By James Esseks,
Director, ACLU Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender & AIDS Project

(Note: This post originally appeared on the ACLU's national Blog of Rights. To learn more about how our case will impact LGBT Floridians, join us at our DOMA Town Hall.)

We're almost there – next week, on March 27, the Supreme Court will hear arguments regarding the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) in Edie Windsor's case. Essentially DOMA requires the federal government to treat legally married same-sex couples differently from all other married couples. In June, the Court will rule on whether DOMA violates equal protection by treating married gay couples as unmarried in over 1,100 federal programs.

We are approaching a watershed moment in the marriage movement. And as we prepare for next week's argument, we know that we are not alone. The Supreme Court has been inundated with legal briefs from "friends of the court" supporting the ACLU's argument that DOMA is unconstitutional.  Edie has now been joined by 46 other briefs filed by one of the most extraordinary collections of "friends of the court" ever assembled.

Highlights of the people and organizations that have weighed in on the side of fairness include:

• Military leaders and families – Retired generals and officers explained how DOMA requires the armed forces to treat married gay service members differently from married straight service members, and how harmful that is to the military's culture of fairness.
• Religious leaders – Leaders of a range of religious faiths – from Episcopalians to Conservative Jews – wrote about their acceptance of marriage for same-sex couples, to rebut the common assumption that people of faith do not support the freedom to marry.
• Businesses – 278 companies, including Goldman Sachs, Google, Viacom, Walt Disney Co., Alcoa, and Marriott Int'l, wrote about how DOMA is bad for business.
• Members of Congress – 40 Senators and 172 Representatives signed a brief arguing that DOMA violates the Constitution.
• Former Senators who voted for DOMA – These Senators wrote about their own journey from supporting DOMA to opposing it, including the realization that all of the supposed justifications for DOMA proved, with the benefit of experience, to be meritless.
• Psychologists and Sociologists – The American Psychological Association and American Sociological Association each submitted briefs making clear that kids raised by gay parents do just as well as kids raised by straight parents, rebutting one of the primary arguments made by the Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group (BLAG) of the House of Representatives, which is defending DOMA in court.
• Political Scientists – The American Political Science Association filed a brief addressing the inability of lesbians and gay men to protect themselves in the normal political process (addressing one of the heightened scrutiny factors).
• Historians – The Organization of American Historians and the American Studies Association wrote a detailed summary of the history of discrimination against lesbians and gay men (another one of the heightened scrutiny factors).
• Former Cabinet Secretaries – A wide range of former Executive branch officials wrote a brief explaining that DOMA was not necessary to ensure uniformity of federal benefits from state to state, since federal programs have long deferred to states' determinations of whether a person is married.

I could go on (there are so many briefs!) but you get the picture.

As exciting as it is to have so many people and groups sign on "officially" to the case, we also recognize that there are families around the country hurt by DOMA who have a real stake in the outcome of this case.

This week we want to shine a spotlight on just a handful of the many voices, including our amici and others, who can explain the range of ways that DOMA not only impacts same-sex couples, but the negative impact it has on children, businesses, and Americans from all walks of life.

Follow the Blog of Rights all week to hear these stories and then next week we're headed to court!

Learn more about the Defense of Marriage Act and other civil liberty issues: Sign up for breaking news alerts, follow us on Twitter, and like us on Facebook.

The world got a glimpse this week into how the United States treats those we lock in solitary confinement, when the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights heard ACLU testimonies on how our treatment of vulnerable prisoners violates international human rights norms. The short story: we should be ashamed. 

The United States has become a global outlier in its over-reliance on incarceration.  Our soaring incarceration rates are, by now, a familiar statistic, expressed in any number of shocking formulas: the U.S. has less than 5% of the world’s population but over 25% of the world’s incarcerated people; the incarceration rate in the U.S. is four times the average for Western European countries; the U.S. incarcerates more people than South America, Central America and the Caribbean combined.  In this era of mass incarceration, the racial disparities are staggering:  one in four African-American children in the U.S. has grown up with a parent incarcerated.

But none of these statistics quite capture our inhumane treatment of many prisoners, especially those who are the most vulnerable – children, the elderly, and those struggling with mental illness.

Prison conditions, particularly conditions of solitary confinement, are often, by definition, hidden from public view.  Yesterday, the world peered into our prisons and jails when the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights(IACHR) held a hearing on human rights and solitary confinement in the Americas.  The ACLU of Florida and Florida Institutional Legal Servicessubmitted testimony to the IACHR describing the solitary confinement of children and the prisoners with mental disabilities incarcerated in Florida prisons and jails.

Currently, the sad state of affairs in Florida serves as a prime example of the U.S.’s poor human rights record on solitary confinement.

Florida’s state prison population is the third largest in the United States, with a higher incarceration rate than any country in Central or South America.  Florida incarcerates 100,272 people in its 60 state prisons and supervises almost 115,000 offenders on community supervision.  Florida sends  more young people under age 18 to adult state prisons than any other state in the nation.

Prisoners held in solitary confinement in Florida state prisons can be there for months on end.  They are detained in nearly complete isolation, entitled to leave their cell three times per week to take a shower, and, only after thirty days, an additional three hours per week to exercise.  Children in state prison may be subjected to solitary confinement and endure long periods without exercise, educational instruction, contact with their families or any rehabilitative programs and services.

Although children and mentally ill prisoners are particularly susceptible to the devastating physical and psychological effects of total isolation, they are dramatically overrepresented in solitary confinement.  Neither Florida law nor its correctional regulations applies solitary confinement any differently to children or those who are seriously mentally ill, as compared to other prisoners, demonstrating a willful blindness to the particular vulnerability of these populations.  In recognition of these practices, international bodies are increasingly investigating the treatment of incarcerated juveniles in the U.S.

The systemic isolation of vulnerable prisoners bucks the emerging consensusthat extended solitary confinement violates the international prohibition on cruel and inhumane treatment.  By reporting on solitary confinement in the Americas, the IACHR will have an opportunity to shine a light on how the U.S. has deviated from international human rights norms.

It’s clear that Florida is out of step with international law and standards. However, there may be cause for hope. If Florida passes SB 812, which was introduced by State Senator Gibson in February, the state would go from being one of worst violators to the state with strongest protections against harmful solitary confinement for young people in adult jails and prisons.

If a nation's greatness is measured by how it treats its weakest members, Florida must act quickly to remedy the mistreatment of our most vulnerable prisoners. We can begin by passing and implementing SB 812 to protect children in facilities statewide.

(Note: This blog post first appeared on the ACLU's nationwide Blog of Rights as part of a series on overincarceration.)