From: harelb@math.cornell.edu (misc.activism.progressive co-moderator)
Subject: "Card-Carrying Member of the ACLU" (Speech by Ira Glasser)(9=last)
Followup-To: alt.activism.d
Originator: daemon@pencil.cs.missouri.edu
Organization: ?
Date: Fri, 22 Jan 1993 06:10:23 GMT

"Card-Carrying Member of the ACLU" (Speech by Ira Glasser)(9=last)

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    "Those mean spirits, I had thought, were safely hidden again below
    the surface. For a major presidential candidate, to call them
    forth again, is a *scandal*."
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    "The reason why the fifties became a time of silence, was not
    because of what McCarthy said, but because of what the rest of us
    failed to say."
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==================================================================
      Speech by Ira Glasser (ACLU national director), before the
        National Press Club, Washington, DC.  October 6, 1988.

    [I use *'s for *strong* emphasis, and ~ for ~lighter~ emphasis]
      [also, commas are sometimes used to indicate pauses, etc.]
==================================================================
The fact is, is that he has said, "I am *not* a card-carrying member of
the ACLU; I am for the people."

*Which* people?    *Which* people?

The Japanese Americans, who were incarcerated because of their race?

The millions of American workers, who were repressed and suppressed
because they wanted to organize?

The Blacks, and other people of color in this society, who for so long
suffered, and suffer still, from discrimination?

*Fifty* percent of our population, women, who were relegated to
second-class citizenship for so long?

The hundreds of thousands of ordinary citizens who are chewed up by
countless public officials every day in this society, and whose only
recourse is the ACLU?

*Which* people?  *Which* people is he for?  -- if he's =for= *those*
people, then he is for the ACLU; and if he is against those people, it
is he, and not we, who are out of the mainstream.


[continued:]


What he represents, it seems to me, is =not= a true patriotism --
Samuel Johnson once said "Patriotism is the last refuge of
scoundrels," but he went on to say -- and this is not the part most
people quote -- he went on to say that the "patriotism" he was talking
about was not that patriotism which reflects a true love of country,
but that *pretended* patriotism, which is used as a cloak for
self-interest.

I ask you to consider, =who= is more patriotic, and who is more
conservative -- when a person says they're conservative, ask them what
it is exactly they're trying to conserve. And frequently you will
find, it is not the Bill of Rights, it is not the values this country
started with, it is not the values that have expanded freedom for the
least of us, and for all of us. It represents instead a mean spirit of
repression, an urging to go back to that time when those rights did
not exist, and when *they* ruled the country, whoever they are.

The fact is, is that George Bush, for what I guess he perceives as
momentary political advantage, has been willing to toy with the
fundamental structures that protect all of our rights in this society.
He has dipped down into those dark forces, and called forth, conjured
up, those mean spirits again; those mean spirits, which in another
time, beat and burned Jehova's Witnesses;

imprisoned Japanese Americans;

enslaved blacks;

and relegated women to second-class citizenship.

Those mean spirits, I had thought, were safely hidden again below the
surface. For a major presidential candidate, to call them forth again,
is a *scandal*.

It is shameful that he would do so. Because what I'm worried about,
frankly, is not how many members the ACLU gets out of this. We *will*
get more members from the people who understand what the ACLU is and
what the Bill of Rights means and how to enforce it and why you need
to advocate it on behalf of unpopular causes. What =I= am worried
about, is all the people who =don't= understand, and who get their
understanding from what a presidential candidate tells them. What I am
worried about is the 22 year old future Dick Thornberg, living
somewhere in Pittsburgh and saying "maybe I =won't= join the board
of the Pittsburgh chapter of the ACLU, 'cause you can never tell how
that's going to hurt me 20 years later." Or the young student, the
future Michael Dukakis, who is saying this moment "maybe I =won't=
join the ACLU, and maybe I won't join the Environmental Defense Fund,
and maybe I shouldn't join N.O.W.," because if you have ambition, you
don't want to be vulnerable to those kinds of things 20 year later.

I grew up in the fifties, when it was almost unthinkable to join
anything, or sign a petition, because they had created a climate of
fear, which made taking risks and defending the underdog, and standing
up for what this country believes in and what it was founded on,
unpopular, and risky. And *that* is what George Bush is playing with,
when he attacks the Bill of Rights, and those people who advocate it.

Now, the =outcome=, whether that's going to happen, does not depend on
George Bush; it depends on =us=; it depends on =you=.  Because the
outcome of these struggles =never depends= on the people who oppose
liberty; they depend on the response -- or the lack of response --
from people who support it.

The reason why the fifties became a time of silence, was not because
of what McCarthy said, but because of what the rest of us failed to
say.

And if George Bush's depredations, if what he has done to undermine
liberty succeeds, it will not be because of what he did; it will be
because of what we failed to do.

=He= has done his worst. It remains for us to do our Best.

Thank you.

{Speech by Ira Glasser, Executive director of the American Civil
Liberties Union (ACLU), October 6, 1988, National Press Club.}

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American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)
132 West 43rd Street
New York, NY 10109-0592

Newsgroups: misc.activism.progressive