News & Commentary

An ACLU of Rhode Island cooperating attorney has filed a charge of race discrimination against the Providence Police Department on behalf of an African-American recruit who was involuntarily dismissed last year from the Police Academy just a few weeks before graduation and after enduring months of harassment from trainers at the Academy. ACLU cooperating attorney Laura Harrington has today also filed a formal claim for damages with the City as a legal prerequisite to the filing of a lawsuit on behalf of the recruit, Michael Clark.

YOU CAN BE “FATTY” BUT NOT “CHUBBY”; “TIPSY” BUT NOT “DRUNK”; ADVERTISE “HEAVEN” BUT NOT “HELL”; SAY “DOGDOO” BUT NOT “DOOBIE”; BE AN “OLDFRT” BUT NOT A “JOCKY”; AND PROUDLY TRUMPET “FRIAR” BUT NOT “HOOSIER”

“I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked…” - Allen Ginsberg, “Howl”

The 2019 Top 10. A completely unexhaustive list of (some of) the most absurd civil liberties violations we encountered this year. 

In what the ACLU of Rhode Island calls an “outrageous and shameful” attack on one of its own students, the Barrington School Committee has filed a lawsuit in R.I. Superior Court against a middle school student who successfully challenged before the Rhode Island Department of Education (RIDE) his three-day out-of-school suspension. In seeking to overturn RIDE’s decision, the school committee is demanding a recovery of its attorneys’ fees against the student and RIDE.

The R.I. Supreme Court has revised a court rule that favorably resolves objections that had been raised in a federal lawsuit filed last year by ACLU of Rhode Island cooperating attorneys on behalf of SouthCoast Fair Housing (SCFH), which had been prevented by the rule from providing legal help to victims of housing discrimination in RI. As a result of the revisions, SCFH will be dismissing the suit.

The ACLU of Rhode Island has called on the Narragansett Town Council to table a proposed discussion of an ordinance tonight that would bar members of the public from making "personal" or "slanderous" remarks, or becoming "boisterous," during the public comment portion of Council meetings.

The ACLU of Rhode Island today announced the favorable resolution of a lawsuit it filed in May, challenging the state Division of Taxation’s position that a special sales tax exemption for Rhode Island authors applied only to works of fiction, and not to non-fiction, because non-fiction was not considered “creative and original.” The lawsuit argued that making such a distinction on the content of the work violated the First Amendment’s guarantees of freedom of speech and freedom of the press. The ACLU dismissed the case today after confirming that the authors who applied for exemptions since the suit was filed have had them granted by the Division.

The ACLU of Rhode Island today has added new constitutional claims to a lawsuit it filed in May against the State, challenging the state Division of Taxation’s position that a special sales tax exemption for Rhode Island authors applies only to works of fiction, and not to non-fiction, because non-fiction is not “creative and original.” The lawsuit, filed by ACLU of RI cooperating attorney Lynette Labinger, continues to argue that making such a distinction on the content of the work violates the First Amendment’s guarantees of freedom of speech and freedom of the press, but adds new claims in light of troubling developments since the suit’s original filing.