vol. 53 (1988), no. 5
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Volume LIl
September/October 1988
No. 5
Fight AIDS-
Stop
Suit Wins Change of Ballot Title
two-pronged legal battle challeng-
Ax Proposition 102-the Danne-
meyer AIDS initiative which would
ban anonymous HIV testing-brought
mixed results in early August. The two law-
suits, litigated by the ACLU-NC, cooperat-
ing attorneys at Brobeck, Phleger and
Harrison, National Gay Rights Advocates
and the Lesbian Rights Project, failed to
remove the initiative from the November
ballot but succeeded in having the title and
summary changed to wording which reveals
the real impact of the measure.
On August 8, Sacramento Superior
Court Judge Roger Warren ruled that there
was no reason to remove the initiative from
the ballot. On behalf of the California Med-
ical Association, the California Nurses Asso-
ciation and San Francisco Public Health
Director Dr. David Werdegar, ACLU-NC
staff attorney Matthew Coles argued that
the measure should be removed as the peti-
tions used to obtain qualifying signatures for
the initiative were false and misleading.
"The petitions did not say that the passage
of this measure would eliminate anonymous
HIV testing," Coles explained. "The public
health community regards anonymous test-
ing as one of the most effective methods of
dealing with the AIDS epidemic. That is
why they brought this lawsuit."
In addition, the lawsuit charged that Pro-
position 102 violates the "single subject" rule
of the California Constitution. That rule
requires that a ballot initiative address only
one subject.
The proposition covers not only reported
probable HIV infection, but use of HIV tests
by insurance companies, employers' use of
so-called protective clothing by employees,
and sentence enhancement for HIV-positive
persons convicted of certain crimes, includ-
ing crimes in which transmission of the virus
is not possible.
Judge Warren stated, "Each of the four
provisions challenged is, in fact, logically
and reasonably germane" to the initiative's
purpose.
"Whether the means the initiative adopts
to accomplish its overall objective is proper
.. 1S not for this court to decide," Warren
ruled. "That is for the people to vote on in
November."
Two days later on August 10, however,
Judge James T. Ford of the same court,
approved an_ out-of-court settlement
between the ACLU-NC and the state Attor-
ney General's office, changing the wording
of the voting machine labels and the voters'
handbook title and summary of Proposition
Prop. 102
102 so that they better reflect the true impact
of the measure.
That settlement came out of a voter's
lawsuit, Warner v. Eu, litigated by the same
civil liberties organizations.
continued on p. 8
Why You Should Vote NO
by Matthew Coles
ACLU-NC Staff Attorney
In 1986, the ACLU provided assistance to
defeat Proposition 64-the LaRouche
AIDS Quarantine Initiative. In June of this
year, the ACLU was there again to defeat a
ridiculous attempt to pass the same law
again.
We all hoped we were through with
extremist threats to our efforts to stop
AIDS. But now, California voters are faced
_ with a ballot measure much more threaten-
ing than any that have come before-Propo-
sition 102. And this proposition has a very
real chance of passing.
A recent California Poll found strong sup-
port among voters for "reporting AIDS
cases." Although this is not what Proposition
102 would do, this is how its backers are
trying to sell it. The results were:
YES on reporting 12%
NO on reporting 22%
Undecided 62%
But a more recent poll shows that when
voters understand what Proposition 102
actually does, they oppose it by over 60%.
This measure can be defeated if we explain
it.
This is what Proposition 102 would do:
-require doctors to report everyone who
tests positive for the AIDS virus, and eve-
ryone who is "suspected" of being HIV-
positive to local health authorities,
-require researchers to report the names
of people suspected of being HIV-positive;
continued on p. 3
Rosa Parks
Civil Rights Pioneer
Keynote Speaker
john powell
ACLU National Legal Director
16th Annual
Presentation of
Earl Warren Civil
Liberties Award to:
Bill of Rights Day Celebration
Sunday, December 11, 5:00 PM
Refreshments and No Host Bar 4:00 PM
Sheraton Palace Hotel
New Montgomery and Market Streets
San Francisco
Tickets $12-Call 415/621-2498 or fill out the order form
| Celebration Ticket Order Form
Enclosed is my payment of $ for tickets.
Name
Address
City Zip
Please make checks payable to the ACLU Foundation of Northern California. Mail
to Bill of Rights Celebration, 1663 Mission St. #460, San Francisco 94103. Please
enclose a self-addressed, stamped envelope.
aclu news
2 sept//oct. 1988
The Campaign, the Pledge, the ACLU
by Dorothy Ehrlich
ACLU-NC Executive Director
( Duka that Governor Michael
Dukakis is a "card carrying member
of the ACLU" have punctuated Vice
President George Bush's campaign for Pres-
ident of the United States. With California
Governor George Deukmejian falling into
line with his explanation at the August
Republican Convention that "the ACLU
stands for Allowing Criminals to Leave
Unsupervised," a visible campaign of ACLU
bashing has been a centerpiece of the early
weeks of the Republican presidential elec-
tion campaign.
This theme is not limited only to name
calling. The early dispute over whether the
flag salute should be a compulsory activity
in America's public schools triggered a sus-
tained and welcomed debate on an impor-
tant civil liberties issue.
Now a day hardly goes by without
another column or feature story being pub-
lished on this subject. The principle, settled
some 45 years ago by the U.S. Supreme
Court in the historic case of West Virginia v.
Barnette, is back on the front page and may
be as controversial today as it was when the
ACLU first filed its brief supporting the
essential right to dissent from the require-
ment of a mandatory oath.
One of the very first cases on the docket of
the ACLU of Northern California was a
challenge brought in 1936 on behalf of a
nine-year-old girl in a Sacramento public
school who refused, due to her religious
beliefs, to participate in the Pledge of
_ Allegiance.
The ACLU-NC won her case in Sacra-
mento Superior Court, but in 1940 the deci-
"If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it
is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be
orthodox, in politics, nationalism, religion or other matters of
opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith
therein."
U.S. Supreme Court decision
in West Virginia v. Barnette
New ACLU-NC Board Chair, Officers
sion was overturned when the U.S. Supreme
Court issued its original decision in the
Gobitis case which initially upheld the con-
stitutionality of mandatory pledges. That
decision was reversed three years later by the
same court in Barnette v. West Virginia
School Board.
Forty-three years later polls show that a
majority of Americans still do not share the
- Supreme Court's view that the right to speak
must surely guarantee the right not to be
compelled to speak.
In the heated jargon of a political cam-
paign, the question is wrongly characterized
as whether saluting the flag is "patriotic,"
not whether a compulsory flag salute is a
violation of the Bill of Rights protection of
the freedom of thought.
It is the freedom to dissent from this
mandatory oath, especially when the dissent
is obligated by religious belief, that is the
cherished American tradition.
Stigma?
Beyond the healthy and visible debate on -
these issues is still the chilling refrain, pulled
out of the attic of the McCarthy era, of "card
carrying" ACLU member.
And why would ACLU Tiemibershis stig-
matize a presidential candidate?
Vice President Bush cites ACLU's opposi-
tion to the death penalty, to prayer in the
school and to censorship to name just a few.
New Board Members of the "abhorrent" tenets of the
organization.
The long list of ACLU principles which
are being highlighted during this campaign
may portend a sustained period of ACLU
bashing. But the best defense for our organ-
ization is a strong offense. So, all of you
"card carrying ACLU members," wave those
cards proudly-it could be a long and nasty
season!
ard, Halterman, Pemberton, Marlene De
Lancie, Marshall Krause, Jack Londen,
Eileen Siedman, Fran Strauss and Beverly
Tucker.
The following members were elected to
serve on the ACLU-NC Board of Directors:
Marsha Berzon, James Blume, Ann Brick,
Richard Grosboll, Lee Halterman, Joanne
A. Lewis, Ethel Long-Scott, Alberto Salda-
mando, and Douglas R. Young
The new Board members will serve for a
three-year term. ;
A Will to give to the ACLU
Outgoing ACLU-NC Chair Nancy Pemberton and newly elected Chair Lee
Halterman (without chairs).
Nancy Pemberton, Chair of the
_ ACLU-NC Board of Directors for the last
four years, passed her gavel on to the new
Board Chair Lee Halterman at the Sep-
tember Board meeting.
Pemberton, the longest serving Chair of
the affiliate in recent history, was honored at
the meeting with a unanimous resolution for
her "commitment, dedication and leader-
ship" of the ACLU-NC.
The resolution stated, "Whereas you
dazzled us with your financial wizardry-
keeping us grounded in the fund balance
while spinning straw into gold for every
major gift campaign," and "as our chair for
four years, you deprived yourself of speech,
that most fundamental and personally cher-
ished right, so that the process of delibera-
tion could thrive ... we thank you for your
incomparable leadership, your friendship
and your kindness."
ACLU-NC Executive Director Dorothy
Ehrlich called Pemberton a "real hands-on
leader" who was a major force in every facet
of the organization. "Nancy had been
involved in substantive policy issues for
many years, and as chair, she was willing to
put some of that time aside to play a central
role in the organizational aspects of the
ACLU-NC."
Pemberton, a federal public defender, will
continue to serve on the ACLU-NC Board
of Directors and on its Executive
Committee.
New Board Chair Lee Halterman, a 1979
graduate of Boalt Hall Law School, has
served 18 years as District Counsel for U.S.
Representative Ronald Dellums. He is the
co-author, with Dellums and Congressman
George Miller, of Defense Sense: The Search
for a Rational Military Policy and served as
a legal intern with the International Com-
mission of Jurists in Geneva.
A veteran of the ACLU-NC Board of
Directors, Halterman. chaired the Ad Hoc
Committee on the Independence of the Judi-
ciary and the Ad Hoc Committee on the
Immigration Reform and Control Act. He
has also served on the Legislative and Exec-
utive Committees of the Board. His term is
one year.
Other new officers include the following
Vice Chairs who serve as Chairs of Board
Committees: Barbara Brenner (Legal), Dick
Grosboll (Field), Milton Estes (Develop-
ment) and Lori Bannai (Legislative). All of
the Vice-Chairs will serve on the Executive
Committee along with Treasurer Tom Lock-
For more than 50 years the ACLU of
Northern California has fought to defend
the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
Through the pages of history - red-
baiting, vigilantes, WWII internment camps,
HUAC, the Free Speech Movement,
Vietnam, civil rights, the women's move-
ment, gay rights and more - the ACLU
has pioneered the fight for individual
liberties.
You can do something now to insure
that the ACLU will continue to fight - and
win - ten, twenty, and fifty years from
now, through a simple addition to your
will.
Every year thoughtful civil libertarians
have, through their bequests, provided
important support for the ACLU. In 1984,
interest income alone earned by these
bequests, contributed over $50,000.
Making a bequest is simple: you need
only specify a dollar gift or a portion of
your estate for the American Civil Liberties
Union Foundation of Northern California,
Inc.
lf you need information about writing
a will or want additional information,
consult your attorney or write:
Bequests, ACLU Foundation of |
Northern California,
1663 Mission Street,
San Francisco 94103.
Elaine Elinson, Editor
aclu news
Si issues a year. monthly except bi-monthly in January-February, June-July,
August-September and November-December
Published by the American Civil I.iberties Union of Northern California
Nancy Pemberton, Chairperson Dorothy Ehrlich, Executive Director a
Marcia Gallo,
1663 Mission St., 4th floor, San Francisco, California 94103. (415) 621-2488
Membership $20 and up, of which 50 cents is for a subscription to the aclu news _
and S0 cents is for the national ACLU-bi-monthly publication, Civil Liberties.
Chapter Page
aclu news
sept./oct. 1988 3
fter 92 unlawful arrests and several
Ae of marathon meetings, Mayor
Art Agnos agreed to try a new
approach rather than arresting members of
"Food Not Bombs" who are giving free food
to the homeless in Golden Gate Park.
After nine Food Not Bombs arrests on
August 15 and 29 on August 29, John Crew,
Director of the ACLU-NC Police Practices
Project, wrote a letter to the Mayor on
September | charging that the arrests were
unlawful and calling for a new policy
respectful of the constitutional rights of the
homeless and those who distribute food with
a political message.
The six-page letter stated, "When the
police are asked to battle a complicated
- social problem, such as homelessness, that is
not fundamentally criminal in nature, pre-
cious constitutional freedoms are usually
among the first casualties."
Crew explained that though some resi-
dents of the Haight claim that the Food Not
Bombs program allegedly attracts people
who will engage in criminal conduct, only
Gene Gaar
Gene Gaar
Distributing food and leaflets to the homeless at Golden Gate Park
.-.led to 91 arrests of Food Not Bombs participants.
Halt to Arrests of |
"Kood Not Bombs"
Activist
those who commit a crime should be
arrested, not those who participate in an
entirely lawful program. "That would be
analogous to halting Giants games when
certain fans are unruly," Crew charged.
The letter also noted that these arrests"
have a ripple effect on police actions against
the homeless which result in harassment of
innocent people, numerous false arrests and
mounting and unnecessary costs to the City.
"The immediate response to our letter
was 54 more arrests on September 5," said
Crew, "so we decided to release the letter to
the press to underscore our concerns."
The following day, Crew was called to
City Hall for a meeting with the Mayor.
Over the next three days, the ACLU met
for seven hours with the Mayor, along with
the City Attorney, Food Not Bombs repre-
sentatives, residents of the area, and the
police.
On the evening of September 9, the
Mayor called a press conference to
announce a new interim policy. The police
were ordered to stop arresting participants
in the Food Not Bombs program, and the
Food Not Bombs group was issued a six-
week temporary permit to distribute food
and leaflets to the homeless at the Park a
short distance away from their original site
(they had previously been denied a permit).
"In this atmosphere of de-escalation and
respect for constitutional rights, we are
hopeful that a more permanent solution is
being sought," said Crew of the new
agreement.
The ACLU-NC has sued the City three
times in the last 10 years over police "street
sweep" tactics. "We hope that this city
administration does not repeat the mistakes
of illegally using police against law-abiding
homeless people," Crew said.
No on 102
continued from p. 1
-allow insurance companies to use
AIDS tests to determine whether to provide
medical insurance;
_ -forbid confidential, anonymous AIDS
testing. Such testing allows people to deter-
mine their health status without the fear of
losing jobs, housing or insurance;
-cost the state and cities hundreds of
millions of dollars-severely threatening the
budget for AIDS education, treatment and
research.
The implications of this misguided legisla-
tion are clear. Programs that are working to
stop new AIDS infections and provide early
treatment for HIV-positive people will be
wiped out. AIDS research will be severely
curtailed. Thousands of Californians will
lose their jobs, homes and health insurance.
The ACLU has been heavily involved in
pre-election legal challenges to Proposition
102 which did not succeed in removing it
from the ballot. We did succeed in requiring
changes in the ballot title and summary for
the initiative which better represent the true
purpose of this law.
Now we are urging members statewide to
commit themselves to defeating Proposition
102 with money and time.
A_ statewide coalition, Californians
Against Proposition 102, is trying to raise $1
million for major media advertising. The
group has already published an excellent,
informative brochure and is organizing a
speakers bureau, educational forums and
other activities to defeat the measure.
This is a critical campaign to assure that
friends, family, lovers, and co-workers are
not placed at higher risk for AIDS, and to
uphold the rights of all Californians to be
safe from forced AIDS testing and
reporting.
If you can contribute your time and
energy, please contact Californians Against
Proposition 102, 10 United Nations Plaza,
Suite 410, San Francisco 94102 or call (415)
621-4450. If you live outside of San Fran-
cisco, please call Matt Coles at the ACLU,
(415) 621-2493, for information on organiz-
ing efforts in other cities.
omy
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ACLU-NC Ballot Card
Proposition 95-Nutritional Assistance
YES
The ACLU-NC advocates the following votes on statewide propositions which
will be on your November ballot:
Proposition 80-Prison Construction NO
The ACLU first opposed this measure when it appeared as a bill, SB 468, in
1987. The ACLU is opposed to prison expansion unless the need has been
demonstrated after other alternatives to incarceration and lesser punishments
have been explored. Prison and jail construction should be authorized only as part
of a program to eliminate existing unconstitutional conditions.
Proposition 84-Housing and Homelessness YES
This measure would provide increased availability of low cost housing in
California, a state which is among the highest in cost of housing in the country. It
is essential that in addition to homeless shelters, funding is provided so that
indigent persons can move into low cost housing. The ACLU supported this
measure in the Legislature when it appeared as SB 1692 and SB 1693.
Proposition 89-Parole NO
This measure, which was first opposed by the ACLU when it appeared as
SCA 9 in the 1988 Legislature, would allow the Governor a period of 30 days to
review a decision made by the parole authority of California before the decision
becomes effective. The measure raises serious questions of due process and
equal protection and weakens the integrity of the criminal justice system by
allowing political and irrelevant concerns to override decisions by the parole board.
This measure will provide counties with additional funds to alleviate the
problems of hunger and homelessness. It will create the California Emergency
Housing and Nutrition Fund for persons in immediate need; the fund will be
financed by fines from violations of existing laws relating to housing and food
preparation. The ACLU supports the measure as services provided by this
initiative will help keep persons out of institutional settings and remove obstacles
to receiving public benefits for homeless persons.
Proposition 96-HIV Testing for Accused Persons NO
The Block initiative would require HIV tests for persons accused of certain
crimes, including crimes where the transmission of the virus could not possibly
occur. It states that any medical person working in any detention facility must report
to the head of the facility the name of anyone held in custody who the medical
person suspects is infected with the AIDS virus. It also provides that all inmates
who might come in contact with the inmate's bodily fluids must be notified and that
any person who is accused of interfering with a police officer, fire fighter or
emergency medical person can be required to take the HIV test.
Proposition 102-Elimination of Anonymous AIDS Tests NO
The initiative would require that all HIV tests be reported, thus eliminating
anonymous testing-one ofthe most important tools in fighting the AIDS epidemic.
It would also increase prison sentences for HIV-positive persons convicted of
certain crimes, require doctors to report anyone they "believe" has the AIDS virus,
allow insurance companies and employers to require HIV tests, and for employers
to require the use of protective clothing. (For more information, see page 7.)
aclu news
4G sept /oct. 1988
oday we have heard some dis-
turbing and painful testimony.
Disturbing because the issue of
economic inequality in our society is unfa-
miliar terrain, and disturbing because the
_~ACLU-NC's usual advocacy weapons and
our traditional civil liberties policies do not
always address these profound inequities.
"But as our speakers challenged us, the
ACLU must not only be the conservator of
traditional rights, but the creator of new
rights as well."
This summation by ACLU-NC Executive
Director Dorothy Ehrlich of the 1988
Annual Conference captured well the diffi-
cult issues that this year's conference
addressed: hunger, homelessness, AIDS,
racism and drugs.
The theme of this year's conference,
which was held on September 10 at the Lone
Mountain Conference Center in San Fran-
cisco, was "Growing Economic Inequality
`and its Impact on Civil Liberties."
Angela Blackwell, an attorney with the
Urban Strategies Council in Oakland,
opened with a keynote address. "Poverty in
the 1980's is intrusively disturbing," said
Blackwell, "but another face of poverty-its
persistence among certain sectors of the pop-
ulation-is not so easily seen or
understood."
Drawing from research compiled in her
recently published reports, A Chance for
Every Child and Changing the Odds, Black-
well painted a desolate picture of the many
millions "who are outside the loop, they are
caught in a web of poverty and they see no
way out."
She noted that in the 1980's there is an
increasing concentration of poverty in
neighborhoods where "everyone is poor,"
citing that in Oakland, there are a number of
neighborhoods where 60% of the families
live below the poverty level.
Blackwell stated that "our work in civil
rights and civil liberties has no meaning if
people are uneducated, in poor health and
with no access to opportunity."
ee
Blackwell's message was underscored in a
plenary entitled "The Poverty Line" where
advocates in the fields of homelessness,
hunger, health care and education laid the
foundation for understanding how desperate
the situation is.
Jed Emerson, who works with homeless
youth at the Larkin Street Center, said,
"Homelessness is not just a social welfare
issue-it is a housing issue, a human rights
issue, an economic justice issue and most of
all a political issue."
Emerson was joined on the panel by Steve
Graham of the S.E Mayor's Council on
Food and Hunger, Lois Salisbury, Chair of
the Health Access Coalition, Blackwell and
moderator Peggy Russell of the San Fran-
cisco ACLU Chapter.
_ The "Out of the Mainstream" plenary
focused on access to services for poor and
non-traditional families. Chaired by former
ACLU-NC staff attorney and Board
member Donna Hitchens, the panel was
opened with ACLU-NC Board member
Ethel Long-Scott of the Women's Economic
Agenda Project. Long-Scott noted that
when we look at the welfare system we are
looking at an area "boiling with human
rights violations. Charges of welfare fraud,"
she said, "criminalize the act of being poor."
She was followed by a moving presenta-
tion from Joanne Edell, a welfare mother
who said, "Welfare works well to shame you,
the program has destroyed my pride.
"Being on welfare means that they can
invade any aspect of my life anytime they
want," said Edell,
Many in the audience were brought to
tears when she concluded, "I feel like I'm
1988 ACLU-NC A}
Focus on Economic
Injustice and
Civil Liberties
being punished for trying to be a good mom.
But I think we have a right not to be so
scared all the time and for someone to be
there when we are told that we are
criminals."
Attorney Roberta Achtenberg of the Les-
bian Rights Project addressed the many
rights and benefits that gay and lesbian
families are denied because they are not
legally married.
Hitchens noted that because benefit pro- |
grams are structured to deny equal protec-
tion and equal opportunity and because
seeking or receiving such services always
involves the invasion of privacy of the recip-
ients, "we can clearly see how access to
services are civil liberties issues."
. Impact of AIDS
In the plenary "The Economics of AIDS,"
Mark Cloutier, legislative assistant to
Congresswoman Barbara Boxer, focused on
the national financial impact of the AIDS
epidemic. Charging that the government
response to the AIDS crisis "will be the most
significant policy failure of the Reagan
administration," Cloutier delineated the
ever-increasing direct costs (doctors, drugs,
hospitalization, nursing and home health
care) and indirect costs (loss of wages, taxes,
productivity) of the epidemic.
Dr. Tanis Dasher of the Bayview-Hunters
Point Foundation/Black Coalition on
AIDS and George Raya of the Latino
AIDS Project focused on the impact of
AIDS on minority communities in San
Francisco. Dr. Dasher pointed out that
while Blacks comprise only 12% of the pop-
ulation, they are 25% of HIV-positive per-
sons. "It is estimated that between 1% and
114% of Blacks are infected with the AIDS ~
virus," she said.
She noted that there were particular edu-
cational needs, based on_ psychological,
social and cultural distinctions in the Black
community, and delineated four groups of
_ people who were especially at risk and not
being reached by current educational mate-
rials: Black homosexual and bisexual men,
IV drug users, incarcerated prisoners, and
children born with HIV infection.
Raya described a similar situation in the
Latino community. Before his project began.
in 1985, he explained, "there was no bilin-
gual staff on the AIDS ward at San Fran-
cisco General Hospital." A poll that was
recently completed in San Francisco's Mis-
sin District revealed that 86% of the resi-
dents want AIDS educational materials in
Spanish.
Raya also drew out the special problems
of doing outreach, education and service
work for the undocumented.
Andree Walton, from People With AIDS,
is a teacher and mother who contracted the
aclu news
sept/oct. 1988 5
.nnual Conference
disease from a blood transfusion following:
kidney surgery. Walton, a passionate advo-
cate and a tireless researcher (she spent 1100
hours in a medical library researching the
disease and made long distance calls all over
the country to find statistics on units of
blood used in surgical transfusions), traced
her personal emotional, medical, legal and
social experiences. ~
Two well-attended Action Sessions-one
focusing on the November 1988 ballot mea-
sures on AIDS and homeless/ hunger issues
and the other dealing with federal legislation
on English Only and state legislation on
comprehensive health care-spurred
ACLU-NC members into mobilizing them-
selves and others on the issues they had dealt
with in the plenary sessions.
Drug wars
A controversial high point of the confer-
ence was the afternoon debate "Should
drugs be legalized?" The ACLU position-
that all victimless crimes, including those
involving drugs, should be decriminalized-
was put forward by ACLU-NC Chairperson
Lee Halterman.
Dr. Harry Edwards, UC Berkeley profes-
sor and sports sociologist, took the opposing
view. Stating that "the greatest terrorism in
the Black community is the drug trade,"
Edwards said that "legalizing drugs would
be to consign entire communities to a living
hell-no doubt, paved with good
intentions."
Halterman warned, "As with other wars,
the war on drugs makes its first claims on
civil liberties." He noted that the ACLU
policy of decriminalization was based on the
principle that private activity that does not
adversely impact another person should not
be illegal, that persons should not be crimi-
nally sanctioned for illness (such as drug
addiction), and that there are a panoply of
due process and equal protection problems
with current law enforcement actions
against drugs.
Both speakers also noted the parallels and
dissimilarities between legalizing illicit
drugs-such as heroin and crack cocaine-
and the legalization of the two drugs that are
responsible for most deaths in this country-
alcohol and tobacco. Questioning the
thought given to how drugs would be regu-
lated and distributed if they were legalized,
Edwards noted that without such considera-
tion, "a policy of legalizing drugs is like
diving off a high board and checking on the
way down to see if there is water in the pool."
A pre-dinner reception launched the
annual Bill of Rights Campaign. Campaign
Chair Marlene DeLancie and Co-Chair
Mike Mitchell made an enthusiastic pitch
for ACLU members to get involved in the
fundraising effort by signing up for Phone
Nights and becoming generous contributors
to the Campaign. Comedian Don Stevens
highlighted the "funny side" of raising
money for the ACLU-NC, and raffle prizes,
including the dramatic conference sweat-
shirt designed by artist Doug Minkler, were
awarded to early sign-ups.
Refugees
The dinner program, "No Human Being
Is Illegal," included a poetry reading by
Demetria Martinez. Martinez was the first
journalist indicted for sanctuary related
activities. She and her co-defendant, Reve-
rend Glen Remer-Thamert, were acquitted
on August 2 after a federal jury trial in
Albuquerque, New Mexico, and this was
her first appearance in the Bay Area.
Martinez' description of her indictment
and trial-in which her main defense was
the First Amendment freedom of the
press-was punctuated with her poignant
poetry. She began with a poem "Nativity,"
which she wrote after accompanying the
Lutheran minister on his trip to help two
pregnant Salvadoran women seek refuge in
4
the United States, which reads in part:
Your eyes, large as Canada, welcome this
stranger.
We meet in a Juarez train station where
you sat hours,
your offspring blooming in you like fruit,
dresses stained where breasts leak,
panties in purses tagged
"Hecho en El Salvador,"
your belts, like equators, mark North from
South
borders I cannot cross,
for 1 am a North American reporter,
pen and notebook, the tools
of my tribe, distance us.
The poem, she explained, turned up in the
U.S. Attorney's investigation files as
"discovery."
Martinez, who is the recipient of the 1988
National Hispanic Poetry Prize as well as a
journalist with the Albuquerque Journal
and the National Catholic Reporter, was -
followed by a presentation on the "No
Human Being Is Illegal Campaign" by
Carolina Castaneda, Director of the Central
American Refugee Center.
Castaneda, herself a Salvadoran refugee
who was persecuted, explained a massive,
national outreach campaign to explain to
the Salvadoran community, the public at
large, as well as Congress the needs and
rights of refugees in the United States. She
also called for intensifying support for the
Moakley-DeConcini bill, now pending in
the U.S. Senate, which would allow Salvad-
orans to remain in the U.S. while war and
- repression is still rampant in their homeland.
The Annual Conference, which drew 200
ACLU members and supporters, was co-
sponsored by the Gay Rights and San Fran-
cisco Chapters of the ACLU-NC. The Con-
ference was coordinated by ACLU-NC
Field Representative Marcia Gallo, who
was ably assisted by program intern Gillian
Smith. The Conference wac chaired by Dick
Grosboll, who also chaired the Conference
Planning Committee. The Committee,
which worked for months to produce a pro-
vocative and informative agenda, included:
Linda Baker, Kathy Cramer, Margot Garey,
Mary Hackenbracht, Lauren Leimbach,
Joanne Lewis, Enid Ng Lim, Mike Mitchell,
Tom Reilly, Tom Sarbaugh, Fran Strauss,
Beverly Tucker, Debby Turrietta and Mike
Williams. Turrietta also designed and pro-
duced the Conference logo and brochure.
The Conference Crew, who helped the
whole event run smoothly, was Gillian
Smith, Renel Sapiandante, Belinda Lee, Jes-
sica Coffin and Michele Hughes.
Conference Photos
1. Keynote speaker Angela Blackwell. 2. Conference Chair Dick Grosboll with Ethel Long-Scott,
panelist from the Women's Economic Agenda Project. 3. Conference Committee members (left
to right) Linda Baker, Kathy Cramer and Margot Garey with Doug Warner of the co-sponsoring
Gay Rights Chapter. 4. Panel on the Impact of AIDS featured (left to right) Andree Walton,
George Raya, Dr. Tanis Dasher and Mike Williams. 5. No on Proposition 102 Campaign
Director Dana Van Gorder and Enid Lim of the S.F. Chapter at the Action Session on AIDS
Initiatives. 6. Debater Dr. Harry Edwards with ACLU-NC Board member Beverly Tucker who
introduced the debate "Should Drugs Be Legalized?" 7. Acquitted journalist Demetria Martinez
read poetry inspired by her sanctuary trial. 8. Andy Grimstad of the co-sponsoring S.F. Chapter
hawked conference sweatshirts designed by artist Doug Minkler.
Conference photos by Elaine Elinson
ao
Shirt Sales
A limited number of sweatshirts, with an
original six-color silk Screen design by Bay 5
Area artist Doug Minkler, are still available.
Send your size, (XL, L or S only) and $20 to
Conference Sweatshirt, ACLU-NC, 1663
Mission Street #460, San Francisco, CA
94103.
aclu news
6 sept./oct. 1988
Anti-Porn Bill Goes to Governor
by Francisco Lobaco
ACLU Legislative Advocate
t the close of the legislative session
Ae Sacramento, the pornography
censorship crusade was revitalized,
and freedom to read may be its first victim.
In the last days of the session, despite intense
lobbying efforts by the ACLU and others,
the Legislature approved SB 5, a bill which
redefines California's obscenity laws.
Fortunately, SB 5, which is currently on
the Governor's desk awaiting his signature,
was passed in an amended version which
eliminated its most egregious feature-the
adoption of a "community standard" as
opposed to a "statewide standard" of
obscenity.
The bill, authored by Senator Wadie Ded-
deh (D-Chula Vista), broadens the defini-
tion of obscenity, going beyond California's
current definition which is more protective
of First Amendment rights.
As originally proposed, SB 5 applied a
community standard, as opposed to a state-
wide standard, in determining what is legally
obscene. The danger inherent in the adop-
tion of community standards is that restric-
tive communities would be empowered to
influence censorship decisions for the rest of
the state. What may be legal to read in San
Francisco may not be in Hawyard, Fresno
or any other community.
While proponents of the bill argued that
community standards and other modifica-
tions would make it easier to prosecute por-
nographers, thereby changing what they see
as California's standing as the "smut" capital
of the country, the ACLU argued that those
changes would have had a serious chilling
effect on creative output.
In other states, for example, prosecutors
have viewed similar standards as license to
harass bookstores and movie theaters. Even
in cases where the obscenity conviction is
eventually overturned, the threat and
expense of litigation has had a severe impact
on film and book distributors.
As approved by the Legislature, the mea-
sure conforms California's standard to the
one adopted by the U.S. Supreme Court in
Miller y. California. While California's cur-
rent definition of obscenity is already vague
and overbroad, it nevertheless is narrower
than the Miller standard and. therefore more
protective of the First Amendment.
No educational value
SB 5 now eliminates the educational
component from the current law which
requires that material must "lack literary,
artistic, political, scientific or educational
value." The elimination of the educational
element could result in such materials as
educational sex manuals being deemed
obscene.
The bill moved through the Legislature
with an inordinate amount of political fan-
fare and grandstanding. When the bill was
first voted in the Assembly on August 4,
Senator H.L. Richardson led a rally of thou-
sands of anti-porn crusaders on the Capitol
steps.
On August 24, the Senate Rules Commit-
tee held a widely publicized hearing at which
representatives of the movie industry, news-
NCAA Cant' Test Stanford Athletes
hen Stanford women's diving
captain Simone LeVant refused
to submit to an NCAA drug test
two years ago, she dove into a controversy of
national dimensions. When she finished her
laps, she emerged with a championship rul-
ing on privacy rights for student athletes.
On August 11, in the suit started by
LeVant, her fellow athletes represented by
the ACLU-NC won a ruling that could affect -
tens of thousands of college athletes. Santa
Clara County Superior Court Judge Con--
_ rad Rushing issued a permanent injunction
prohibiting the NCAA (National Collegiate
Athletic Association) from requiring Stan-
ford students to submit to drug testing in
order to enter NCAA competitions.
"The NCAA's monitored taking of urine
samples for drug testing is clearly an inva-
sion of the right to privacy," Rushing stated.
The NCAA began requiring college ath-
letes to submit to drug testing in 1986.
Stanford students LeVant, women's soccer
captain Jennifer Hill and football linebacker
Barry McKeever were the first in California
to challenge the rule as an invasion of the
constitutionally protected right to privacy.
In November 1987, ACLU-NC staff attor-
ney Ed Chen and cooperating attorneys
Robert Van Nest and Susan Harriman of
Keker and Brockett succeeded in winning a
preliminary injunction banning drug testing
for most of Stanford's 600 student athletes.
However, the preliminary injunction
excluded football players and men's basket-
ball players, allowing those athletes to be
tested for four substances: steroids, cocaine,
heroin and amphetamines.
Judge Rushing's permanent injunction,
following a five-week trial replete with med-
ical, drug and athletic experts, bars testing in
those sports as well. "It appears the evidence
is wholly insufficient to support the NCAA
program of drug testing in any sport," the
judge ruled.
Rushing stated that mandatory drug tests
invade an athlete's right to privacy because
"urinating under the watchful eye of an
NCAA monitor is degrading and embar-
rassing to both men and women."
He also noted that because such tests
-could reveal whether a woman athlete was
_ taking birth control pills, there was a further
invasion of privacy.
Furthermore, Judge Rushing agreed with
ACLU-NC arguments that the tests are
"fatally overbroad," because literally thou-
sands of drugs and their "related com-
pounds" are banned.
Judge Rushing, in his 28-page opinion,
stated that because some over-the-counter
medicines are prohibited substances
detected by the NCAA tests, he was con-
cerned that some athletes may avoid taking
needed medication for fear of failing a drug
test.
He also faulted the NCAA for spending
only $200,000 on drug education over a ten-
year period, while pouring $1 million into
the drug testing program in one year alone.
"Drug education is certaintly a viable alter-
native to drug testing which has not been
adequately attempted by the NCAA," Rush-
ing said.
"It's a complete victory," said cooperating
attorney Harriman. "Maybe at this point
somebody at the NCAA will sit back and
think of something they can do with all that
time and money spent on this."
The NCAA competitions involve 250,000
college athletes across the country.
Attorneys for Stanford University, who
intervened in the case during the course of
the lawsuit, also lauded the decision.
paper publishers, book sellers and other
First Amendment advocates strongly
objected to the adoption of the community
standard. That same day, the Rules Commi-
tee with a 3-2 vote recommended that the
statewide standard not be replaced with the
community standard.
A joint Assembly-Senate Conference
Committee on August 25 came up with the
final version of the bill, again rejecting the
community standard.
That version of the bill was passed by the
full Senate on August 30 and the full Assem-
bly on August 31, the final day of the session.
Governor Deukmejian is expected to sign
the bill into law.
The ACLU continues to oppose the bill as
it is still overbroad, vaguely defined and
eliminates exceptions for educational value.
Vending machines
_ Asecond measure, AB 2093, authored by
Assemblyman Gil Fergeson (R-Newport
Beach), also passed by the Legislature, bans
the sale of "harmful matter" in vending
machines located in any public place, except
those where minors are excluded. The bill
also criminalizes the sale of print materials
which contain sexual representations, but
are not legally obscene. The ACLU argued
that the bill denies adults their constitutional
right to purchase the materials in question.
Harmful covers
The Assembly passed AB 2093 by a vote
of 61 to 11 in January; it was subsequently
amended in the Senate to affect only vend-
ing machine sales of publications which dis-
play "harmful" matters on their covers.
Courts have generally held that if "harmful"
books or magazines do not carry anything
offensive on their covers, restrictions on their
sale are unconstitutional.
The Senate passed the amended version
of SB 2093 on August 25 and it is now on the
Governor's desk. He is also expected to sign
this measure into law.
"With so many crucial public policy ques-
tions on the agenda, it is absurd that the
Legislature wasted so much time on this
legislation," said ACLU lobbyist Marjorie
Swartz. "Judging from the rallies, the name
calling-one opposing Senator was called a
`porno king'-and the thousands of compu-
ter printout letters from anti-porn crusaders
that besieged legislators during these final
votes, it is obvious that the focus on this
legislation was aimed at forcing a `Moral
Majority' standard on the people of Califor-
nia," she added.
VA Workers Win
he ACLU-NC and the Employment
Law Center scored a victory July 22
when U.S. District Court Judge Robert P.
Aguilar enjoined the Veterans Administra-
tion from using urinalysis for random testing
of its Western States employees.
The "Drug-Free Federal Workplace" pro-
gram, established by President Reagan's
1986 Executive Order, mandated testing
employees of federal executive agencies. The
class action suit was brought by five non-
union VA hospital employees.
The case was argued by staff attorneys Ed
Chen and Matthew Coles of the ACLU-NC,
John True of the Employment Law Center,
and cooperating attorneys Barry Levin,
continued on p. 8
Message T-Shirt
Sales Barred from
City Streets
S= Francisco wouldn't be the same with-
out message T-shirts. They display ever-
ything from events to jokes to points of view.
Few disagree that they are a popular forum
for expression, but, according to the city of
San Francisco, T-shirts with the messages
"Free Nuclear Weapons; Stop Star Wars"
and "Save the Whales" are forms of speech
which do not belong in certain parts of the
city.
On August 4 the ACLU-NC filed an ami-
cus brief in the U.S. Court of Appeals chal-
lenging a San Francisco ordinance which
prohibits the sale of advocacy T-shirts by
non-profit organizations on San Francisco
streets. The ordinance is a "blunderbuss,"
said ACLU-NC staff attorney Margaret
Crosby, and it violates the First
~ Amendment.
In January 1986, the city adopted an
ordinance which placed restrictions on sales
by non-profit groups on the sidewalks in
Fisherman's Wharf and Union Square.
When merchants and commercial street
vendors complained that the ordinance was
not tough enough, the city added amend-
ments which essentially barred non-profit
groups from sidewalk sales.
Immediately, complaints from the non-
profits regarding the violation of First
Amendment rights began flowing in. Bow-
ing to pressure from those asserting such
rights, city attorneys admitted in court that
they could not constitutionally ban the sale
of books, bumper stickers and buttons by
the non-profits, and once again the ordi-
nance was amended. The sale of T-shirts,
however, was still prohibited.
U.S. District Court Judge William
Schwarzer enjoined the city from banning.
sale of T-shirts with messages related to the
work of the advocacy group. He ruled that
slogan-bearing apparel was a form of pro-
tected speech. The city has appealed that
decision.
"The city essentially claims that a state-
ment is constitutionally protected if printed
on paper [books, bumper stickers] or metal
[buttons], but unprotected if printed on
cloth," said Crosby.
While the city argued that the non-profits
which displayed items containing political
messages threatened the aesthetic beauty
and caused congestion in the area, the
ACLU-NC maintains that such an interest
does "not support the broad proscription on
charitable sales."
The city allows peddlers and street artists
to erect stands in Fisherman's Wharf. The
ACLU-NC contends that the government
can limit the number of all stands, but it
cannot prefer commercial activity to politi-
cal advocacy. .
Political landscape
Banning the advocacy T-shirts from sales
tables, Crosby asserted, also shrinks the -
expanse of the "marketplace of ideas,"
depriving the public of their constitutional
right to exposure to other views. Those
views are carried by advocacy T-shirts,
which are, in Crosby's words, a "lively recent
addition to America's political landscape."
T-shirts are also a means of free expres-
sion, the ACLU-NC explained. "By pur-
chasing a message-bearing T-shirt from a
non-profit organization, an individual sup-
ports its cause financially and by carrying its
message throughout the day," Crosby added.
- Suzanne Samuel
aclu news
sept/oct. 1988 7
$100,000 Goal for
Bill of Rights Campaign
ith a goal of $100,000 the Bill of
Rights Campaign kicked off its
annual fundraising drive on September 19
with the first of many "Phone Nights."
Campaign chair Marlene De Lancie
explained that this year's goal represents
nearly 20% of the total fundraising effort of
the ACLU-NC Foundation. "These dona-
tions are crucial for the legal, educational
and outreach programs of the Foundation,"
De Lancie said.
The Bill of Rights Campaign is a crucial
component of the ACLU-NC Foundation
budget. Each year, through personal letters
and phone calls, ACLU-NC members are
asked to give a special, tax-deductible con-
tribution aside from their membership.
"These contributions determine directly
how many cases we can handle and how
much education and outreach we can under-
take in Northern California," De Lancie
said.
The Campaign relies on the generous
donation of time and energy of ACLU-NC
chapter activists and volunteers. The Cam-
paign Committee, chaired by De Lancie -
(North Peninsula) and co-chaired by Mike
Mitchell (Mid-Peninsula), includes:
Deborah Doctor (Marin), Audrey Guerin
(North Peninsula), Larry Jensen (Santa
Clara), Jeff Perkins (Gay Rights), Louise
Rothman-Riemer (Earl Warren), Andrew
Rudiak (Mt. Diablo), Peggy Russell (San
Francisco), Tom Sarbaugh (B-A-R-K), and
Doris Thomson (Sacramento).
The Committee has already scheduled a
dozen Phone Nights (see schedule below) for
volunteers to call ACLU-NC members to
ask them to pledge a special gift to the
Foundation. Each Phone Night includes
DeGrand, New Fiscal Manager
Susan DeGrand
Su DeGrand, the new Fiscal Man-
ager, is not unfamiliar with the ACLU.
In her home state of Tennessee, where the
ACLU is viewed as "lefter than left," her
parents have been members for years.
DeGrand received a B.A. in Creative
Writing from Antioch University in San
Francisco and went on to take courses in
accounting at Golden Gate University
before holding bookkeeping and fiscal man-
agement positions. DeGrand has devoted
her career to sharing her financial skills with
non-profit organizations.
"I prefer to work at a place that's activist,"
she explains, "and a place trying to do
something to effect positive change." The
groups she has worked with include the Fort
Mason Foundation, the Alvarado Arts
Workshop, Scroungers Center for Reusable
Union Maid Photos
g
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Bill of Rights Campaign Co-chair Mike
Mitchell and Chair Marlene DeLancie
recruit fund raising volunteers for Phone
Nights.
volunteer training and dinner, and, accord-
ing to Development Associate Sandy
Holmes who is staffing the Campaign, "the
challenge and pleasure of working with
other volunteers to help build the resources
of the ACLU."
If you want to volunteer for a Bill of
Rights Campaign Phone Night, check the
schedule on this page and call Sandy
Holmes at (415) 621-2493. More Phone
Nights will be scheduled, so call for an
`update. All are welcome.
1988 Bill of Rights Campaign
~ Phone Night Schedule
OCTOBER
Monday, October 3
Tuesday, October 4
Tuesday, October 11
Wednesday, October 12
Monday, October 17
Wednesday, October 19
NOVEMBER
Monday, November 14
Saturday, November 19
The Mount Diablo, Sacramento and Yolo Chapters will be scheduling phone
nights in the next few weeks.
If you are interested in volunteering for a phone night, or you would like
more information about the time and location of any specific phone
night, please call Sandy Holmes at the ACLU Office, (415) 621-2493.
B-A-R-K and Earl Warren Chapters
(Oakland location)
Marin Chapter
(Larkspur location)
Santa Clara Valley Chapter
(Campbell location)
San Francisco and Gay Rights Chapters
(ACLU Office, San Francisco)
Mid-Peninsula Chapter
(Palo Alto location)
*"Baseball Night**
(ACLU Office, San Francisco-
a very special phone night for sports fans!
Here's your night to cheer on your favorite
team during the playoffs.)
North Peninsula Chapter
(San Mateo location)
10am - 2pm
(ACLU Office, San Francisco)
Arts Parts (SCRAP), Friends of Support
Services for the Arts and Central City Hos-
pitality House.
Before coming to the ACLU-NC,
DeGrand served as Fiscal Manager for Cen-
tral City Hospital House, a Tenderloin
agency which provides the homeless and
low-income Tenderloin residents with servi-
ces including a shelter, an art program, a
youth program and a peer counseling center.
Working at Hospitality House, she says,
"was an experience such as I've never had
before in my life. It was important for me in
that the homeless are now individuals, not a
faceless mass. It's given me a completely
different perspective in terms of what is
necessary in the world and what is superfi-
cial. It redefined my values tremendously."
Before coming to Hospitality House,
DeGrand worked at Harrah's in Reno-a
place which she considers to be similar to the
Tenderloin. "In both places," she explains,
"there is an anonymity to the amount of
transience, and there is the false glitter that
your ship is going to come in suddenly. You
could also say that life in the Tenderloin is
like a gamble."
ACLU, (c)
As Fiscal Manager at the
DeGrand is in charge of the accounting and
fiscal management for both the affiliate and
the ACLU-NC Foundation. DeGrand
appreciates the way in which the ACLU
addresses issues using a long continuum.
"The ACLU has a historical stability," she
notes, "that I have never experienced before
`in anon-profit. It's a sense of history-of the
past and the future."
DeGrand's financial expertise has already
been an asset to the ACLU-NC. The com--
bined operating budget of both the Founda-
tion and the affiliate is over $1 million.
According to ACLU-NC executive direc-
tor Dorothy Ehrlich, "Susan jumped into
our painstaking annual budget process as
soon as she was hired. Within six weeks she
had prepared a budget of over $1 million.
Her arrival also coincided with a major
The ACLU-NC mourns the passing of
Jan Criley, a veteran ACLU activist and a
central figure in the Monterey Chapter of
the ACLU, who died on September 2 follow-
ing a lengthy illness.
Criley was a board member of the Monte-
rey Chapter and a mainstay of the Chapter's
Complaint Hotline. In that capacity, she
took hundreds of calls from individuals who
turned to the ACLU because they felt their
rights had been violated. "Jan took on one of
the most difficult jobs of the ACLU-trying
to find a recourse for people who had been
wronged-and she did this wearing task
with unflinching warmth, sensitivity and
compassion," said ACLU-NC Executive
Director Dorothy Ehrlich.
"Jan lived her life in complete consonance
with her principles," said Ehrlich. "Her pas-
sionate involvement in peace and justice
issues is an inspiration to all of us."
Criley's activism was not limited to the
Jan Criley
budget crisis-yet she was able to organize
our accounts thoroughly so that the Board
could make difficult decisions with the most
organized and comprehensive figures
possible."
She also aims to revise the ACLU-NC
accounting system and streamline the finan-
cial records by using a sophisticated compu-
ter system to bring the whole system in-
house.
ACLU. She was recording secretary of the
United Nations Association, and a member
of the Monterey County SANE/ Freeze,
Monterey County Sanctuary, El Refugio,
Medical Aid to El Salvador and the Repro-
ductive Rights Coalition. She was also an
umbrella-carrying member of the Star Wars
Drill Team, a memorable part of numerous
peace and disarmament demonstrations.
At a September 9 memorial meeting at
the Unitarian Church of Monterey Penin-
sula, family, friends and fellow activists from
her many areas of work paid tribute to her
energy, intelligence and commitment.
She is survived by her husband, Dick
Criley, executive director of the Monterey
ACLU-NC Chapter, her mother, her sister,.
two brothers, her daughter and _ her
granddaughter.
The family requests that any memorial
contributions be sent to the Monterey Chap-
ter of the ACLU or the Monterey County
SANE/ Freeze.
aclu news
8 sept./oct. 1988
OCC Makes "Giant Strides"
Practices Project, the once sleepy
watchdog of the San Francisco Police
Department has made giant strides in the
past year.
Under previous directors, the Office of
Citizens Complaints (OCC) had developed a
reputation as a "lap dog" of the police. The
agency sustained few complaints, snubbed
community groups, and even squandered its
scarce resources on promoting the police
department.
That began to change last year, when
rising controversy and scathing reports
from the ACLU-NC, the San Francisco Bar
Association and even the City Auditor
forced Director Frank Schober to resign. In
November, San Francisco voters removed a
spending cap on the OCC's budget. And
after receiving more than 200 applications in
a nationwide search for a new director, the
Police Commission selected Michael
Langer, former chief of detectives of the
Skokie, Illinois, Police Department.
Since then the agency has added two
investigators despite the severe citywide
budget crunch, obtained a Police Commis-
sion order that all officers cooperate with the
OCC investigators, stopped document
shredding and established closer relations
with community groups of all types. Langer
is also working with the San Francisco Bar
Association to set up a pro bono panel of
hearing officers.
Of the complaints filed in 1987 that hav
been completed to date, 98 of the allegations
made against San Francisco police officers
were found to have merit, almost triple the
amount from the previous year. The total
number of complaints was about 1,500 in
both years.
The ACLU-NC's Police Practices Project
aided the OCC's revival by keeping a steady
drumbeat against the OCC's lax practices
and working closely with Langer since he
took office last November. The Project has
Qi by the ACLU-NC's Police
Title Changed (c)
continued from p. I
The agreement changes the title appear-
ing in the voter handbook and on the ballot
from "Acquired Immune Deficiency Syn-
drome Reporting" to "Reporting Exposure
to AIDS Virus." In addition, the words
"requires reporting AIDS cases" in the old
voting machine label were substituted with
"requires reporting persons exposed to
AIDS virus."
"Having AIDS and carrying the AIDS
virus are not the same thing," Coles said.
"The title and summary originally assigned
to Proposition 102 was misleading because
there are far fewer AIDs cases in California
than people who have been exposed to the
virus," he added.
At the August 10 hearing, Paul Gann, a
supporter of the initiative, showed up with a
pre-packaged press release claiming that his
opponents had been defeated a second time
by not having the initiative removed from
the ballot. Once the settlement hearing was
completed, and the point of the lawsuit-
change the wording of ballot materials-
made clear, reporters left Gann's release in
the circular file.
Attorneys who litigated both cases are
Coles, ACLU-NC cooperating attorneys
George Cumming and Tom Peterson of Bro-
beck, Phleger and Harrison, Benjamin Schatz
of National Gay Rights Advocates and
Roberta Achtenberg of the Lesbian Rights
Project.
also played a key role in blocking legal
efforts: by police officers to undercut the
OCC's authority.
In one case, Police Practices Project direc-
tor John Crew and ACLU cooperating
attorney Maria Astengo of Pillsbury, Madi-
son and Sutro helped a woman defeat a defa-
mation suit filed by an officer who had
arrested her. The woman, a transsexual
arrested for "obstructing the sidewalk" by
two officers who assumed she was a prosti-
tute, filed a brutality complaint against the
officers in May 1987. In December, minutes
before a hearing on the complaint was slated
to be held in OCC offices, the woman was
presented with a small claims complaint by
one of the officers.
"Clearly the motivation was to intimidate
the complainant from testifying-to scare
her off," said Crew.
The small claims court judge upheld the
officer's complaint and ordered the woman
to pay damages. But the ACLU-NC Project
took up the woman's cause and won a rever-
sal on appeal. The OCC also sustained new
charges against the officers for failing to
cooperate with the complaint process.
In another case, the ACLU-NC filed a
friend of the court brief wtih the state Court
of Appeal in a police union suit challenging
the OCC's hearing procedure. The Police
Officers Association (POA) contended that
OCC hearings were personnel hearings, and
that allowing complainants to participate
violated an officer's right to privacy. The
court quashed the POA suit, ruling that the
. primary purpose of OCC hearings is fact
gathering.
In one of the OCC's most dramatic cases
to date, it upheld complaints by gay rights
groups that police were lax in investigating
the stabbing death of a gay man.
Crew helped the Stonewall Gay Demo-
cratic Club and the Alice B. Toklas Lesbian
and Gay Democratic Club in preparing and
filing the complaints. The OCC conducted a
two-month investigation and concluded that
police-conducted interviews and evidence
collection at the crime scene were inade-
quate. They also found that the laughter
heard emanating from the victim's home
shortly after the police arrived was improper.
Most significantly, the OCC also con-
cluded that the shoddy investigation was
caused in part by the victim's status as a gay
man and this constituted official misconduct
on the part of the officers responsible for the
case. A disciplinary trial before the Police
Commission is scheduled for later this year.
The Police Commission has supported
the reinvigorated agency by warning all
officers that they must cooperate fully with
the OCC or face "the most severe forms of
discipline, including termination."
In July the Commission slapped an
officer with a 90-day suspension without
pay, the stiffest penalty yet given to an
officer resulting from an OCC investigation.
The OCC had determined that the officer,
six-year veteran John Haggett, had pistol-
whipped a minor while arresting him.
According to Crew, "While there is still a
long way to go, we are very pleased with the
progress being made in the OCC. The last
year has brought more improvements in the
agency than the previous five years
combined.
"With continuing reforms, maybe San
Francisco will finally get the effective and
credible police watchdog agency it voted for
six long years ago," Crew added.
-Kent Miller
B-A-R-K (Berkeley area) CHAPTER
MEETING: (Usually fourth Thursday) Come
to Bill of Rights Phone Nights (jointly with
Earl Warren Chapter) on Monday, September
26 and Monday, October 3. Both will be held at
171 12th Street, Oakland, at 6:30 p.m.; call
835-8870 for details. Contact Julie Houck,
415/848-4752.
EARL WARREN (Oakland/ Alameda
County) CHAPTER MEETING: (Usually
third Wednesday) See B-A-R-K Calendar for
joint Bill of Rights Phone Night dates.
October meeting set for third Wednesday, Oct.
19, 7:30 p.m. Contact Paul Bernstein, 415 /534-
ACLU or Lauren Leimbach, 415/655-7339
(eve).
FRESNO CHAPTER MEETING: (Usually
third Tuesday) For September and October
209/486-7735 (eve).
GAY RIGHTS CHAPTER MEETING:
(Usually first Wednesday) Wednesday,
October 5, 7:00 p.m., Chapter Phone Night for
the Bill of Rights Campaign. ACLU-NC
office, 1663 Mission St., San Francisco. Con-
tact Doug Warner, 415/621-3900.
MARIN CHAPTER MEETING: (Usually
third Monday) Monday, October 17, 7:30 p.m.,
Citicorp Bank, 130 Throckmorton Avenue,
Mill Valley. We will be establishing a Marin
Hotline, watch quarterly newsletter for details!
Contact Eileen Siedman, 415/383-0848.
MID-PENINSULA (Palo Alto area) CHAP-
TER MEETING: (Usually fourth Wednes-
day) Wednesday, September 28, 8:00 p.m., All
Saints Episcopal Church, 555 Waverly, Room
15, Palo Alto. Special Event in October featur-
ing guest speakers: Chris Durkin, Chief of
Police of Palo, and John Crew, ACLU attor-
ney. Thursday, October 27, 8:00 p.m. at Mit-
chell Park. Contact Harry Anisgard, 415/
856-9186.
MONTEREY CHAPTER MEETING: Usu-
ally fourth Tuesday ) Tuesday, September 27,
7:30 p.m., Monterey Library, Pacific and Jef-
ferson Streets, Monterey. Annual Ralph
Atkinson Civil Liberties Award Banquet
honoring Edith Alt. October 30, 3:30 to 5:00
p.m. at the Santa Catalina School. Contact
Richard Criley, 408/624-7562.
VA Workers
continued from p. 6
Melanie Gold, Andrea Adam and Gabriel
Bassan of Heller, Ehrman, White and
McAuliffe.
The court agreed with the plaintiffs who
argued that Reagan's drug testing plan vio-
lated employees' Fourth Amendment rights.
Judge Aguilar found testing without "reaso-
nable suspicion" of on the job drug impair-
ment and
unconstitutional.
In explaining why such a program does
not create a drug-free environment, plain-
tiffs' attorneys cited the high levels of false
positive and false negative test results
obtained from urinalysis, and the program's
failure to test for alcohol or prescription drug
"post-accident" _ testing
abuse which constitute a greater problem in ~
the workplace than illicit drug use.
Moreover, urinalysis drug tests, unlike
blood-alcohol tests, do not measure impair-
ment; they only indicate prior exposure to
drugs, days or even weeks before.
The ruling in this case came on the heels
of two other recent victories in drug testing
cases in which the ACLU has participated.
In a case brought by the American Federa-
meeting details please contact Mindy Rose,
Chapter Meetings
MT. DIABLO (Contra Costa County)
CHAPTER MEETING: (Usually fourth
Tuesday or Wednesday) Wednesday, Sep-.
tember 28, at 7:30 p.m. -Date for October
meeting to be set at that time. Contact Beverly
Bortin, 934-1927.
NORTH PENINSULA (San Mateo area)
CHAPTER MEETING: (NOTE CHANGE:
Now third Monday) Monday, October 17, 7:30
p.m. Bank of America, Third and El Camino,
San Mateo. Contact Bob Delzell, 415/
343-7339.
SACRAMENTO VALLEY CHAPTER
MEETING: (Usually second Wednesday)
Wednesday, October 12, 7:30 p.m., County
Administration Building, 7th/I Streets, Sacra-
mento. Annual Membership Meeting Friday,
October 21, Auditorium of the Almond Grow-
ers Exchange, 1701 C Street. Contact Eric
Andrus, 916/441-2552 or Joe Gunterman, 916 /
447-8053.
SAN FRANCISCO CHAPTER MEET-
ING: (Usually fourth Tuesday) Next meeting
will be Tuesday, October 27, 6:00 p.m. ACLU
office, 1663. Mission Street, San Francisco.
Contact Marion Standish, 415/863-3520.
SANTA CLARA CHAPTER MEETING:
(Usually first Tuesday of the month) Next
meeting Tuesday, October 4. Contact Christine
Beraldo, 408/554-9478.
SANTA CRUZ CHAPTER MEETING:
Contact Kathleen Tranchina, 408/438-6094.
SONOMA CHAPTER MEETING: (Usually |
third Thursday) Thursday, October 27. Con-
tact June Swan, 707/546-7711.
YOLO COUNTY CHAPTER MEETING:
(Usually third Wednesday) Wednesday,
October 19. Contact Casey McKeever, 916/
442-0753.
Field Committee
Meetings
Field Committee: Priority setting meeting to
be held on Saturday, November 12, from 10:30
a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Contact Marcia Gallo,
ACLU-NC office, 415/621-2493.
tion of Government Employees (AFGE), in
which the ACLU-NC filed an amicus brief;
a May ruling held the drug testing of Bureau
of Prisons employees to be unconstitutional.
Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Con-
nor denied the Government's request to stay
that injunction pending appeal.
AFGE also sued the Veterans Adminis-
tration on behalf of its members nationwide.
On August 8, Judge William Ingram ruled
that he agreed with Judge Aguilar's order
and stated that Judge Aguilar's preliminary
injunction protected AFGE members as
well.
In a suit brought by the ACLU national
office in Washington, D.C., testing of Justice
Department attorneys was also deemed ille-
gal in a decision handed down in late July.
"The preliminary injunction against the
Veterans Administration is an important
victory," said Chen. "Not only will it pre-
serve the constitutional rights of thousands
of innocent, law-abiding employees until
trial, it, together with the preliminary
injunctions issued against drug testing of
Bureau of Prisons employees and Justice
Department attorneys, represents a major
setback to the Reagan Executive Order
which calls for testing of over two million
federal employees." '