Rift Emerges at A.C.L.U. on 2 Big Issues
By STEPHANIE STROM
Published: December 8, 2005
....Since (Anthony D.) Romero stepped into the job just four days before the Sept. 11 attacks, the A.C.L.U. has been transformed. Under his watch, membership and revenues have risen sharply. The use of data to maximize contributions has become more sophisticated. Big donors have been wooed and won. At the group's first membership conference in Washington in 2003, 1,500 members descended on Congressional offices.
But Mr. Romero has also become a lightning rod, with a band of vociferous internal critics saying that civil liberties are not his top concern. They have seized on his failure to inform the board about a settlement with the New York attorney general over privacy breaches on its Web site and his signing of a government fund-raising agreement that the organization later renounced. In both cases, they say, Mr. Romero was not entirely forthcoming even after those controversies came to light.
There have been heated boardroom exchanges and an unusual number of resignations from the board. Dissidents say Mr. Romero is ignoring the A.C.L.U.'s traditions, of encouraging dissent; threatening its core principles, like free speech, and too often acting without the full knowledge and support of the board, which is supposed to guide him.
"I think there is an ideological difference among board members having to do with pure principle versus the pragmatism of money," Ms. Esman said, echoing current and past board members.
The internal friction has roiled the organization, which is unaccustomed to scrutiny of its operations, and prompted members of the executive committee to try to limit access to recordings of board meetings....
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/08/national/08aclu.html?pagewanted=all