Court Cases

Victory! In 2014 the ACLU and the Arkansas Public Law Center filed suit in state court on behalf of voters challenging the Arkansas voter identification law passed in 2013. The suit said the law violated the Arkansas Constitution by impairing the right to vote and by adding to the voting qualifications already set out in the Constitution. People who had voted for twenty years in the same precinct and were known by election officials were turned away for lack of a picture ID. The court agreed with us and found the law unconstitutional. The Arkansas Supreme Court upheld the decision.

The ACLU of Arkansas and the Arkansas Public Law Center challenged restrictions passed in 2013 restricting the right of Arkansans to propose new laws or to reject those passed by the state legislature or a local legislative body.

VICTORY! Cole v. Arkansas challenged Act 1 of 2008, a ballot initiative that prohibited fostering or adoption of children by unmarried couples; since Arkansas did not recognize the marriage of same-sex couples, this included not only unmarried same-sex couples, but same-sex couples married elsewhere. The intent of the law was to categorically ban same sex couples from consideration, without regard to the needs or relationships of the child to the potential foster or adoptive parents, or their suitability as parents.