voices were heard – proved to be a pivotal moment in the history of organized labor. In fact, it can be argued that what those union members did went even further than that, helping to strengthen American democracy by increasing the collective clout of the working class and providing a much-needed balance to corporate power. So there’s no small amount of irony in the fact that Flint is now part of what can be called an experiment in anti-democracy. Read the whole blog over at Democracy Watch.

There are many individuals and groups in Michigan who lost as a result of yesterday's United States Supreme Court decision in Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action.Schuette is widely misunderstood as being a case about affirmative action. It is not. In fact, it leaves in place Supreme Court law recognizing diversity as a compelling governmental interest and permitting carefully constructed affirmative action programs. Today's decision has no effect on states that want to adopt or maintain affirmative action plans.The policies banned by Proposal 2, a 2006 Michigan ballot initiative that led to a state constitutional ban on race-conscious college admissions policies, were all constitutionally permissible. None involved quotas or singling out race over other factors contributing to a diverse student body. Rather, this case is about civic participation for all.The question is not whether universities in the state must implement race-conscious admissions policies. Only whether those who want to take policies that promote racial diversity into consideration along with other diversity factors – that benefit everyone – can compete on the same playing field as other groups advocating for admissions policies that matter to them.And that is where the losses come in.Applicants to schools in Michigan who believed that they should be able to ask schools to consider race as one factor in their admission lost.Even though other students that had alumni parents or grandparents or relatives that made large donations to the school can continue to argue that family giving should be considered in the admissions policy.Potential students who hail from Buford, Wyoming, or other geographically isolated locations will likewise continue to have the opportunity to say that factor should be considered for admission to Michigan universities.University officials who, following the instruction of the Supreme Court, decided that diversity served important educational interests and put together carefully crafted programs to ensure diversity existed lost.Students who valued the opportunity to learn in the rich educational environment created by real diversity and sought to be prepared to live in a diverse business and social world lost.Citizens who believed that educational institutions should reflect the diversity of their state and prepare all of its citizens to assume leadership roles in their state lost.And, in a very real sense, everyone including those of us outside of Michigan lost as the Supreme Court placed one more obstacle in the path of people seeking, as Justice Sotomayor so movingly put it, "to participate meaningfully and equally in self-government."Fortunately, these losses are confined to the relatively few states that have enacted total bans on consideration of race in governmental decision making. Today's case is an opportunity for those states to reassess those bans, to take note of the dramatic loss of qualified students of color in their schools and the resulting loss of diversity, and to consider repealing the ill-considered bans.While a setback for Michigan, affirmative action remains alive and well in many other places across the country. For the states that still allow affirmative action policies, today is an important reminder that although the Supreme Court did not go so far as international law which requires the use of fair consideration of race, it does clearly permit it.Instead of supporting initiatives that rig the game against people who were traditionally excluded, those states should take every step to enact practices which further the diversity which benefits us all.By Dennis Parker, Director of the ACLU Racial Justice Program

Terribly important civil rights work can be terribly upsetting, I’ve found. When I signed on to be a student in the Wayne Law Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Clinic with the ACLU of Michigan, I had no idea that fighting against the injustices of our world would mean submerging myself in a sea of injustices and swimming around. Upon starting at the ACLU of Michigan, I learned about Allison Ben, a pregnant single mother being evicted for being a victim of domestic violence. I immediately jumped at the chance to help her. Though we worked feverishly on her case, Inkster Housing resolutely refused to dismiss her eviction while her abuser grew more and more determined to terrorize and control her. Over the last few months while I’ve worked with Allison, I’ve had some dark days, days where all that work sometimes seemed to make so little difference in her life. I confess that I felt my hope for society waning, slowly but surely.

I've been happily married for nearly 33 years. I know first-hand how much marriage can mean to a couple and their children, and it has hurt me to see other loving couples barred from sharing the same joys and sorrows. I’m ecstatic that I've been part of the legal team which has opened the door to marriage for all loving couples in our state. This struggle is far from over. In the weeks and months ahead, we'll need everyone's support to ensure that the clock isn't turned back on our progress. Michigan’s Attorney General has already appealed the victory.  The fight will be long, hard and expensive. You can be a part of history by supporting the litigation through your donation. When we first brought this case just two years ago, it was about April and Jayne’s right to adopt each other’s children. We never imagined that the case would turn into a challenge to Michigan’s discriminatory marriage amendment.  Sometimes, things can change fast. First the judge invited us to expand the case to include a challenge to the Michigan Marriage Amendment. Then he decided that the issues in the case were important enough that there should be a full trial – the first marriage equality case to go to trial since California's ban was ruled unconstitutional – and he agreed to expedite the trial date. When the trial started on February 25, though, we were ready. All of our witnesses were at the top of their field. As Judge Friedman found, the State’s witnesses were part of a "fringe" group.  The legal question was whether sexual orientation was a valid reason for denying full equality to some of those couples, and Judge Friedman has answered with a resounding “no”! Reading Judge Friedman’s landmark decision was an exhilarating experience. He heard our message and speaks in stirring language, pointing out that the protections, joy and dignity of marriage are the right of all Michiganders. All couples have the right to love one another, make a commitment to one another and decide together whether to form a family. As excited as we are about this victory, this struggle is far from over. Depending on what happens, this case could end where it is now, at the federal appeals court in Cincinnati, or it could possibly end up in the U.S. Supreme Court.  We’re going to keep fighting to protect April and Jayne and their children for as long as it takes, but we need your help. Talk about the case with your friends, keep sending us your good wishes and consider giving the fight your financial support. We’ve made it this far with the help of many generous donors, and we’re going to need a lot of help again as we defend this win on appeal. This has been a truly amazing case to be involved in. It has been wonderful working with and getting to know April and Jayne, and I have heard touching stories from many folks about how this case is affecting them, their friends, relatives or co-workers. We have also seen first-hand how public opinion in Michigan is shifting right before our eyes. With the support of amazing friends across our state, we hope this is the last time loving couples like April and Jayne have to prove that they are the same as any other couple. To talk about the sweeping changes we've seen in the last decade and look at some upcoming challenges, we're talking about Marriage Matters. This series of blogs deals with the history of the fight for LGBT rights and takes an in-depth look at the DeBoer case, which could impact marriage equality in Michigan and beyond.