The Rights Stuff

En español | Abortion, race, and terrorism are just some of the hot-button topics examined in In Defense of Our America: The Fight for Civil Liberties in the Age of Terror by Anthony D. Romero, the first Latino and first openly gay executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, and award-winning author Dina Temple-Raston. Says Romero: “These are issues people often run away from because they are controversial.…I want to ignite the conversation.”

The authors go behind the headlines in the struggles for civil liberties. Readers meet a Sioux president facing the wrath of her people for trying to open an abortion clinic and a student told she can’t use a biblical quote in her yearbook. Providing a firm ground for these accounts is the seamless integration of interviews, court cases, and history.