Rusty Benson
AFA Journal associate editor
August 2008 – The organization that many consider the most significant threat to Christian values in our nation seems poised for a major expansion of their extreme left-wing agenda.
In June, The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) announced the largest fundraising campaign in its 88-year history. ACLU executive director Anthony Romero said $258 million of their $335 million goal has already been met in cash and pledges.
“When we see this hugely successful fundraising effort and consider the agenda of the ACLU, Christians should be concerned,” said Mat Staver, founder and chairman of Liberty Counsel, a nonprofit litigation organization that works in the areas of religious liberty, the sanctity of human life and the traditional family.
Alan Sears agrees. Sears is co-author of The ACLU vs. America: Exposing the Agenda to Redefine Moral Values. He says that although the ACLU calls itself “our nation’s guardian of liberty,” the organization actually works to censor religion in America.
Sears, CEO of the Alliance Defense Fund, says that although the ACLU has always had leftist leanings, the organization has grown more radical in recent years, particularly in its efforts to interfere with the rights of private organizations and faith groups in the administration of their internal affairs.
“They have such a distorted view of the First Amendment,” Sears said in a 2006 radio interview. For example, the ACLU has either supported or filed lawsuits against many religious organizations, including Catholic Charities of California, he said. The ACLU filed a brief supporting a lawsuit that would force contraceptive coverage to be included in the insurance benefit package of Catholic Charities employees. “This would be contrary to a very basic tenet of Catholic belief,” Sears said.
In another example of the ACLU’s twisted claim to protect religious freedom, in 2004 the group sued The Salvation Army in New York claiming it discriminates against employees by applying religious standards to their employees.
Still another case that illustrates the ACLU’s agenda to cleanse the nation of public religion began in 1989, Sears said. In the suit, the ACLU sided against the City of San Diego and the majority of local residents in an effort to remove a cross from a war memorial on Mt. Soledad.
In addition to its hostility against religion, the ACLU has also promoted the pro-abortion movement and special rights for homosexuals, including same-sex marriage. It is also infamous for its threats and lawsuits to censor public expressions of faith such as prayer.
Donations to the ACLU’s fundraising campaign include 21 contributions of $1 million or more. Notable left-wing philanthropists making gifts include George Soros, through his Open Society Institute. Soros is the controversial financial speculator and political activist who backed MoveOn.org and America Coming Together, both groups that worked to support Democrats in the 2004 presidential election. During the campaign, Soros had said he would sacrifice his entire fortune to help defeat President Bush’s re-election campaign.
According to an ACLU press release, the organization plans to use the huge new nest egg to increase and strengthen their presence in “heartland states” including Michigan, Missouri, Mississippi, Montana, New Mexico and Tennessee. Staffs in Texas and Florida will also double.
Issues that will be more diligently pursued in this new initiative include immigrants’ rights, gay rights, police brutality and opposition to the death penalty, Romero said.
“Any future expansion would simply increase [the ACLU’s] destructive presence and be concerning to people of conservative, moral values,” Staver stated.
However, he also says that his experience in litigating against the ACLU demonstrates that the organization can be beat in the courtroom. “We have been very successful against the ACLU,” he said. “In fact, in Florida where the ACLU intends to more than double its presence, we have never lost a case against them.” Staver says the most significant problems in combating the ACLU involve learning about the group’s activities in time to counter them, and having the resources to protect and advance values such as freedom, life and family.
“Sometimes the ACLU’s activities are reported in the media, other times, they are covert,” he explains. “Often, they will simply send a threatening letter to a school or local government. All of a sudden there are no Christmas carols in the chorus program or no nativity scene at city hall.”
That’s why Staver says vigilance is necessary. “Christians must stay involved in community activities and know what’s going on inside of situations.”
The ACLU was founded in 1920 by Roger Baldwin, an agnostic and socialist with acknowledged communist leanings. He was a close friend of Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood. Noted contemporaries who have served in influential positions with the ACLU include Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a current U. S. Supreme Court Justice, and Judith Krug, director of the American Library Association.
The ACLU’s national headquarters are in New York City. The organization maintains a network of 53 locally based affiliates and chapters. 
