Progressives Mastering Politics of Control

There was a time, in the mist of the past, when the American Civil Liberties Union actually cared about civil liberties — so much so that it would defend those rights for people whose views they (and most Americans) abhorred. On occasion, that even included defending the protest and free-speech rights of the Ku Klux Klan and neo-Nazis.

Today, the ACLU’s commitment to that principle above all else has disappeared. Its mission has warped into something else. Rather than expanding access to the public square, the powerful progressive activist group regularly seeks to constrict it. It often couches its new illiberalism in the language of its old mission: “Far from compromising civil liberties, vaccine mandates actually further civil liberties,” two of the group’s national leaders argued implausibly in a September essay for the New York Times.

About the Author

Nate Hochman

Nate Hochman was a staff writer at National Review.

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There was a time, in the mist of the past, when the American Civil Liberties Union actually cared about civil liberties — so much so that it would defend those rights for people whose views they (and most Americans) abhorred. On occasion, that even included defending the protest and free-speech rights of the Ku Klux Klan and neo-Nazis.

Today, the ACLU’s commitment to that principle above all else has disappeared. Its mission has warped into something else. Rather than expanding access to the public square, the powerful progressive activist group regularly seeks to constrict it. It often couches its new illiberalism in the language of its old mission: “Far from compromising civil liberties, vaccine mandates actually further civil liberties,” two of the group’s national leaders argued implausibly in a September essay for the New York Times.