f I had to pick one institution more than any other that might contribute to the death of a nation, it would be the ACLU.  I, understand, of course, that the ACLU has in fact done much good in society.  Arguably, the Civil Rights Movement would not have had the track-record of success that it had were it not for the ACLU.  The problem with the ACLU, though, is that it is a false friend; for in truth it does not really stand for anything except the absence of restraint (the issue of harm aside)

To give a stark example, there is nothing at all about the ACLU that speaks to the value of racial integration.  That we should all live together as one is not in any way a part of the ACLU agenda.  It is easy to miss this because the ACLU has as a matter of fact opposed some very fulsome social values.  But from the belief that it is wrong to prevent people from having access to this or that, it does not follow at all that one also has the belief that it is a good thing for people to interact freely.  Certainly, one need not believe that society should cultivate this as a value. 

Indeed, it is not at all obvious that the ACLU believes in the equality of all people.  It does not need to for its agenda.  For if anyone organization has to be committed to the rights of the manifestly bereft intellectually it is the ACLU.  No doubt some members of the ACLU believe that when it comes to intelligence across groups, the bell curve would be the same for all.  But there is absolutely nothing about what the ACLU does that requires this view.

Turning to an entirely different matter, the ACLU has no view about the kinds of values that should be taught to children.  Of course not.  For that would be a restraint on freedom.  Not surprisingly, then, the ACLU thinks that sexual techniques should be taught in elementary schools, since the failure to do so constitutes a restraint on freedom.  Never mind that some restraints at the tender age of 10 are apt to facilitate one living a much better life when one is in the fullness of adulthood. 

But a restraint is a restraint.  And the ACLU pretty consistently thinks that such things are woefully unwarranted. 

Freedom, obviously, is rather important.  But the issue is whether or not the value of freedom alone is sufficient to hold a society together.  And the answer is that freedom alone suffices only if other values are in place.  This, obviously, is to say that freedom alone does not suffice. 

In the absence of self-command and goodwill, a society of freedom alone is nothing short of hell on earth.  In this regard, then, the ACLU is perhaps the most misleading organization around.  For the ACLU presents itself as fighting for freedom in the tradition of this nation’s founding fathers.  But the ACLU is quite mistaken.  This is because individual responsibility is the guiding presupposition of all that they, the founding fathers, wrote.  The very idea of freedom without responsibility was all but an oxymoron to them.  And they eschewed those individuals who lacked the moral backbone that is deeply characteristic of being a responsible individual.

With the ACLU, it is not at all obvious to me that the word responsibility is even a part of the organization’s vocabulary.  And the proof of this, ironically, is its stand on sex-education.  I would venture to say that teaching a 10 year old how to use sex toys, whatever those toys might be, is utterly irresponsible.  Why?  Because no 10 year is even remotely close to having the insight necessary for appreciating the significance of sex toys.  True, they understand the literal meaning of the words, but understanding the literal meaning of words can be a very long ways from having a grasp of the subtleties of a string of words. 

In a quite jovial manner, it was about 3 years ago that I uttered the following words to a beloved colleague in his late 70s: “Man, you are the shit”.  Though he understood each word, he had no idea at all what the sentence meant.  None at all.  A 10 year old with sex toys is rather like my colleague with respect to that sentence.  But the ACLU cannot seem to wrap its mind around that reality, just as it cannot seem grasp that teaching is effectively undermined in the classroom if students can dress so provocatively that their attire becomes a distraction.  But to hear the ACLU tell it: Nothing of the sort is true. 

Freedom without responsibility is but a disaster waiting to happen.  And if there is one organization more than any other that has fostered, however unwittingly, the idea that freedom has not the least connection with responsibility it is the ACLU. 

People really do not grasp the way in which the times have changed.  When the founding fathers advocated free speech, a fundamental part of their thinking was that people could be held accountable for what they said.  Indeed, that very idea finds itself in the jury system itself: a person has a right to face her or his accusers.  The very idea that a person could say anything he or she damned well please without being answerable to others for her or his remarks was simply unthinkable to the founding fathers. 

If I am right here, then the ACLU, far from continuing the vision of this nation’s founding fathers, is assiduously working to destroy that vision. 

Just what values a nation should foster is obviously a matter of great debate.  However, there are two values that stand or fall together, namely freedom and responsibility.  Owing to the ACLU, way too many fixed upon the idea of freedom.  In this regard, the ACLU is proving to be masterfully shortsighted.  This is because the freedoms that we are yet able to enjoy sit upon a masterfully constructed scaffold of responsibility.  And if we destroy that scaffold, then we will be left with freedom all right, but it will be freedom of a very different kind.  For it will be the freedom of a very vicious state of nature.  True, freedom will still be about what we can get from others.  The problem, though, is that we will have effectively destroyed the benefits that only a sense of freedom and responsibility, operating in tandem, can produce.  

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*For the record, the ACLU's defense of Nazis marching through Skokie (IL) is one that I accept.  That a view is highly unpopular or terribly offensive is not sufficient justification for prohibiting public declarations of that view in the public arena.