Liberalism At It's Finest: ACLU & NRA Odd Bedfellows. But It's About Free Speech, Not Firearms

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The A.C.L.U. Has a New Client: The National Rifle Association

The civil liberties group says it opposes the N.R.A. and its mission but has agreed to represent it in the Supreme Court in a free-speech case.

www.nytimes.com

"A central question in the case, National Rifle Association v. Vullo, No. 22-842, is whether Maria Vullo, a former superintendent of the New York State Department of Financial Services, leveraged government power in a way that violated the First Amendment."

It's a liberal thing. Liberals protect and defend speech. The term Liberal, does not equal leftist, progressive, or even Democrat.

The NRA is smart to have the ACLU and not one of the rightwing or conservative groups representing them. They can all file briefs in support, but knowledgeable, intelligent people know that the ACLU is the 800lb Gorilla on Speech.

 

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quotes:

The American Civil Liberties Union and the National Rifle Association agree about very little. They are often on opposite sides in major cases, and they certainly have starkly different views about gun rights.

But when the Supreme Court agreed to hear the N.R.A.’s free-speech challenge to what it said were a New York official’s efforts to blacklist it, one of its lawyers had a bold idea. Why not ask the A.C.L.U. to represent it before the justices?

“The N.R.A. might be thought of as the 800-pound gorilla on the Second Amendment,” said the lawyer, William A. Brewer III. “Clearly, the A.C.L.U. is the 800-pound gorilla on the First Amendment.”

David Cole, the civil liberties group’s national legal director, said the request in one sense posed a hard question.

points made here at usmb before: You Know Things Are Changing When