Racial Justice

The failed War on Drugs has been used to target communities of color, tearing communities apart and creating barriers to employment, housing, and health care.

For instance, Black people were roughly 1% of Maine’s total population but accounted for 8% of drug arrests and 12% of prison sentences in 2018 – despite Black and white people using drugs at roughly the same rate.  

The ACLU strongly supports policies that address the root causes of substance use rather than the same failed policies that attempt to punish people out of a health condition. Fining, jailing, and punishing people for a health condition fuels mass incarceration and saddles people with lifelong criminal records that make it more difficult to get jobs, earn a degree, and find stable housing. 

We must treat problematic substance abuse for what it really is: a health issue that can be treated with a health-centric response. The policies of the past 50 years have not worked to keep people safe and healthy. Investing in a statewide public health response to substance use will open doors to treatment, keep families and communities whole, and save taxpayer dollars.

America’s ongoing and failed War on Drugs has led to over-policing communities of color.

Most often, new criminal penalties related to drugs lead to the over-policing and disproportionate incarceration of people of color in Maine. Additionally, many departments throughout the country have an "us vs. them" mentality that antagonizes communities by casting a blanket of suspicion over entire neighborhoods, often under the guise of preventing crime.

The ACLU of Maine recently fought against legislation that would make it illegal for people in Maine to purchase property based on their national origin, would surveil Mainers’ electricity usage and share that data with the Maine State Police, and create new crimes related to drug possession.

Few fights are more pivotal to ending systemic inequality than the fight for fair and stable housing.

In the United States, millions of people live in communities of concentrated poverty, including 26% of all Black children and 27% of Indigenous children. For example, Black women are evicted at much higher rates than others, and white people are much more likely to be homeowners than their Black peers.

Even with many explicitly racist laws off the books, our systems are still designed to hold Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities back. Centuries of racism – from colonialism to Jim Crow – are at the root of this injustice.

In addition to explicitly racist housing policies of the past, such as redlining, our broader systems continue to make it more difficult for people of color to acquire stable housing than their white peers. For instance, over-policing in communities of color leads to people of color having more interactions with law enforcement and higher arrest rates – despite white people breaking the law at similar rates. As a result, people of color are more likely to be saddled with long-term consequences of criminal records and entanglement with the legal system. This makes it more difficult for people to get a job, earn a degree, access life-saving benefits, and more.

Maine is facing an acute housing crisis, with housing needs severely outpacing affordable housing access. These housing shortages disproportionately affect people of color. When people are denied the opportunity to obtain stable housing, they are also blocked from the better schools and economic opportunities that come with it.

Last, our housing crisis has led to many people falling into homelessness – even while working full-time jobs. Maine has one of the worst racial disparities in homelessness. Despite being only 2% of the state's population in 2023, Black and African American people made up 47% of the state's unhoused residents, according to Maine Housing. (At the time, white people made up 92% of the state's population and 48% of the state's unhoused residents.)

The ACLU of Maine continually fights against discriminatory policies that punish people for trying to survive while homeless. Instead of attempting to punish people out of poverty, our government must address the root causes by increasing access to housing, health care, jobs, job training, and education.

Systemic inequities and barriers keep people — particularly people of color — from accessing the mainstays of economic life, including education, employment, and homeownership.  

According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, wealth disparity in Maine has grown consistently over the last several decades. Today, the richest 5% of households in Maine have average incomes that are 10.7 times larger than the bottom 20%, and 4.1 times larger than the middle 20% of households.  

Wealth disparities result from a combination of ongoing discrimination, structural inequality, and biases throughout our institutions. Through litigation and advocacy, the ACLU of Maine aims to remedy deeply entrenched sources of inequality so all people have access to opportunity and the ability to build wealth. 

Nationally, the "school-to-prison pipeline" is a troubling trend that disproportionately impacts students of color, students with disabilities, and students from low-income families. A national ACLU report states that Black students are more than twice as likely as their white peers to be referred to law enforcement and three times as likely to be arrested, with Black girls facing even higher rates in some states. 

In Maine, these trends are evident as well: Black and African American people made up only 1.9% of the state's population in 2020, yet 23% of the children incarcerated in Maine’s youth prison identified as such. (LGBTQ children and children with disabilities are also overrepresented at Long Creek Youth Development Center, and are more likely to suffer violence and abuse than their peers.)

The ACLU of Maine is strongly opposed to policies that exacerbate youth incarceration, including the increase of resource officers at schools. Research shows that school resource officers increase negative – and sometimes dangerous – interactions between children and law enforcement without even improving student safety. 

When children misbehave, they need guidance and support – not criminal punishment. Every child deserves access to safe and clean housing, quality public education, accessible and practical transportation, convenient and affordable groceries, first-rate healthcare, quality childcare, and – most importantly equitable access to joy. We all know these are the true and undeniable hallmarks of a safe and thriving community, not the addition of armed law enforcement officers in our schools. 

Know Your Rights at School

Indigenous Justice encompasses a multitude of racial, political, economic, and environmental issues.

We are committed to supporting tribal communities and following their lead , as they fight to regain sovereignty. Our nation is founded on colonialism – a powerful method of control and attempted erasure – and the effects of colonialism permeate all government structures and institutions. As we center Indigenous voices and honor their experiences, we must further examine and dismantle the discrimination built into our political, economic, and social institutions.

Specifically, the ACLU of Maine is committed to supporting the Wabanaki Alliance as it fights for tribal sovereignty and comprehensive public education that includes Wabanaki Studies.

LEARN MORE ABOUT INDIGENOUS JUSTICE