Each Friday, we’ll bring you updates on the latest civil liberties news from Maine and the nation.

Victory!  Drones and Privacy

This week, the Maine Senate and the Maine House of Representatives both voted in favor of a bill requiring law enforcement to obtain warrants before. For more on this, and why it’s of timely importance, see here.

Early Voting
The Maine House of Representatives fell six votes short of strengthening democracy in Maine by giving towns the option of adopting true early voting. A bill (LD 156) would have put a question on the November ballot about whether towns should have the option of adopting early voting. Because establishing early voting would require a constitutional amendment, a two-thirds vote in favor of LD 156 was needed in both chambers.

The Supreme Court

Next week in Civil Liberties, the Supreme Court will hand out decisions in the four following cases for which we filed Amicus briefs.

Fischer v. University of Texas at Austin
Can Universities consider race as one factor, among many, in attempting to create a diverse educational experience for its students?  After the Supreme Court decided in 2003 that universities have a compelling interest in creating a student body, the University of Texas at Austin crafted an admissions program (modeled after the Supreme-Court-Approved plan at Michigan) to increase diversity at the classroom level. We think the university gave serious good faith consideration to race-neutral alternatives and that should be sufficient under Supreme Court precedent.

Shelby County v. Holder
Section 5 of the historic Voting Rights Act of 1965 requires states with a history of discrimination to get advance approval from the federal government before changing voting rights laws. Shelby County in Alabama brought a challenge to the law now before the Supreme Court. As a blogger from our national parent organization says here,

“The South, as a direct result of the Voting Rights Act, has changed, but that does not mean we no longer need Section 5, which requires nine states and parts of seven others with the worst and continuing histories of discrimination in voting to preclear their proposed changes in voting and show that they do not have a discriminatory purpose or effect.”

The Supreme Court has upheld the constitutionality of Section 5 in four prior decisions. We hope they continue to do so.

DOMA: Windsor v. United States
In this case, the Supreme Court will decide whether the Defense of Marriage Act violates equal protection by denying same-sex couples recognition under federal law. Edie Windsor shared 44 years of her life with Thea Spyer. When Thea died, the federal government taxed Edie’s inheritance like they were strangers, meaning she paid hundreds of thousands she wouldn’t have had to pay were their marriage federally recognized.


Prop 8: Hollingsworth v. Perry
California’s 2008 Proposition 8 amended the state’s constitution to define marriage as solely  between a man and a woman. The Supreme Court will decide if that violates equal protection. The ACLU’s amicus brief argues that Proposition 8 is unconstitutional under any level of equal protection review. For more information, see here.