A reporter for the ACLU stated, “The lawsuit, filed in District Court of Polk County, seeks to reinstate Griffin's voting rights and asks the court to declare that the Iowa Constitution prohibits the disenfranchisement of people convicted of certain felonies, such as nonviolent drug offenses. The suit also seeks an injunction to stop the state from bringing criminal charges against Iowans with past lower-level felony offenses who register to vote.” This is just one of many cases where the ACLU steps in so that these people get the justice they are seeking to find. Without this organization, we don’t know if any of these cases would progress to where they are now.
Outcome for Case 1
“Oral argument in the District Court for Polk County occurred on August 6, 2015. On September 25, 2015 the District Court for Polk County denied our request for summary judgment. Plaintiffs appealed to the Iowa Supreme Court on September 29, 2015,” says Julie Ebenstein (an attorney for the ACLU Voting Rights Project.)
This picture represents the equality that should be shown the the Lewiston School
Case 2: Lewiston School
“Lewiston School Department has failed to serve students of color and students with disabilities. Disability Rights Maine and Kids Legal at Pine Tree Legal Assistance.” According to the ACLU of Maine. These department policies have violated civil right laws and have disenfranchised people of color and children with disabilities. Some of the things that the school would do are discipline disparities for students of color and students with disabilities compared to their white and non-disabled peers, failure to identify students of color as having disabilities, resulting in a failure to provide necessary services and supports to enable them to access the general education curriculum and protect them from discrimination. Language Learners (ELL) are kept in non-credit and elective classes without an opportunity to enroll in the required classes necessary for graduation, not enough room for non-English speaking parents to talk to anyone in the school. As you can see, they are clearly discriminating and disenfranchising students who don’t follow their judgmental criteria. According to data provided by the Department to the federal Department of Education, black students were nearly three times as likely to receive an in-school suspension as their white classmates, and nearly twice as likely to receive an out-of-school suspension. Students with disabilities were more than three times as likely to receive an out-of-school suspension as students who do not have disabilities. Black students with disabilities were suspended at the highest rate, over 26 percent, compared to the lowest rate of three percent for white students without disabilities, says a reporter from the American Civil Liberties Union.
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