News & Commentary

The ACLU of Rhode Island today released a report that both shows that most public libraries in the state oppose the use of censoring software for their computers with Internet access, and that calls upon libraries to take steps to minimize the impact of a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision which will now require most of them to nonetheless install so-called “blocking software.”

The ACLU of Rhode Island today filed a federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of an unprecedented state law passed by the General Assembly last month that gave the Town of North Smithfield a one-time exemption from the state’s major law banning employment discrimination. The suit was filed on behalf of an Hispanic female applicant, Christine Melendez, who is barred from obtaining any position with the newly-created North Smithfield Fire Department because of the law. Instead, the town has voted to hire 21 white males who currently work for the town’s private fire and rescue service. Last week, the Town, which has no fire department of its own, took formal action to acquire the private fire and rescue service that has been serving North Smithfield. In doing so, the Town voted to hire en masse the service’s all white and all male firefighting force. Before taking this action, the Town sought and obtained an exemption from the state’s Fair Employment Practices Act (FEPA), the state law prohibiting employment discrimination on the basis of race, gender and age. The exemption, granted by the General Assembly, bars any individual from filing an employment discrimination claim under FEPA for the Town’s mass hiring. However, the law did not – and legally could not – exempt the Town from federal anti-discrimination statutes.

The ACLU of Rhode Island has today intervened in the pending litigation between the state of Rhode Island and the Narragansett Indians over the highly publicized state police raid of the Indians’ smoke shop last month. The ACLU affiliate, joined by its National office, has filed a “friend of the court” brief in U.S. District Court in support of the Tribe’s legal arguments. The brief was prepared by National ACLU staff attorney Stephen Pevar who, as the author of The Rights of Indians and Tribes, has literally written the book on the subject.

The ACLU of R.I. has today filed a “friend of the court” brief in the R.I. Supreme Court in support of the free speech rights of West Warwick resident and Republican Town Committee member Alan Palazzo, who was sued for defamation by state Senator Stephen Alves for his newspaper letter-writing activities. The court brief, filed by ACLU volunteer attorneys Joseph Cavanagh, Jr. and Staci Kolb, argues that the lower court correctly dismissed Alves’ lawsuit as a “SLAPP suit” designed to intimidate Palazzo for exercising his First Amendment rights.

The ACLU of Rhode Island and over 20 civil rights and community organizations joined today in the release of a report sharply critical of Governor Donald Carcieri’s civil rights record in his first six months in office. The 16-page report, “Civil Rights and Civil Wrongs in the Governor’s Office,” focuses on five major issues the Governor has dealt with during his term. The report calls his response to them “cause for considerable alarm,” and says they demonstrate “a pattern of ignoring the people with something to say about discrimination when an issue directly affecting them” arises. The report, prepared by the ACLU and two civil rights organizations, concludes with a series of twenty recommendations for the Governor to implement to address the concerns outlined in the report.

The ACLU of Rhode Island, joined by representatives from three civil rights groups -- the R.I. Civil Rights Roundtable, R.I. Affirmative Action Professionals and the Providence Human Relations Commission -- have called on Governor Donald Carcieri to publicly respond to “troubling issues” raised by the State Police internal report of the July 14th Narragansett Indian smoke shop raid, including information that the state police clearly knew that a confrontation was likely to occur if an attempt to execute a search warrant was made.

In a brief filed this week, the ACLU of Rhode Island has asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit Court of Appeals to allow its “racial profiling” lawsuit to proceed against the Town of Westerly on behalf of a 50-year old African-American man, Ashaway resident Bernard Flowers, who was stopped in his car and detained at gunpoint by town police. The appeal, filed by ACLU volunteer attorney Thomas G. Briody, claims that the district court erred when it ruled that the police had sufficient grounds to warrant a “felony car stop” of Mr. Flowers.

Representatives of the Providence Human Relations Commission, the Urban League of R.I., the R.I. Civil Rights Roundtable and the ACLU of Rhode Island issued the following statement in response to yesterday’s State Police raid of the Narragansett Indian smoke shop:

At a news conference organized by the ACLU of Rhode Island, a dozen civil rights and community groups gathered at the State House today to call for concrete action by the Attorney General and local law enforcement authorities to address the now-thoroughly documented problem of racial profiling in the state.