ACLU Fixing Leaks

The ACLU has gained a new board member and lost one of their most vocal critics.

The most vocal dissident on the national board of the American Civil Liberties Union, Wendy Kaminer, has been replaced by a candidate promising a less confrontational stance.

An attorney with the Juvenile Justice Center at Suffolk University in Boston, Lisa Thurau-Gray, won the post Monday night in a narrow, secret-ballot vote conducted by the Massachusetts ACLU board. She defeated, 17-15, an outspoken criminal defense lawyer from Boston, Harvey Silverglate.

It wasn’t an ousting of any kind. Ms. Kaminer had come to such odds with the hypocrisy going on at the ACLU that she decided did not seek reelection. Wendy was backing Mr. Silvergate who agreed with her criticism of the ACLU only disagreeing with her methods. His narrow defeat replaces Ms. Kaminer with a new board member who will fall in line with the ACLU’s agenda.

It seems the pressure to shut up and color was just too much for Ms. Kaminer.

In early 2005, an effort began to remove Ms. Kaminer and another board member, Michael Meyers, for allegedly leaking confidential ACLU information to reporters. The impeachment effort was dropped, but Mr. Meyers left the board in 2005 after losing a bid for re-election. A related plan to set limits on board members’ criticism of the organization triggered an outcry.

Ms. Kaminer, who backed Mr. Silverglate’s failed bid, has complained that Mr. Romero is too secretive and made decisions at odds with the group’s core principles. She said the ACLU’s president, Nadine Strossen, the executive committee, and the board as a whole shared responsibility for “a mess” at the organization.

So remember, if you leak classified information about secret government programs to fight terror you will be a hero to the ACLU. But don’t dare leak “confidential information” about the hypocrisy of the ACLU or you will be shunned and come under enormous pressure to be censored and silenced. If only our government could do so well fixing leaks.

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