ACLU Alternative Launches and Makes Waves - YEAH!!

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Wednesday, May 14, 2008

ACLU Alternative Launches and Makes Waves

By Jeremy Reynalds
Correspondent for ASSIST News Service

NEW YORK, NY  (ANS) -- There’s now an alternative to the ACLU. It’s the Manhattan-based Gotham Legal Foundation.

A news release from the group said that the Gotham Legal Foundation’s intent is a focus on “aggressively advancing the cause of liberty,” and it has already signed its first client.

That’s Rev. Michel Faulkner's New Horizon Church Ministry, an organization which Gotham said is being denied the right to operate a publicly funded charter school because of its clearly expressed religious viewpoint.

Executive Director Jay Golub said in a news release the group believes strongly in the case because of its clear free speech implications.

He said, “We believe in a level playing field for all Americans, and that eliminating pointless discrimination against people of faith makes America stronger.”

Golub added, “Reverend Faulkner would run a great school. Along with his masters in education, (he) has support in his community and the trust of local parents. A school run by the ministry would do all of the same things any other nonprofit group would do in managing an educational environment, and we believe that discrimination of this type is just as damaging as any other. Of course this is not the kind of case that the ACLU regularly takes because it doesn't fit their overall ideological agenda. That's the void Gotham intends to fill.”

Golub was emphatic that Gotham will stand up for every breach of liberty.

“The ACLU is well known for their ideology, but no one can doubt their effectiveness,” said Golub in the release.

He added, “While the conservative movement has been unnecessarily stuck on the concept of strict constructivism, at Gotham we won't be guided by such a barrier. Our only guides are within the Constitution and our playbook is open to all the modern techniques of the day, including the aggressive filing of lawsuits that force courts to act in defending and advancing individual freedoms unencumbered by government overreach.”

Gotham will file up to three new cases this year, and was cited in a recent George Will column on the Faulkner case.
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