Civil Liberties -The ACLU Cashing In.

[Eamonn]

The ACLU is alive and well and making money. Yes the ACLU is profiting in such cases as those against the Boy Scouts, the Mojave Desert Veterans Memorial and every public expression of America's religious history and heritage.

They are making millions of dollars in taxpayer-paid "attorney fee awards" authorized under the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S. Code Sec. 1988.

While the law was paved with good intentions - to ensure legitimate victims of civil-rights violations could obtain representation - it has been exploited by the ACLU in First Amendment "establishment of religion clause" cases in which there are, in fact, no attorney fees incurred by the ACLU or its plaintiffs, who appear to be "mascot plaintiffs" with de minimis claims like "Oh my God, I saw a cross!"

 

Elected and appointed officials at the local, state and federal levels have been literally terrorized from standing up to the ACLU in fear of enormous attorney fees being imposed by unelected judges not answerable to the taxpayers. As far as is known, not a single American judge has had the courage to exercise discretion to deny attorney fees to the ACLU under 42 U.S. Code 1988, which is the sole authority for awarding attorney fees.

 

Delegates at the National Convention 2004 unanimously adopted Resolution 326, "Preservation of the Mojave Desert Veterans Memorial," which calls on Congress to amend the law and end judges' authority to award attorney fees in cases brought "to remove or destroy religious symbols."

 

The Department of California sponsored Resolution 326 after a federal court in Riverside, Calif., for the first time allowed the ACLU to pursue a precedent-setting lawsuit to remove a solitary cross at what is now the Mojave Desert Veterans Memorial.

 

That case, Buono v. Norton, illustrates the ACLU's fanaticism and disrespect for veterans, and it exposes the threat of further legal attacks on veterans' memorials by the ACLU or others.

 

In 1934, a private citizen strapped two pipes together to form a cross and mounted it on a rock outcrop in a remote, privately owned area of the Mojave Desert. The purpose was to honor the service of World War I veterans. President Clinton, as one of his last acts, issued an executive order incorporating the area in the Mojave National Preserve. The ACLU seized on that fact to file a federal suit to remove the cross in 2000. A district court ruled for the ACLU and awarded it more than $40,000 in attorney fees.

 

Veterans protested, and Rep. Jerry Lewis, R-Calif., who represents the area, achieved legislation officially establishing the site as the Mojave Desert Veterans Memorial. The legislation authorized an exchange of the 1-acre site for five acres from a private owner, placing the memorial on private land.

 

However, that did not satisfy the fanatical ACLU. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals held the case was "not moot" because the land exchange, although legislatively authorized, was not complete. Further, the court found the lead plaintiff - the first and sole remaining plaintiff - had legal standing to complain of civil-rights injury.

 

The lead plaintiff, Frank Buono, is a retired Forest Service employee who later moved to Oregon, but claims civil-rights violation and injury because he sees the cross when driving back on visits. ACLU's attorney fee award for representing him was increased to $63,000.

 

Upon such de minimis dross as this is constitutional law being made by judges, and the ACLU is profiting financially, at taxpayer expense.

 

They're still at it. The ACLU filed a motion in District Court in December to declare the land exchange unconstitutional, claiming it doesn't comply with the spirit of the injunction.

 

Other examples of ACLU abuse are multiple, nationwide and glaring:

 

- The ACLU reaped some $940,000 in settlement from the City of San Diego when it surrendered in ACLU's litigation to kick the Boy Scouts out of Balboa Park. The Boy Scouts are appealing. The American Legion has filed a friend-of-the-court brief supporting the Scouts. - The ACLU received some $500,000 to drive the Ten Commandments out of the courthouse of Alabama Judge Roy Moore, notwithstanding the fact that the same Ten Commandments are on the massive doors and the wall of the U.S. Supreme Court itself. -Portland Public Schools were ordered to pay the ACLU $108,000 in a case brought for an atheist who objected to the Boy Scouts being allowed to recruit during non-class time.

I have to wonder what comes first money or civil liberties? $50,000 per Commandment!!

Eamonn.

 

[FScouter]

Yeah, I'll bet most people don't realize the ACLU is funded by the taxpayers.

[Proud Eagle]

The ACLU has chosen to wage a war. It is a war opposed by most of the nations people. It is a war that causes more and more of the nation to question the motives and intentions of the ACLU. It is a war that causes many to see the ACLU as an enemy.

 

It is inevitable that there will be a back-lash against the ACLU. It is only a matter of exactly when it happens, what sets it off, and how severe it will be. The ACLU's actions are also serving as the greatest single energizer of the conservative/traditional groups that support the appointment of "originalist" or "strict constructionist" judges. In the end this may very well lead to changes in both the elected halls of goverment and in the appointed jurists on the bench.

 

It is quite possible that the ACLU will manage to defeat itself, as long as people keeping showing how nutty some of these ACLU cases are. It may take a generation, but the courts can be changed. And if it comes to it, so to can the Constitution. Note to ACLU members: this requires passing and ratifying an amendment, not convincing the court that the EU has had a shift of opinion. By bringing in such farcical evidence as the opinions of foreign courts (based on foreign laws), polling data, and other non-Constitutional sources various parties to various legal cases have managed to do more to end the Rule of Law in this country than just about anyone else, except the judges that were willing to side with them. Can anyone really make an intellectually honest argument for the inclusion of the opinions of EU or African court opinions, or of polling data, in the decisions of a US court?

 

Oh, as to this particular case, the ACLU screwed it up big time (and the court more so for siding with them). They should have challenged the original govt take over of this site. After all, it is clear the govt aquired control of this property only so it could maintain this monument. So that was the actual violation of the seperation of church and state, if you believe in such a thing. The correct path would be to rule the govt take over of the property was invalid and find some way of disposing of the property, such as returning it to its previous owner, if possible. Taking down the display in no way supports the free excersise of religion, and in fact greatly infringes upon it. After all, if that were allowed to stand, a local govt could use immenent domain to take over a local religious shrine to "preserve it" and then conveniently be forced to remove all religious displays from the property. This is a hostile act toward religion and speech as it terminates a current free excersise of religion and creates a zone that cannot be used for a certain type of speech (if burning a flag is speech, then building a monument certainly would be). If govt cannot have religious displays on its land, that essentially sets up the govt as the enemy of religion. After all, that would mean every acre of govt land would be one less acre available for excercising religious freedoms now and in the future. We can not survive as a nation if the secular and the sacred in our country are forced to war against one another. That would destroy us utterly and completely as a people. Yet that is the very circumstance being set up by certain radical activists and irresponsible judges.

 

The ACLU must shurely be able to find a way of preserving constitutional liberties without destroying the nation built on those liberties.

[Merlyn_LeRoy]

Hey Eamonn, either your real name is Rees Lloyd, or you just plagiarized his rant from American Legion magazine without giving any indication that you were quoting someone else.

[NJCubScouter]

Oh no, not again.

 

Haven't I dealt with this before in this forum?

 

The important fact that is missing from the article Eamonn quoted (since I think Eamonn's heart is always in the right place, I will pretend that he did mention that this was an article written by someone else), is that a plaintiff in a "civil rights" case is entitled to legal fees only if he/she wins the case. The real issue that the writer of this article has is that he does not like the judicial decisions that are being made on the cases themselves. (ProudEagle at least acknowledges that the issue is with the judiciary, though I of course believe that many (not all) of the judicial decisions in question are correct, but that would be another thread.)

 

But I guess it must get tiresome to attack the judiciary all the time, so let's pick on the ACLU, right? Yes, the ACLU is a large organization, but as I have pointed out before, there are "legal advocacy" organizations on all sides of the political and ideological spectrum. Some taxpayers do, indirectly, help fund it. These would be taxpayers of government entities (including the U.S.) who, in particular cases, are found to have violated someone's constitutional rights (called, in the statute, "civil rights," which I am sure confuses some people, it confused me at first.) So in other words, if you do not want your government to have to pay legal fees to successful plaintiffs in civil/constitutional rights cases, then you need to prevail upon your government not to violate peoples' rights. (Or, appoint only judges who will allow peoples' constitutional rights to be violated, which seems to be the political trend these days, but I prefer my way.)

[evmori]

Actually the real truth is the ACLU has only itself interest at heart! Not the interest of the American public. The ACLU is neither American or for civil liberties!

 

Merlyn,

You complaining about Eamonn not posting the real author of his post is funny! Now back to your list editing!

 

Ed Mori

Troop 1

1 Peter 4:10

[packsaddle]

There is a simple way to completely end this source of funding to the ACLU...Stop Breaking the Law!

[Eamonn]

I thought I had pasted the link at the top.

The shock of the amounts awarded must have got to me!!

Eamonn.

[evmori]

What laws have been broken?

[FScouter]

Uh - that would be "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof ...", also known as the first amendment of the Constitution.

 

It's a no-no for the government to blatantly establish a national religion like that. They should be ashamed. The National Park Service broke that law when it accepted ownership of that pipe cross for war veterans. That guy from Oregon doesn't like the government forcing him to follow the new government religion.

 

Thank God the ACLU is there to protect the citizenry.

[Hunt]

I've defended the ACLU elsewhere, but now I feel like criticizing them.

Like a lot of people who are zealous about certain causes, the ACLU sometimes lacks a sense of proportion (and strategy) when it chooses causes to pursue. This "solitary cross" is a good example. While the ACLU is almost certainly right as a legal matter that this cross must be removed under established precedents, the publicity from the case is so bad that it probably sets back the broader goals of the ACLU more than it advances them.

Also, there is no question that the ACLU is politically liberal, and that it cares more about certain rights than others--it's championing of the Dale case is a prime example--in that case, the ACLU really should have been defending the right of free association, rather than defending a state's power to control the membership requirements of a private organization. I think it did what it did there, however, because it is strongly influenced by gay rights supporters.

I do think that there is a danger that the ACLU will "defeat itself" if it pushes too far beyond what the great majority of Americans will accept. They could actually help get more conservative judges named to the Supreme Court, who might cut back on all our rights. That would really be a defeat.

[evmori]

How is the government establishing a national religion? A cross isn't exclusive to any one religion!

 

Ed Mori

Troop 1

1 Peter 4:10(This message has been edited by evmori)

[berkshirescouter]

Ed

 

Sorry to disagree but a cross exludes Judism and Islam among others. In this case I would have left the cross there and I'm Jewish.

 

Paul

[molscouter]

From the ACLU website:

 

"The ACLU is supported by annual dues and contributions from its members, plus grants from private foundations and individuals. We do not receive any government funding."

 

So if the ACLU is funded as they say they are, they shouldn't need to receive any attorney's fees. For those that argue that it is only the overhead budget that is funded as outlined above, it would be interesting to see what, if any, portion of this "non-profit" group's budget comes from attorney's fees. I'd be willing to bet that they would be less than anxious to have their books audited.

[firstpusk]

molscouter,

 

By looking at the 2004 annual report, it seems clear that the entity referred to as the ACLU has expenses for Public Education & Mobilization, Affiliate Distribution, Fundraising & Management and Lobbying & Public Policy Formation. It is a 501©4. It is a membership, outreach and lobbying organization and does not conduct litigation.

 

The ACLU Foundation on the other hand had 34% of its expenses going to litigation. Net legal awards amounts to a little less than 3.5% of the ACLU foundation income. It seems obvious that the money garnered from attorney fees and other awards would largely offset expenses incurred by the foundation. The foundation is a 501©3 tax deductible organization.

 

It seems you are mixing apples and oranges. The two organizations are set up to deal with separate issues and have different methods of funding as a result. I am not sure where you get the notion that the ACLU would not be audited. However, I have noted that many scouters here like to assume the worst about the organization because they don't like some of the cases that they have taken on and often won. Do you have information indicating that either organization refuses to have an audit done or are you just casting aspersions like a few of my other fellow scouters.