Those we love to hate

These words are often used to demean or otherwise attack someone: “He is probably a card-carrying member of the ACLU.” And that is bad? Conservatives often rail about the constitution and how liberals are undermining the very principles our founders enshrined in it. Principles such as freedom of speech, freedom of association and freedom of religion (interestingly, no sane person wanting to be a politician or judge would ever admit to being an atheist, clearly a protected right under the constitution). The American Civil Liberties Union takes on causes that are clearly constitutional issues that affect the rights of all citizens. The cases often involve the bottom feeders of society or issues that are repugnant to most of us, but the constitutional issues are always for all of us. The next time you see the ACLU representing someone you find disgusting, or defending a practice you find repulsive, remember that the issue is not the person or practice, but the constitutional rights involved.
I wrote an essay about the Supreme Court overturning a law that limited the rights of people involved in the “crush” trade and in dog fighting. The law was a bad law. Overbroad. It is being replaced as you read this by a new law that is narrower and targets the offending trades. By overturning the existing law, the Court protected the rights of hunters, fishermen and many others to make, own and watch videos about these things. That’s right. These were illegal under the old law, although not challenged. Now we will have a law that does what the original was supposed to do.
This was a free speech issue, and the Court got it right. Put another way, here is what law professor Jeffery Rosen said on the Diane Rhem show this week: “The First Amendment is always for people we hate.”
Quotation: http://www.npr.org/blogs/ombudsman/2010/04/22/126199842/why-did-npr-join-a-suit-to-overturn-the-law-banning-animal-cruelty-images-?sc=nl&cc=omb--20100423
Image: 43.photobucket.com/.../0_24_aclu_081105_1.jpg