The American Civil Liberties Union is a non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to protecting the rights of citizens under the U.S. Constitution. Founded in 1920, the organization now has about 500,000 members and a budget of over $100 million. The ACLU is now the largest public interest organization in the United States, with 50 autonomous chapters throughout the country. This organization has litigated and defended the rights of citizens before the U.S. Supreme Court more than any other similar organization. About 100 full-time lawyers working in a network of more than 2,000 volunteer attorneys handle more than 6,000 court appeals concerning violations of citizens’ rights. The organization also lobbies for board-determined policies, namely: advocating abolition of the death penalty, supporting same-sex marriage and adoption rights, birth control and abortion rights, eliminating discrimination against women, minorities and LGBT, protecting prisoner rights, opposing torture in prisons, supporting the right of religious people to practice their religion without government interference, criticizing the dominance of one denomination over another.

During World War I, the United States feared the spread of the Communist revolution to the West. And as is often the case in such cases, the rights of some citizens had to be sacrificed. In November 1919, the “Palmer Raids” began, when thousands of citizens were deported from the country because of their political views. Their apartments and homes were illegally searched and they themselves were groundlessly accused of radical views. Those who were not deported were kept in prisons and interrogation rooms. It was during this time of egregious violations of human freedoms that the American Civil Liberties Union was founded by a small group of enthusiasts.

In 1925, the organization was involved in a lawsuit in Tennessee that passed a law banning the teaching of evolution and where creationism was taught exclusively in schools. This trial was nationally known and highlighted the importance of academic freedom.

After the attack on Pearl Harbor, the United States began to persecute Japanese Americans and only the ACLU stood up for them and stopped the atrocities of a government that had sent more than 110,000 Japanese Americans to internment camps.

In 1954 the ACLU along with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) fought against racial segregation in public schools and participated in Brown v. Board of Education.

In 1978, the organization had to prove to the American people that constitutional rights were equal for all, even though they could be used by the worst kind of racists and criminals. The point was that the Nationalist Group wanted to hold its march in one Chicago suburb, Skokie, where a large number of Holocaust survivors lived. The NAACP secured permission to hold the march, taking the case to federal court.

And after September 11, 2001 and the terrorist attacks, the organization had to fight the government’s spying on its citizens, and defending citizens who had been arbitrarily declared terrorists by the authorities and convicted without due process of law.

Activists in the organization are still defending minority rights and believe that the fight to protect rights will never end. The American Civil Liberties Union is dedicated to defending the constitutional rights and freedoms of United States citizens.