The American Civil Liberties Union is pushing members of Congress to introduce a federal End Racial Profiling Act (ERPA) that would build on the guidelines issued by the Department of Justice in 2003, which ban federal law enforcement agencies from engaging in racial profiling and require states to establish procedures for handling racial profiling complaints. See www.aclu.org/profiling.
Yesterday, the ACLU cheered the House of Representatives for passing H.R. 923, the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act, by a vote of 422-2. The Senate Judiciary Committee has passed the companion bill, S. 535, out of committee. This legislation would promote the investigation and prosecution of unsolved civil rights cases by establishing a special agent in the FBI who would work with the Department of Justice to focus on clearing these cases.
The Alabama Supreme Court has ruled that state and local election officials have violated the state constitution and laws, causing the loss of voting rights for eligible voters. The recent ruling in Gooden v. Chapman resulted from a class action lawsuit filed on behalf of Richard Gooden and Angela Thomas by the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund and Alabama attorney Edward Still.
Gooden had been denied the right vote after he was convicted of felony DUI, which was illegal because Alabama law only disqualifies people whose felony convictions involve “moral turpitude.”