News & Commentary

The Maine State Legislature is gearing up for the 2014 short session - and so are we! We are closely watching any bills that threaten or promote civil liberties. While we haven't taken an official position on any bills yet, here's a list of some bills that we're following:

Tomorrow the ACLU will appear in a federal courtroom in New York City to argue that the NSA's mass call-tracking program violates Americans' constitutional rights of privacy, free speech, and association, and that it goes far beyond what Section 215 of the Patriot Act authorizes.

Yesterday, Maine's new cell phone privacy laws went into effect. Under the new law, if the government wants to get the location information generated by your cell phone, they must first go before a judge and give a good reason. This is an importand update to our cell phone privacy laws - which were written in 1986!

Thursday morning, Chelsea Manning came out as a transgender woman. Following her announcement, a military spokesman stated that the Army will not provide gender affirming healthcare for Ms. Manning, which raises significant constitutional concerns. The national ACLU writes:

Last week the Washington Post reported that the NSA has been violating restrictions on surveillance powers thousands of times a year. The Post's reporting also made clear that the chief judge of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court doesn't even think his court has the tools or capacity to evaluate the government's representations about its compliance with the law.

We went into the 126th Legislature with a plan: to bring Maine's privacy laws up to speed with advancing technology. To that end, we proposed a 5-bill privacy package with bipartisan sponsorship. And while it was an uphill battle the whole way, we were successful in winning privacy protections and standing up for the 4th Amendment! 

Today, a federal judge ruled that the New York Police Department’s stop-and-frisk practices are unconstitutional. The ACLU’s affiliate in New York has been on top of this issue for years, and the data they’ve compiled clearly shows that this is not just a minor problem. Innocent New Yorkers have been subjected to police stops and street interrogations more than 4 million times since 2002, and nearly nine out of 10 who were stopped-and-frisked were completely innocent.

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

The federal government classifies marijuana as a "Schedule 1" narcotic--high potential for abuse; no currently accepted medical use; and dangerous--and for decades the government has asserted that there is sound scientific basis for this classification. It is not true.  Medical research in countries that make it easier for such research to take place without fear of prosecution have shown that cannabis has enormous potential as a treatment for a wide range of debilitating conditions, including seizure disorders (families in this country are desperate for that research, but marijuana's legal status makes it nearly impossible).