News & Commentary

Racial Profiling is any police or private security practice in which a person is treated as a suspect because of his or her race, ethnicity, nationality or religion. This occurs when police investigate, stop, frisk, search or use force against a person based on such characteristics instead of evidence of a person's criminal behavior. It often involves the stopping and searching of people of color for traffic violations, known as "DWB" or "driving while black or brown." Although normally associated with African Americans and Latinos, racial profiling and "DWB" have also become shorthand phrases for police stops of Asians, Native Americans, and, increasingly after 9/11, Arabs, Muslims and South Asians.

Racial profiling can also involve pedestrian stops, "gang" databases, bicycle stops, use of police attack dogs, suspicion at stores and malls, immigration worksite raids, and in the 2000 presidential election in Florida, harassment on the way to polls, or, "voting while black or brown." Customs and other airport officials also engage in racial profiling of passengers. (a href="http://www.aclu.org/racialjustice/racialprofiling/21741res20051123.html">Read more about different kinds of racial profiling.)

Racial profiling is a new term for an old practice known by other names: institutional racism and discrimination and owes its existence to prejudice that has existed in this country since slavery.

Tens of thousands of innocent drivers, pedestrians, and shoppers across the country are victims of racial profiling. And these discriminatory police stops and searches have reached epidemic proportions in recent years - fueled by the "War on Drugs" and the "War on Terror" that have given police a pretext to target people they think fit a "drug courier," "gang member," or "terrorist" profile. In fact, racial profiling is the first step in a long road that leads to the heavily disproportionate incarceration of people of color, especially young men, for drug-related crimes, and of Arabs, Muslims and South Asians for suspicion of terrorism. This despite the fact that people of color are no more likely than whites to use or sell drugs, and Arabs Muslims and South Asians are no more likely than whites to be terrorists.

We must end the practice of racial profiling.

On November 5, 2008, the day after Proposition 8 was approved by voters, the California ACLU affiliates joined with the National Center for Lesbian Rights, Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund, Inc., and the law offices of David C. Codell, Munger, Tolles & Olson, and Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe to file suit in the California Supreme Court to invalidate Proposition 8. (link to original press release, which links petition)

We argue that Proposition 8 is a revision to the California Constitution, rather than an amendment, and therefore cannot be adopted by a simple majority vote on an initiative. Revisions, unlike amendments, must be approved by a two-thirds vote of the legislature before being submitted to the voters or a constitutional convention. Our position is that Proposition 8 is a revision because it subverts the constitutional guarantee of equal protection, allowing a simple majority of voters to deprive a particularly vulnerable minority, such as LGBT people, of fundamental rights, and prevents courts from exercising their unique responsibility to uphold the equal protection rights of minorities.

Our case, Strauss et al. v. Horton et al., was consolidated with cases filed by other plaintiffs, including various individuals and a coalition of cities and counties. The California Supreme Court agreed to decide the case in the first instance, without waiting for lower courts to address the issue. The court placed similar cases, filed by other plaintiffs including various civil rights and religious organizations, on hold pending the outcome in Strauss and its companion cases.

The court allowed proponents of Proposition 8 to intervene in the case to attempt to defend its validity.

In its November 19 order, the court directed the parties to brief the following issues:

(1) Is Proposition 8 invalid because it is a revision rather than an amendment to the California Constitution?

(2) Does Proposition 8 violate the separation of powers doctrine under the California Constitution?

(3) If Proposition 8 is not unconstitutional , what is its effect, if any, on the marriages of same-sex couples performed before its adoption?

On Friday, December 19, 2008, the intervenors filed their brief and the state filed its brief.

Unsurprisingly, the proponents of Proposition 8 claim it is a valid amendment. They also argue that it retroactively invalidates marriages of same-sex couples performed before its adoption.

The state Attorney General argues Proposition 8 is invalid because the initiative process may not deprive persons of certain fundamental rights without a compelling justification, which is not present in this case. The state also argues that even if it is valid, Proposition 8 is not retroactive.

We will post further updates on the Prop. 8 Lawsuit Blog page: https://www.aclu-sdic.org/issues.php?sub_cat_sel=000098

Welcome to ACLU-San Diego's update blog on the litigation challenging Proposition 8. We are not aiming to blog at you too much. Rather we want to get you detailed information quickly.

Why?

We know that many people are following this important challenge very closely, and they want more information. We are hearing from members of the public gay and straight, married and unmarried who are deeply distressed.

Rightly so. Denying marriage equality strips couples of their right to be free from discrimination in exercising a fundamental right as the California Supreme Court recognized in its historic decision In Re Marriage Cases on May 15, 2008. But, Prop. 8 sought not only to reverse that progress. It also stripped every American of the confidence and security that every one of us is entitled to equal protection of the law.

That's why we have petitioned the California Supreme Court to hold Prop. 8 invalid. The case is called Strauss et al v. Horton et al.

Here's how to use this resource.
- First, bookmark this link: https://www.aclu-sdic.org/issues.php?sub_cat_sel=000098
- Or, select Prop. 8 Lawsuit Blog under the list of issues on the left hand side of our homepage: https://live-awp-san-diego.pantheonsite.io

We will post the legal briefs and court decisions, as well as provide other useful information. Already, you can find:
- A helpful overview of the litigation,
- The expected timeline of the case, and
- Legal documents related to the case.

If you have questions, let us know at prop8@aclusandiego.org.

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tags are tiny computer chips that can be encoded with any type of information. These chips are embedded within documents or objects to be used for monitoring or tracking purposes. When an RFID reader emits a radio signal, the RFID tags in the vicinity respond by automatically transmitting their stored information to the reader, at a distance, without alerting anyone that the tag is being read.

RFID technology originally gained a foothold in the commercial sector as a means to allow real-time monitoring and tracking of cattle in the fields and inventory moving through the supply chain.

U.S. government initiated the rollout of RFID-embedded passports, and there are potential plans to embed RFID tags in other identification documents.

How does it really work? The information that has traditionally been printed on the face of ID cards, such as our name, address, and unique identifier number, is encoded on the chip in the card. Without adequate privacy and security protections, our personal information could be transmitted without our knowledge. That means that whether we are walking down the street, participating in a political rally, or visiting a doctor's office or a gun show, we are at risk of being tracked and stalked and of having our identity stolen.

The ACLU has been working to protect privacy, personal safety, and financial security and bring attention to the risks associated with the use of RFID technology in identification documents.

The Real ID Act was passed by Congress last year, with no hearings, as part of a must-pass military appropriations bill. Real ID will turn state driver's licenses into national identity cards, and impose numerous financial and bureaucratic burdens on taxpayers and state governments.

The act rolls back civil liberties protections, attacks privacy rights, and sets the stage for a national ID. Many diverse groups, including the ACLU, the National Council of State Legislatures, the National Governors Association, and the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators are opposed to the Real ID Act. Conservative estimates place the minimum cost of the program at $12 billion, and some believe it could cost at least double that.

Read more about the act in our Frequently Asked Questions.

Justice Potter Stewart wrote that "The Fourth Amendment and the personal rights it secures have a long history. At the very core stands the right of a man to retreat into his own home and there be free from unreasonable government intrusion."

From using the telephone to seeking medical treatment to applying for a job or sending e-mail over the Internet, our right to privacy is in peril. Our personal and business information is being digitized through an ever-expanding number of computer networks in formats that allow data to be linked, transferred, shared and sold, usually without our knowledge or consent. The same technological advances that have brought enormous benefits to humankind also make us more vulnerable than ever before to unwanted snooping.

As technology provides new ways to gather information and databases proliferate, the need for privacy protections becomes more urgent. The ACLU is a national leader in working to guarantee that individuals may determine how and when others can gain access to their personal information.

In early 2006, Congress reauthorized the Patriot Act without fixing the law's most fundamental flaws. On March 9, 2006, President Bush signed the flawed reauthorization bill into law.

The ACLU is obviously disappointed with this outcome, the fight to reform the Patriot Act is far from over. Lawmakers have introduced legislation to ensure that needed changes are made to the Patriot Act, protecting our liberty and privacy. Both Congress and the courts are examining the National Security Letter (NSL) provisions of the act.

Additionally, Congress failed to include commonsense reforms to the Patriot Act that would target our precious anti-terrorism resources on suspected foreign terrorists rather than invading the privacy of innocent people through fishing expeditions into their financial, medical, library and Internet records. We need to contact our legislators and tell them to reprioritize our limited resources.

There are signs of progress in the mdist of it all. The Patriot Act debate has come a long way in the last four years. When the Senate first voted on the Patriot Act, only one Senator opposed it -- on this year's reauthorization vote, ten Senators opposed it. And a bipartisan group of 52 Senators stood up to the administration and filibustered the reauthorization bill late last year.

In the House, bipartisan majorities supported bills to limit the reach of the Patriot Act by placing better checks and balances into the law -- moves that were ultimately overridden by the Republican House leadership at the behest of the Bush administration's knee-jerk opposition to common-sense reforms.

Since the Patriot Act was first debated and passed, we've made tremendous progress. Thanks to your efforts, the White House was unable to secure the rubber stamp reauthorization and expansion of the Patriot Act it had hoped for. This debate over the need to protect our most fundamental freedoms laid the foundation for the public's rejection of the president's abuses of power, including the warrantless NSA program to spy on Americans. Now, more than ever, Americans are aware of the Bush administration's reckless policies, and they are speaking out.

If you are not already a member, please join our News & Action Network and/or Membership Action Squad to receive periodic updates and calls to action on issues as important as this one.

The Bush Administration and Congress have ignored their obligation to end the torture and abuse of detainees in U.S. military custody and restore faith in America's commitment to human rights at home and around the world.

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