It’s been a year since the Board of the ACLU of Virginia offered me the privilege of leading this wonderful organization. Kent Willis who preceded me in this job gave me some wonderful and welcome advice when I was considering the offer. He said I would be fortunate to be the leader of an organization in wonderful financial shape due to prudent and forward looking management by its board. He told me that I was being offered the chance to lead an organization with a talented staff passionate about the mission and familiar with hard work and service above and beyond the call. And, he emphasized that I would be joining an organization with committed supporters ready to continue to provide a strong foundation for our work. In short, I was being given the gift of building on success. He was right.
The work the team at the ACLU of Virginia has been able to accomplish this past year has been significant in its impact and remarkable for its breadth.
We worked with non-traditional partners (the Tea Party Patriots Federation, the Farm Bureau, and the Agribusiness Council) to persuade the Virginia legislature to pass the first statewide restriction on the civilian use of drones by law enforcement – an issue at the intersection of privacy and technology.
We won yet another case challenging government-led denominational prayer at public meetings continuing our fight against the establishment of state-endorsed religion.
We convinced a Fairfax judge that the Virginia law restricting the right of religions without ministers to solemnize marriages for members of their congregations without posting a $500 bond was unconstitutional, protecting the free exercise of religion.
We set the stage for a challenge to the Charlottesville panhandling ordinance helping to protect our right to free speech.
We established that a transgender woman in prison has the right to be evaluated to determine what medical treatment she may need thereby helping to secure equal rights for transgender inmates.
We achieved real reform of jail and prison rules regarding the use of restraints on pregnant women-- rules that subjected women to cruel and unusual punishment and endangered their health.
We sought and received assurances from the state Department of Motor Vehicles that immigrant students granted deferred action can qualify for Virginia drivers’ licenses, securing their right as people in the United States to the equal protection of the laws.
We applauded the support offered by the Governor and the Attorney General for the restoration of voting rights for persons once convicted of felonies, although we were disappointed their support was not enough to convince the legislature to act and we continue to ask the Governor to take executive action available to him.
The team at the ACLU of Virginia also worked this year to grow our organizational capacity to do even more great work. We moved to new, higher quality office space in downtown Richmond built out to our specifications at no cost to us and for which we are paying 13% less per square foot than we were paying at our former location. We enhanced our communications technology, purchased legal case management software, and upgraded our computing capacity. The staff made decisions about our health insurance coverage that held premium increases to 6% instead of the 25% originally projected. And, we reorganized and reconfigured our staffing to allow us to hire the first full-time paralegal for the office, a communications and development assistant, and a director of public policy and communications without increasing the amount budgeted for staff over the amount budgeted in the prior fiscal year.
None of what we accomplished this year would have been possible without the successful work of the Board and staff that came before and provided the foundation and imperative for continued success. At the same time, however, the year also brought lessons about how much more work we have to do, and how much the ACLU is needed to assure we are all free.
None of us can truly be free as long as there is a risk that any innocent person might die on death row.
None of us can truly be free as long as hundreds of thousands of fellow Virginians are denied the right to vote because of convictions for long past behavior.
None of us can truly be free as long as aspiring citizens have no path to full civic participation.
None of us will truly be free so long as the government can freely access our cell phone data and email without a warrant.
None of us can truly be free as long as any Virginian goes to work or school afraid that they will be disciplined, bullied, or fired just because of their sexual orientation or gender identity, or until all are free to marry the person they love.
A sad lesson from this year is that, despite changing public attitudes, the recalcitrance of the Virginia legislature to any proposal to grant equality or freedom to LGBT people means that freedom to marry will be won for LGBT Virginians in the courts if at all. The ACLU of Virginia was founded by those who helped end the ban on interracial marriage by bringing the case of Loving v. Virginia before the United States Supreme Court. A fitting celebration for the ACLU of Virginia’s 50th anniversary in 2019 would be the successful outcome of a case brought to establish the freedom to marry for all couples regardless of sexual orientation.
Another difficult lesson from this year is that it is time to change the conversation about abortion so that everyone who values their privacy, their autonomy, and their basic liberty will understand that limits on women’s freedom to access basic reproductive health care represent a challenge to everyone’s freedom. New ultrasound laws threaten the freedom of women to get health care without having to compromise their privacy or invite the government into their doctors’ offices. Regulations that are unnecessary to protect the health and safety of women patients threaten the freedom of health care providers to continue to offer their services and the freedom of women to have access to such care. We cannot allow those who seek to restrict women’s freedom to use religious liberty as a cloak to hide their true intent.
Returning to the positive, the ACLU of Virginia continues to be blessed with remarkably committed and talented staff and volunteers and thousands of dedicated supporters who have invested and continue to invest their time and money in our work. Supporters like Pat Arnold and Nat Wilson have made lasting gifts that seeded our women’s rights work and enabled this year’s technology investments. The new Jules S. Cohen Fund for Religious Liberty established this year will help fund our work to secure religious liberty for all and fend off the cynical effort to use religious liberty to justify discrimination. Last year’s Kent Willis Challenge by an anonymous donor helped ensure the success of our annual Liberty Campaign. These blessings fuel our optimism and nurture all of us for the work ahead.
