With just a few days to go before Election Day we know you are being barraged with political advertising, mailings and emails for specific candidates. The ACLU of Illinois wants to remind you that there are two critical ballot issues worthy of your support. 

The first is an advisory referendum question that asks whether insurance plans in Illinois that offer prescription drug coverage should also cover prescription birth control. The ACLU urges a strong YES vote on this question. We must send a strong signal to legislators, other elected officials and regulators that birth control for women is a medical necessity and must be treated with dignity and respect, not as some political football.

The second question is a proposed constitutional amendment that explicitly protects voting rights in Illinois. This measure also deserves a strong YES vote from you. The ACLU historically has worked to expand and protect voting rights for all persons in the United States and we would like to see these principles enshrined in Illinois' state Constitution.

Please keep these issues in mind when you go to vote.

Thirty-six years ago this week, the federal Pregnancy Discrimination Act was signed into law. The law protects pregnant workers from job discrimination, and requires that employers treat pregnant workers the same as other workers in similar situations (like those with temporary disabilities).

Unfortunately, many women are still denied reasonable accommodations at work when they get pregnant. For example, Quinniya Hearn was working at Chicago’s Roseland Community Hospital as a mental health counselor when she became pregnant. According to a lawsuit filed by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) on her behalf, Ms. Hearn asked Roseland to accommodate her high-risk pregnancy by temporarily excusing her from restraining disorderly and combative patients.  Roseland refused to accommodate her medically ordered restrictions, but granted the same request when made by a male security guard with an injury. Roseland later fired Ms. Hearn, allegedly because of her pregnancy as well.

The EEOC has made fighting pregnancy discrimination a priority issue in recent years, filing a number of lawsuits and issuing new guidance on pregnancy discrimination for employers. In April, EEOC Commissioner Chai Feldblum expressed shock at how many employers and employees don’t realize that pregnancy discrimination is illegal.  Illinois recently addressed the issue by enacting a law that expands workplace protections for pregnant employees, including requiring employers to tell employees about their rights.
 

Have you experienced pregnancy discrimination at work?  Tell us about it here.
 
 

Over the weekend, the State of Illinois announced that it too would impose a mandatory quarantine on health care workers who return to Illinois after providing professional care to those suffering with Ebola in West Africa.  In response to this announcement, ACLU of Illinois Executive Director Colleen Connell issued the following statement:

As we continue to gather information about the State's plans for a quarantine policy related to Ebola, we urge such policy to be guided by public health care professionals, not politicians. Forcibly quarantining an individual who is not exhibiting symptoms of any disease is a dramatic step, fraught with numerous constitutional questions. A forced quarantine is, at its core, the deprivation of fundamental liberty. Government should not exercise this authority without clear standards (based on public health science) and without an ability to have a decision to quarantine reviewed. This is what our Constitution demands, and without appropriate due process there is a risk that the State will abuse its authority.

For all these reasons, the State of Illinois should be very cautious before it implements this policy.