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==History==
==History==
===National Civil Liberties Bureau===
===National Civil Liberties Bureau===
The NCLB was formed as a committee of the American Union Against Militarism, which in 1920 became the ACLU.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://blogs.princeton.edu/mudd/2012/09/the-birth-of-the-civil-liberties-bureau-and-the-national-civil-liberties-bureau1917-1919/ |title=The Birth of the Civil Liberties Bureau and The National Civil Liberties Bureau,1917-1919 |date=September 5, 2012 }}</ref> The ACLU's founding members were [[Roger Baldwin]], [[Crystal Eastman]], [[Walter Nelles]], [[Morris Ernst]], [[Albert DeSilver]], [[Arthur Garfield Hays]], [[Helen Keller]], [[Jane Addams]], [[Felix Frankfurter]], and [[Elizabeth Gurley Flynn]].
The ACLU began as the National Civil Liberties Bureau NCLB), a committee of the American Union Against Militarism (AUAM), a Socialist front group established to exploit antiwar sentiment during World War I.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://blogs.princeton.edu/mudd/2012/09/the-birth-of-the-civil-liberties-bureau-and-the-national-civil-liberties-bureau1917-1919/ |title=The Birth of the Civil Liberties Bureau and The National Civil Liberties Bureau,1917-1919 |date=September 5, 2012 }}</ref> AUAM was co-founded by Morris Hillquit, a Latvian immigrant lawyer who served as liaison between the Socialist International and the Socialist Party of the U.S.<ref>Michael Kazin, quoted in Juliet Kleber, "[https://newrepublic.com/article/141647/opposition-world-war-one-galvanized-left How Opposition to World War I Galvanized the Left]," ''The New Republic'', March 28, 2017</ref> In 1919, the American Socialist Party expressed official support for the Kremlin's fledgling Communist International,<ref>"The Socialist Party of the United States, therefore, declares itself in support of the Third (Moscow) International..." Document No. 7: "Minority Report Adopted by Overwhelming Party Vote on Referendum on Submission to the Emergency National Convention Held at Chicago, September, 1919," reprinted in Joint Legislative Committee of the State of New York Investigating Seditious Activities, ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=Vq0XAAAAYAAJ Revolutionary Radicalism: Its History, Purpose and Tactics], Part I, Vol. I (Albany: J.B. Lyon Company, 1920), p. 626</ref> and the following year applied for membership in the Comintern.<ref>[https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/parties/spusa/1920/0312-bran-applicationtoci.pdf Application of the Socialist Party of America for Membership in the Communist International], March 12, 1920</ref> That year, the NCLB changed its name to ACLU.
In 1924, William J. Burns, former director of the Department of Justice's Bureau of Investigations (precursor of the FBI), testified before Congress:
{{cquote|I dare say that unless the country becomes thoroughly aroused concerning the danger of this radical element in this country, we will have a very serious situation. These parlor Bolsheviks have sprung up everywhere, as evidenced by this American Civil Liberties Union of New York. They have organized a civil liberties union on the coast. Wherever we seek to suppress these radicals, a civil liberties union promptly gets busy.<ref>Testimony of William J. Burns before a subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, U.S. House of Representatives, April 1, 1924, as quoted in The Record of the Fight for Free Speech in 1923: The Work of the American Civil Liberties Union, January to December 1923, in ACLU 1923 [https://books.google.com/books?id=V30zAQAAMAAJ Annual Report]</ref>}}
Four years later, in 1928, a committee of the New York State Legislature agreed:
{{cquote|The ACLU, in the last analysis, is a supporter of all subversive movements; its propaganda is detrimental to the interests of the state. Its main work is to uphold the Communists in spreading revolutionary propaganda and inciting revolutionary activities to undermine our American institutions and overthrow our Federal government.<ref>As cited in Investigation of Communist propaganda: report, pursuant to H. Res. 220. United States. Congress. House. Special Committee on Communist Activities in the United States. U.S. Govt. Print. Off., 1931, p. 57</ref>}}
Three years after that, in 1931, a special committee of the U.S. House of Representatives concurred:
{{cquote|The American Civil Liberties Union has received large sums from the Garland Fund, of which Roger N. Baldwin is one of its directors. During the trial of the Communists in Gastonia, not for freedom of speech, of the press or assembly, but for a conspiracy to kill the chief of police, of which seven defendants were convicted, the ACLU provided bail for five of the defendants, amounting to $28,500, which it secured from the Garland Fund. All of the defendants convicted jumped their bail and are reported to be in Russia.<ref>House of Representatives. Special Committee to Investigate Communist Activities in the United States. United States. Congress (71st, Investigation of Communist Propaganda. (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Govt. print. off., 1931). Cf. Allan H. Ryskind, "[https://web.archive.org/web/20060109190645/http://www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=9669 George Clooney’s Clueless Movie], ''Human Evants'', October 2005</ref>}}
The ACLU's founding members were [[Roger Baldwin]], [[Crystal Eastman]], [[Walter Nelles]], [[Morris Ernst]], [[Albert DeSilver]], [[Arthur Garfield Hays]], [[Helen Keller]], [[Jane Addams]], [[Felix Frankfurter]], and [[Elizabeth Gurley Flynn]]. Baldwin, the driving force behind the ACLU in its early years, testified in 1938 that he had expressed his views in the Harvard Classbook three years previously as follows:
{{cquote|I am for socialism, disarmament, and ultimately for abolishing the State itself as an instrument of violence and compulsion. I seek social ownership of property the abolition of the propertied class, and sole control by those who produce wealth. Communism is the goal.<ref>Affidavit of Roger N. Baldwin, December 31, 1938, Investigation of un-American propaganda activities in the United States. Hearings before a Special Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, 75th-78th Congress, pp. 3081-3082.</ref>}}
In 1940, during the Nazi-Soviet pact, under threat of being listed by HUAC as a Communist front, the ACLU purged from its Executive Committee any "member of any political organization which supports totalitarian dictatorship in any country, or who by his public declaration and connections indicates his support of such a principle."<ref>Lucille Milner and Martin F. Luthke, ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=s9XBz5mD1OkC Education of an American Liberal]'' (eBookIt.com, 2013), ISBN 1456602063</ref> Among those purged was Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, who would go on to serve as National Chairwoman of the Communist Party USA.<ref>[http://content.cdlib.org/view?query=&docId=kt396n99b3&chunk.id=d0e2699&toc.depth=1&toc.id=0&&x=0&y=0 History of the American Civil Liberties Union], Eleventh Report of the Senate Fact-Finding Subcommittee on Un-American Activities, California Legislature, 1961</ref>
Among the NCLB's early high-profile cases include its defense of the [[Rand School of Social Science]].<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gKM6AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA337|title=The National Civic Federation Review, Volumes 4-5|date=1919}}</ref>
Among the NCLB's early high-profile cases include its defense of the [[Rand School of Social Science]].<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gKM6AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA337|title=The National Civic Federation Review, Volumes 4-5|date=1919}}</ref>