Three days ago I wrote about the ACLU backing the NRA’s lawsuit in NY because they figured the same tactic could be used on them down the pike. It seems some chapters and members are copacetic with the idea.
Within hours, the organizationwide listserv had lit up. Staffers at both the national office and state affiliates wrote back to register their frustration with Cole’s decision. The ACLU of New York sent out a statement on Monday explaining why it had declined to support the national office’s position. Some attorneys vigorously defended the group’s brief; others cautiously endorsed it, while complaining that its authors had failed to seek input from other stakeholders before committing to a contentious stance. Privately, some litigators fumed, concerned that the organization had needlessly tarnished its reputation by devoting limited resources to help the NRA, a formidable lobbying group with the means to defend itself.
“Tarnished its reputation.” They are afraid they are going to look bad, which seems to be more important than being on the side of the Bill of Rights. Some inside the ACLU may be thinking that the NRA is worse than the Neo-Nazis because they fought for their First Amendment rights in Skokie.
If they continue down the path of only taking cases that are “pretty” (read approved by the Lefty overseers) they will end up being a beautiful and useless legal corpse.
Hat Tip Rob R.
I got on some blogger lawyer’s nerves the other day. He was bemoaning how the ACLU wasn’t supporting First Amendment issues in political speech.
I said that, as a gun owner, I’m more than familiar with the ACLU being mighty selective about the civil liberties it cares to support and that anyone who had observed how it treated the Second Amendment over the years (decades) shouldn’t be a bit surprised that the ACLU has no problem with censorship of points of view it doesn’t like. He got all huffy and conjured the specter of Skokie. I asked him if, had the Skokie marchers been NRA members, the ACLU would have spent a single minute thinking before rejecting their case.
He didn’t have a good answer for that.