The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) encountered bitter opposition in the South for challenging racial discrimination in the courts. Hostility to the organization mounted following its victory in Brown v. Board of Education. As the NAACP worked on forcing school districts to comply with Brown, southern hostility led states to try to figure out ways to stop the NAACP from doing its work.
In 1956, Alabama’s state attorney general tried to stop the NAACP from doing business in Alabama by enforcing a law that required out-of-state corporations to register and satisfy certain reporting requirements before doing business in the state. (Though you may think of a “corporation” as something different, the NAACP counts as a non-profit corporation.) The NAACP was incorporated in New York and considered itself exempt from Alabama’s law requiring, among other things, filing with the state certain records and membership lists, including the names and addresses of all members living in Alabama.
The NAACP filed its registration with the state, but refused to turn over the list of its members. For refusing to obey the state law, the NAACP was declared to be in contempt of court and fined $100,000. On appeal, the case reached the US Supreme Court.
Present (in the comments) your argument for what, if anything, in the Constitution justifies the NAACP in ignoring the Alabama law. Also indicate how you would rule in the case if you were on the court, and why.
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
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9 comments:
The NAACP filed with the state in compliance with the law, but then disobeyed it by refusing to turn over the names address’s of all members in Alabama. The Constitution promises the right to privacy to every citizen in this country; it would therefore be unconstitutional for the NAACP to turn over that information. Here’s why: When people who were already members of the NAACP in Alabama initially joined, they were not forced to submit this information to the state of Alabama. The NAACP never said to them that they need to. For that matter, nowhere in the country is it necessary to do that. Because the people who are members were not required to give up their right to privacy initially, the NAACP can’t then violate their rights even if the attorney general tells them to. That’s the ethical argument anyway. Another is that, at the time, being a member of the NAACP was could make you a target for race violence and therefore having that information be public knowledge could be dangerous to your life. The NAACP could not release this information believing that it could cause harm to its members.
Why would Alabama need to know the name and address of every single NAACP affiliate in the State?! What would they do with that information?
I think it’s a huge violation of privacy. Even though privacy is not mentioned in the constitution, it has been established as a basic human right in other court cases. The 9th amendment protects basic human rights, so this stupid state law is unconstitutional.
Obviously and ethically, I’d rule in favor of the NAACP.
If I were on the supreme court I would rule in favor of the NAACP. My argument is that having to turn over members' private documents is a violation of the 4th Amendment. The 4th Amendment guarantees the right to all citizens "...to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated..." Therefore, I think that the Alabama law was unconstitutional because of my reasoning above.
The legal rights of corporations are the same as a citizen. Thus having the same rights a US citizen and the Alabama law clearly violates the NAACP's 14th amendment rights. I would rule this case unconstitutional.
If I were to rule on this case, I would rule in favor of the NAACP.
It's clear that the state of Alabama is attempting to undermine the efforts of the NAACP, and they're doing so in a seemingly legal way, but the goal of the state is for negative reasons.
It also contradicts the 4th amendment which guarantees privacy. If the list of members was turned over, it would violate the members' privacy. And although the members could legally permit the NAACP to hand over that information, it was not made clear that this would be a stipulation of their membership. If that were to happen, it would have to be presented in the form of terms and agreement that the members would be required to read and accept upon joining the corporation. But since they were never told their information may be made public, it shouldn't be legal to do so.
Although there is no literal right to privacy in the constitution, the supreme court regularly reads the guarantee of liberty from the 14th amendment as a fairly broad right to privacy. So while the NAACP was not technically protected by the constitution, if I was a justice I would rule in their favor.
If I were on the Supreme Court, I would rule in favor ot the NAACP. This is because the NAACP is a corporation and is entitled to some of the same rights of a citizen, including protection under the 4th amendment from unreasonable searches and seizures. The Alabama law violates this right unreasonably, and therefore is unconstitutional.
Like others have said, even though there isn't a specific amendment about privacy, quite a few of them mention the right to your property and papers, which I believe this would fall under the category of.
I would rule in favor of the NAACP.
This is a violation of the fourth amendment, which does not explicitly protect privacy, but strongly implies it in principle. And I would also rule it unconstitutional, considering the states bad intent.
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