LOS ANGELES - Community leaders from the African American community, the Latino community, the disability rights community, the Jewish community, and the civil rights community gathered today at the ACLU of Southern California to debunk the underlying premise of Proposition 38 - that it will help solve the problem of inequality in California schools.

Rev. Norman Johnson, Eve Hill, Hon. Antonio Villaraigosa, and Ramona Ripston at the press conference today

The ACLU of Southern California Department of Public Affairs also released an analysis of the geographic distribution of private and religious school seats in Los Angeles County that showed that the numbers of private school seats per capita are lower in areas with higher percentages of African-American residents, with higher percentages of Latino residents, and with lower per capita income.

"There's a gap between the resources offered to rich and to poor students and a gap between those provided to students of color and to white students," said Ramona Ripston, Executive Director of the ACLU of Southern California. "But to close a gap you need a bridge, and Prop. 38 is no bridge. It simply presents us with another gap in a different sector and calls it a solution."

"The vast majority of private and religious schools - 78% in one survey - select only students who are performing at grade level or above," said Ripston. "That means that the students whose education has suffered the most in public schools are the very ones who don't stand a chance of leaving them."

In fact, a 1998 U.S. Department of Education survey of private schools revealed that only 15 to 31% of private schools surveyed would participate in a vouchers program if they were required to accept students with special needs, such as learning disabilities, limited English proficiency, or low achievement.

Other speakers raised questions about the real-life hurdles families will face when trying to access vouchers, including transportation costs, discrimination on the basis of academic preparation, discrimination on the basis of language ability, private schools' lower rates of participation in free or reduced-cost lunch programs, and discrimination based on ability to pay.

"Vouchers are not a reform movement or solution to the problems of public education," said Rev. James Lawson. "Black and brown children are not the ones who stand the most to gain from the passage of Proposition 38; it's the affluent children already in private schools."

"Here in California, we're beginning at last to realize that a multi-ethnic, multicultural society cannot pick and choose which children to value," said Speaker Emeritus Antonio Villaraigosa.

"A multicultural society cannot survive without building a common platform to launch our multitude of dreams."

The issue of equal access was also a concern of the disability rights community. Religious schools are exempt from the two pieces of federal civil rights education that guarantee students with disabilities access to a free and appropriate public education: the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act. In addition, only around 9% of private and religious schools in Los Angeles County offer special education.

The community leaders who came together to address access issues at today's press conference included:

--Hon. Antonio Villaraigosa, Assemblymember of the 45th District, former Speaker of the California Assembly, and Board member of the ACLU of Southern California.

--Rev. James Lawson, former vice president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and a Board member of the ACLU of Southern California. Rev. Lawson recently retired after 45 years as a minister.

--Rev. Norman Johnson, President of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and Vice President of the Southern California Affiliate of the Congress of National Black Churches

--Eve Hill, Executive Director of the Western Law Center for Disability Rights

--Angela Sambrano, Central American Resource Center (CARECEN)

--Daniel Sokatch, Executive Director of the Progressive Jewish Alliance

--Ramona Ripston, Executive Director of the ACLU of Southern California

LOS ANGELES 'The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California has received notice from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals that it succeeded in challenging the retroactive application of a Prison Litigation Reform Act provision in Chappell v. Dickerson, a civil rights case brought by an inmate at the notorious Corcoran State Prison. The prisoner, Rex Chappell, sued for violation of his constitutional rights and psychological injury after he was deliberately placed in danger by a Corcoran prison guard. The Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA), which became law in 1997, restricts prisoners' civil rights lawsuits for psychological injury to those in which a prisoner can show physical injury.

The lawsuit alleged that a Corcoran guard locked Chappell in a recreation yard with other inmates. The guard then deprived the other inmates of their usual recreational items and incited the inmates to attack Chappell. Chappell, who has a history of psychological disorders known to the guard, was afraid for his life and asked to be returned to his cell. His request was denied, and he was forced to remain in the recreation yard, afraid and distressed.

The incident took place before the PLRA'S passage. The district court dismissed Chappell's case stating that he had failed to show physical injury as required under the PLRA. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed and reversed, noting that the application of the PLRA to Chappell's claim "creates an impermissible retroactive effect" because it changes the legal consequences of past conduct. As a result, the Court stated in a Memorandum decision that "Chappell made out a pre-PLRA claim for psychological injury under ﾌ_1983. His complaint should not have been dismissed."

As a result of the Ninth Circuit's decision filed on September 28, 2000, Mr. Chappell is now free to pursue his lawsuit.

"Every law passed that limits individuals' civil rights carries with it a shadow of animus," said Rocio Cordoba, staff attorney at the ACLU of Southern California, which represented Chappell in his appeal, "and that shadow tends to show up in actions such as the state's attempt to apply the PLRA retroactively to bar Mr. Chappell's civil rights case, despite the well-settled rule that laws should not be applied to conduct that took place before they passed."

"Broad curtailments of individual liberties, such as those provided for under the PLRA, inevitably serve to sweep real problems under the rug," said Cordoba. "We were able to prevent that in this case because the law was not properly applied, but the larger problem remains: The PLRA limitations deprive prisoners of their basic human rights. To suggest that prisoners do not suffer real emotional distress when abused in ways similar to what Mr. Chappell experienced is simply inhumane."

LOS ANGELES - Federal Judge Ronald Lew firmly signaled to Mattel today that its efforts to quash an artist's free speech rights through litigation will most likely not succeed. In denying Mattel's request for preliminary injunction against artist Tom Forsythe on copyright and trademark grounds for his artistic use of Barbie dolls, Judge Lew stated that Mattel had not demonstrated it was likely to succeed on the merits.

"Today's statement from the court should give Mattel and its attorneys pause," said Peter Eliasberg, Staff Attorney at the ACLU of Southern California. "Their strategy of trying to bury Tom Forsythe's First Amendment rights in an avalanche of legal documents will not work."

"There are a few things money and power can't buy in America," said Annette Hurst, of San Francisco's Howard, Rice, Nemerovski, Canady, Falk & Rabkin, pro bono co-counsel in the case, "and one of them is the silence of someone determined to express a viewpoint. That's what the First Amendment is all about, and the court recognized that intellectual property laws must sometimes accommodate free speech interests."

Artist Tom Forsythe, of Kanab, Utah, has used Barbie dolls to parody Barbie's embodiment of America's culture of consumption and conformism. His Barbie series of photos appeared in galleries across the country and won critical acclaim. In August of last year, Mattel sued the artist for copyright and trademark infringement. The ACLU of Southern California and the firm Howard, Rice stepped in to stop Mattel's use of litigation as a method of bullying artists into abandoning their First Amendment rights. Working with Ms. Hurst of Howard, Rice are attorneys Douglas Winthrop, Simon Frankel, and Peter Drobac.

"My Barbie series of photos critiques the Barbie doll and the shallow, consumerist values fostered and perpetuated by it," said Forsythe. "Little did I know that Mattel, chief purveyor of images that degrade and silence young women, would turn the full force of its multi-billion dollar power on me. This lawsuit has been a surreal experience: Mattel has basically taken over my life in an effort to shut down my work. I don't plan to roll over and play dead as so many other artists have been forced to do by Mattel's aggressive tactics."

Mattel has a long rap sheet as an aggressive litigator to stop the fair use of Barbie images:

--Artist Paul Hansen, of San Francisco, sold 150 modified Barbies as art works, on which he made a profit of around $2,000. Mattel sued for damages of $1.2 billion. Hansen ultimately settled after Mattel, despite Hansen's vow never to sell his dolls in stores again, forced a protracted legal wrangle. The judge in the case granted partial summary judgment against Mattel "for not having a sense of humor." "It's been a year from hell,"the artist said. ("You can Call Her Barbie-Sue," The News and Observer, January 12, 1998)

--In late 1997, Mattel succeeded in bullying the art web-site "The Distorted Barbie" into altering its images and ultimately moving to a new address with a less nervous provider. The purpose of the site, according to its host, web artist Mark Napier, was "to explore the phenomenon of Barbie. Not Barbie as a toy or collectible, but Barbie as a symbol that a culture has created, absorbed, shaped, and been shaped by." ("Does the Distorted Barbie Violate Mattel's Copyright?" http://207.159.135.123/bbhold/censored/censored.htm)

--Mattel has been exceptionally aggressive and punitive toward defendants in its copyright and trademark cases. In one case involving a fan and trading magazine, a member of Mattel's legal team was quoted in the Spokane Spokesman-Review saying, of the defendants, "We want the Millers' house." ("Mattel's Latest: Cease and Desist Barbie," WIRED News, Oct. 28, 1997, http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,8037,00.html)

--While Mattel's vast resources have helped it overcome most defendants without much of a fight, MCA, which Mattel sued in September 1997 over the band Aqua's hit song, "Barbie Girl," continues to succeed in resisting Mattel's efforts to shut down artistic references to Barbie. A federal court judge ruled in favor of MCA in 1998. That decision is on appeal. ("Spinning Vinyl at the 9th Circuit," The Recorder, Dec. 6, 1999; "Recent Cases," Entertainment Law Reporter, June 1999).

--In December of 1999, Mattel sued Seal Press, a small book publisher whose book, "Adios, Barbie," a feminist examination of body image, aroused Mattel's ire. In a settlement reached in January, Seal agreed to remove Barbie's name from the book's title and to remove images of the doll's clothing and accouterments from its cover.

Faith Conlon, Seal Press publisher, believed that the book was protected speech: "We thought the First Amendment provided us with every right to evoke the outrageousness of tall, thin, and white being the only widely accepted body type."

--But Mattel's resources overwhelmed the small press. "We are a small publisher," said Conlon, "We're not insured for the costs associated with this type of lawsuit." ("Seal of Disapproval," Seattle Weekly, March 3, 2000)

"This case is about insisting that a corporate giant can't stop an artist from using one of their products to create art and to comment on our society," said Douglas Winthrop, of San Francisco's Howard, Rice. "If we were to allow that to happen, the content of our culture would be greatly reduced and emptied. We cannot allow Mattel to do that."