Name: Tatsuya King

Social Justice Group: 2018-2019, Freedom of the Press

Date of Fieldwork: December 19, 2018

Name of Organization: ACLU

Person (people) with whom I met and their job titles: Chris Ott

Type of Fieldwork: Interview

What I did:

We called Chris Ott and talked about what the ACLU is and does and why it is important to the US. We also discussed famous cases where the 1st amendment was tested.

What I learned:

I learned that the ACLU has been around for a long time and that they were started to help with unfair taxes and other 1st amendment rights issues. Since then, the ACLU has worked on a lot more famous cases like Brown v Board of Education and the States ban on interracial marriage. I also learned that the 1st amendment was probably the 1st because without out it, a lot of the other amendments or laws wouldn’t be possible. This is important because if the 1st amendment were to be changed, a lot of other laws would be affected as well. There were many cases that the ACLU took where they disagreed with the clients but they still took the case. This is because the ACLU has to follow the 1st amendment and they cannot take or not take a case based on their own personal opinions.

What I learned about Social Justice “work” and/or Civil and Human rights “work” from this fieldwork:

I learned from this field work that working with organizations like the ACLU is tiring and rigorous work. Not only do you have to research and know a lot about your topic. But you are also working on many cases all the time where some of the clients may be people that you would hate outside of your work. It is because of this that people in the ACLU have to be very professional and cannot let their emotions get ahead of their work.