Civil Rights & International Human Rights Advocate to Lead ACLU/SC
Isabelle Gunning was elected president of the ACLU of Southern California on December 15, 2004. Gunning has been on the board for the past 14 years. She is currently a law professor at Southwestern University in downtown Los Angeles. She sat down for a quick chat with Ramona Ripston.
Ramona Ripston: Isabelle, I am so pleased that you are president of our new board. I know you bring incredible experiences to the ACLU and a powerful vision for our future. Tell us a little about how you got involved in the struggle for civil rights and civil liberties.
Isabelle Gunning: I was born and grew up in a small town in upstate New York in the Catskills mountains. My parents were immigrants. My mother, who is now 90 years old, is an Afro-Latina from Panama, and my father, who is now dead, was from Jamaica.
My father was a special education teacher and a civil rights activist. He headed our local NAACP and was instrumental in supporting our local legal services and public housing. My favorite picture is from the front page of my hometown newspaper showing my father and his best friend and lawyer, Sam Eager, at the 1963 March on Washington. My father's strong belief in the equality of all and in the idea that community is about supporting individual rights and creating an environment in which every individual can use those rights to grow and flourish has influenced me greatly.
RR: As a professor you have tremendous access to young people, teaching them about civil rights and liberties and helping shape their educational experience. What do you hope to impart to your students?
IG: I want my students to remember that they are important and they have the power to make a positive difference in the world. I also encourage them to remember that the law is important, but so is justice. And that if the law and justice do not coincide, it is lawyers who are most responsible for getting the law back in line.
RR: You also served as a public defender, which shaped your view of our criminal justice system.
IG: When I left the Washington, D.C., Public Defender Service, I was trying the most serious of felonies. What I learned was that all people matter. No matter how reprehensible the behavior of any individual, redemption is always possible, but so rarely do we provide the right environment to give that possibility a chance. We must always maintain the opportunity for redemption and re-inclusion in community – even as we demand some punishment and accountability.
RR: You have also done extensive work in mediation and advocacy for the rights of people in Africa.
IG: I worked for the Southern Africa Project of the Lawyers' Committee For Civil Rights Under Law during the apartheid era. And the biggest lesson for me is that civil rights and civil liberties at home are inextricably bound up with human rights abroad.
My shift from only thinking of conflict resolution in an adversarial fashion and being open to the more collaborative approaches like mediation may have started while working on southern African and international issues. South Africa's contemporary example of using Truth Commissions as an alternative way to approach the horrors of apartheid has valuable lessons for us in using more collaborative and healing approaches.
RR: And what about the future, especially the next four years? The tenure of Mr. Ashcroft has been very threatening to the American people's civil liberties, but we're not out of the water yet.
IG: I admit that I am happy to see Mr. Ashcroft leave, since he was so terrible on civil liberties and civil rights, but I am hardly comforted. Alberto Gonzales is as close to a supporter of torture as you could get. But we can't just state what we think of as obvious, that our positions are grounded in moral values. We must clearly articulate how our defense of the Bill of Rights reflects a positive vision of community, where we all look out for each other.
Isabelle Gunning, Personally
Family: Pam, her partner, is a lawyer and economic development consultant; daughter Jolanda, 17, is a high school junior aiming for a volleyball scholarship and thinking of a career in medicine; her mother, Nella, lives nearby.
Dogs: Lucky, Cookie and Scottie, a Scottish Terrier
Cat: Miss Alice, a tabby
Spiritual Community: Member of Agape International Spiritual Center for several years
FEBRUARY 2005
Download Issue as PDF
Governor Proposes Budget with Deep Cuts, Harsh Real-Life Consequences
High School Students Fight Back Against Hate
LAPD Officer Shoots and Kills Youth in South Los Angeles
California Expands Domestic Partnership Rights
Civil Rights & International Human Rights Advocate to Lead ACLU/SC
State Legislative Preview: Beyond the Budget
ACLU Takes Aggressive Stance on Torture and Detentions
