ACLU Head Urges Student Activism In Preservation of Civil Liberties

Nadine Strossen '72 encouraged students to become involved in the preservation of civil liberties in a speech at the Law School's Pound Hall last night.

The first female president of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and a graduate of the Law School, Strossen described the organization to her audience of about 75 students and faculty members as "the largest law firm in the country."

"The vast majority of what we do is...making real differences in the lives of real people by enforcing the law," she said. "If the government is ceded the right to take one right from one person, then no rights are safe."

Strossen, a professor at New York Law School, urged all those interested in civil rights, regardless of their belief systems, to serve as volunteers for the ACLU.

"No matter what your values are, I strongly urge you to devote some of your talent...to promoting your ideal of justice," she said.

Almost all of the lawyers who work with the ACLU, including Strossen herself, are volunteers. She joked: "I just want to make it clear [that] when we lose cases, it is not because of bad lawyers, but because of bad judging," eliciting laughter from the audience.

Strossen also discussed legislative lobbying and public education as vehicles through which to support the ACLU, in her speech which followed a dinner with undergraduates at Winthrop House.

Education is extremely important, Strossen said, because "without some [public] understanding of what civil liberties issues are, we can never garner public support."

Throughout the evening, Strossen repeatedly criticized the Communications Decency Act passed by Congress last year, charging officials with abandoning their "oath to uphold the Constitution."

A Federal Court panel declared the law unconstitutional last summer, and the case is now being appealed to the Supreme Court.

Strossen's speech was sponsored by the Harvard Law School Civil Liberties Union in conjunction with the Law School's Office of Public Interest Advising and the undergraduate Civil Liberties Union of Harvard.