ACLU President to Speak on "The 1st Amendment: Why It's First" at CWU
To kick off Central Washington University's year-long First Amendment Festival, ACLU President Nadine Strossen will spell out why the five freedoms guaranteed in the First Amendment are indeed first in a speech Oct. 11.
"As the Supreme Court has often said, the First Amendment is the prerequisite for the exercise and enjoyment of every other right," said Strossen, president of the American Civil Liberties Union. "If we don't have freedoms of speech, press, religion, petition and assembly, we cannot seek change to bring about civil rights, women's rights, lesbian and gay rights, we can't protect religious minorities, laborers can't organize."
Strossen, the first woman to head the nation's largest and oldest civil liberties organization, has been the president since 1992. After her remarks, Strossen will take questions and comments from the audience.
"I'm looking forward to having a dialogue with people about controversial First Amendment issues where there's a lot of disagreement and I think misunderstanding," Strossen said. "While there's never going to be total agreement on specifics, I really think on the principles there's so much more common ground than people know."
Since its founding in 1920, the ACLU has been on the front lines of some of the most important - and most controversial - First Amendment cases in U.S. history. Flag burning, school prayer, intelligent design, campaign spending limits and internet pornography are just a handful of the cases the ACLU has tackled, often drawing ire from both sides of the political aisle.
Because the two religious clauses in the First Amendment are so controversial, Strossen said she plans to spend a good portion of her remarks at Central helping to explain and clarify the ACLU's stance. She said she'll also spend some time talking about how the Bush Administration's "war on terrorism" is eroding the First Amendment and America's long history of providing its citizens with basic civil liberties.
"The first freedoms in the First Amendment are the religious freedoms and the very first one is the separation of church and state," Strossen said. "It's probably the most controversial and the least understood.....in part because of so much political pandering that if you're for separation of church and state you're against religion. That's not the case."
To uphold the First Amendment's call that "Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion," the ACLU has sued to get the Ten Commandments removed from publicly funded courthouses, to make sure prayer in public schools is a private choice, and to keep "intelligent design" from being taught as scientific theory alongside evolution in public schools.
Those battles have prompted some religious conservatives to brand the group the Anti-Christian Liberties Organization, Strossen admits. But she stressed that the ACLU's fights against religion in the public square shouldn't be interpreted as antagonism toward religion in general. In numerous cases, she said, the ACLU has also sued on behalf of Christians, Jews & Muslims who've claimed their First Amendment right to practice their religion freely has somehow been infringed.
The ACLU is active on the First Amendment's other freedoms as well. Last month, U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor ruled in the ACLU's favor in its suit challenging the Bush Administration's domestic spying program, saying the program violated the First and Fourth Amendments. In mid-September, the city of Seattle agreed to pay a $75,000 settlement to two protesters during the World Trade Organization meetings in a suit backed by the ACLU. And earlier this summer, the U.S. Senate narrowly defeated a constitutional amendment to ban flag desecration; the ACLU's campaign against the amendment is credited by its opponents and blamed by its backers for the amendment's failure.
And whether it's neo-Nazis or anti-abortion protesters, the ACLU has backed their right to protest peaceably. "We neutrally defend fundamental freedoms for all people," Strossen said. "No matter who you are or what you believe or what groups you belong to, there are going to be some issues that are important to you that the ACLU would defend, and no matter where you are, there are going to be some areas in which you strongly disagree with the ACLU. It's important for people to see the overlap as well as the disagreement."
Strossen's speech at Central is the keynote address in the university's 2006-2007
First Amendment Festival. Other events in the festival include a screening of the Steve Anderson documentary
"F*CK: The movie that dare not speak its name," as part of the
Ellensburg Film Festival on Oct. 7. On Oct. 17, hip hop pioneer
Chuck D, founder of
Public Enemy, which has fought many a censorship battle, and
MC Lyte will speak about
"Rap, Race, Rage and Reality." In November, the festival will feature staged readings of banned books and a forum addressing the many issues revolving around the First Amendment's application on college campuses - from hate speech to academic freedom to administrative censorship of the student press.
The festival, organized by a committee of faculty and students, is getting broad financial support from both Central and from numerous media outlets and organizations, including the Daily Record, The Wenatchee World, Yakima Herald-Republic, Davis, Wright, Tremaine LLP and the Washington Journalism Education Association. CWU partners include the Office of the Provost, Communication Department, College of Arts and Humanities, College of the Sciences, Diversity Education Center, Center for Excellence in Leadership, and Student Empowerment Center.
For more information about Strossen's presentation, or for persons of disability to arrange for reasonable accommodation, call (509) 963-1687, or (for the hearing impaired) TDD (509) 963-2143.
