Equal Rights

Extremist politicians and special interest groups are trying to divide us. From hateful attacks on our LGBTQ+ community to an assault on our voting rights to extreme attempts to restrict our right to an abortion or erase our racist history while perpetuating systemic inequality, they placed our rights, our healthcare and our very lives in jeopardy. 

Federal guidance, schools and equality

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.

On April 25, 2017, the ACLU filed a motion to intervene in the case on behalf of three Fayetteville residents and PFLAG of Fayetteville/Northwest Arkansas, arguing that the Arkansas legislature’s attempts to nullify Fayetteville’s local non discrimination ordinance violates their right to equal prot

Same-sex couples who had children before marriage equality was the law of the land filed suit in state court in July 2015 in order to amend their children’s birth certificates to include the names of both parents without having to procure a court order, as the state required, although non-biological fathers in opposite-sex marriages are added to Arkansas birth certificates upon request and without a court order. After a lower court ruled that the Department of Health’s refusal to amend the birth certificates violated the couples’ rights to equal protection, the state appealed to the Arkansas Supreme Court, which overturned the ruling.

Tased, beaten, and terrorized: the Robinson family of Dover, Arkansas was not suspected of any crime when they were stopped by police near their home where they were walking their miniature schnauzer, in 2011. The catalyst for the stop was innocent: Matthew looked and waved at Dover Deputy Marshall Steven Payton as he drove by.