News & Commentary

The Illinois Senate approved the legislation limiting law enforcement agencies’ access to “real time” location tracking data generated by the electronic devices that are now used daily by an ever growing majority of Americans. The ACLU of Illinois supports the bill and points out that in 2011, phone carriers received as many as 1.3 million demands for information about their subscribers, including location-tracking information. The bill, which now goes to the Illinois House, seeks to balance privacy issues with public safety needs. It allows police and other government agencies to obtain a tracking order, similar to a search warrant, based on probable cause of a crime. In an article at Evanston Now, the bill’s sponsor, Senator Daniel Biss (D-Evanston), maintains that:

The day started with a cold downpour of rain, drenching everyone and everything, as we boarded a bus at 6:00 a.m. in Chicago to travel to Springfield, Illinois. There was no promise of sunshine for this trip, literally or figuratively, as we headed to the state capital to voice our opposition to the recently-enforced Illinois Parental Notification Act (PNA). Currently, there is not a legislative proposal before the Illinois General Assembly to rescind the law. So everyone making the trek to Springfield understood that the planned march and rally was largely symbolic. Yet, by late afternoon, as we all walked down the capitol steps, under a still misty-grey sky, everyone was smiling and there was a swagger of accomplishment as we re-boarded the buses home.Ever since a State Supreme Court ruling paved the way for enforcement of

The Illinois State Supreme Court recently struck down the state's eavesdropping law. The ruling came in two cases where the law's requirement of consent of all parties before a conversation could be recorded had been used in some places to prosecute individuals who recorded conversations that were really not private, or involved recording public officials doing their public duties. The Court found the language of the law was too vague and too broad in permitting these prosecutions. Now, members of Illinois General Assembly must pass legislation in order to put an eavesdropping law in place. The ACLU of Illinois has urged the General Assembly to maintain the important privacy protections in the previous law, protections that protect residents of Illinois against broad government intrusion. Ed Yohnka, ACLU of Illinois Communications Director noted the challenge here:

The ACLU of Illinois helped to clarify an issue regarding a local woman's First Amendment right to peacefully assemble in a letter to the City of Peoria this week. Shelby Cooper, organizer of the city's first Million March Against Child Abuse was told that she would need to pay for a permit, and would need proof of insurance coverage for her event. She contacted the ACLU who stated in the letter:

The Illinois Senate Judiciary Committee debated and defeated a resolution, opposed by the ACLU of Illinois, which urged academia to condemn college and university boycotts as a tool to influence policy issues on the international scene. The defeated non-binding resolution called on Illinois college and university presidents to publicly oppose boycotts in an effort to deter any action against Israeli institutions now being promoted on many campuses by pro-Palestinian groups. Introduced by Illinois State Senator Ira Silverstein (D-8th) the resolution sited the disruptive effects boycotts have on students’ rights to a global education. ACLU of Illinois Legislative Director Mary Dixon sited the U. S. Supreme Court decisions upholding the importance of freedom of association. In her statement on the resolution Dixon said:

ACLU of Illinois Executive Director Colleen K. Connell appeared on WTTW's Chicago Tonight to discuss the cases of two companies - Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood Specialties - that are seeking exemption from the Affordable Care Act's requirement to provide access to contraception in their employee health care coverage based on religious objections. Watch the segment below:

The Illinois House passed legislation to make permanent the very successful Illinois Traffic Stop Data Collection Act which requires state and local police in Illinois to record particular information (including the race of the motorist) for every civilian stopped for a traffic infraction. The measure, first adopted in 2003, under the leadership of then State Senator Barack Obama, contained a "sunset" provision resulting in several temporary extensions. Should the permanent extension also win State Senate support, police and law enforcement officials will continue to compile and report the race of every motorist stopped for traffic violations in Illinois, casting a spotlight on racial profiling problems. By making the program permanent, the bill, sponsored by Monique Davis (D-Chicago) and supported by ACLU of Illinois, keeps in place a process which forces law enforcement officials to self-assess and check their motivations for stopping drivers. Ed Yohnka, ACLU of Illinois Communications Director, emphasized that the program’s existing sunset provision would have ended the data gathering in 2015 unless another extension was granted, as has been done in the past:

Chicago Sun-Times columnist Neil Steinberg distills the religious freedom hyperbole surrounding the Hobby Lobby case, now before the U. S. Supreme Court, and synthesizes what the case is really about: a woman’s civil liberties. Hobby Lobby seeks exemption from the Affordable Care Act which mandates employee- health insurance policies cover contraceptives; it maintains that forcing it to comply would violate the religious beliefs of Hobby Lobby owners and share-holders. In a WTTW interview, Colleen Connell, Executive Director of the ACLU of Illinois, argued that religious freedom issues are not applicable “in this instance” because the company is a profit making corporate entity, not a religious organization. Steinberg’s Sun Times column outlines the country’s historical social progress which, over time, has mitigated the power of employers to control the private lives of their workers and pairs that reality against Hobby Lobby’s oral arguments before the court. Switching religious labels Steinberg surmised:

Legal Director Harvey Grossman appeared on WTTW's Chicago Tonight to discuss the Illinois Supreme Court ruling that struck down the Illinois Eavesdropping Law. You can watch the segment below: