My top priority
when I first got to the national ACLU, I
thought,
was going to be racial justice.
Mr. Ira Glasser, head of the American
Civil Liberties Union. What years?
'78 to 2001. Throughout its existence, the
American Civil Liberties Union has
defended
unpopular causes. Actually, my top
priority turned out to be
organizational survival. American Nazi
Party leader Frank Collin has been trying
to hold a march through the streets of
Skokie, Illinois.
The ACLU is supposed to defend the free
speech of Nazis.
The reaction of the Holocaust survivors
was very understandable.
It brought up all our pains,
all our losses of the families.
We can do it. This is only a beginning.
You would defend it again
today if you had to? Yes. The First
Amendment
is what permits people to organize for
social justice goals.
Surely, Charlottesville is a lot like
Skokie.
White supremacists were looking for a
way to flex their muscles. It highlighted
the issue of:
Why would you ever want to defend the
rights of people
like that? We cannot forget history.
We cannot forget what our leaders, our
mentors, and champions
did for society. The tide of liberty and
individual rights and
equal justice is clearly with us,
but only if we keep swimming.
Thank you.
