American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California records, circa 1935-1985

Collection context

Summary

Extent:
736 linear feet (1513 boxes, 3 oversize boxes)
Language:
Materials are in English.
Preferred citation:

[Identification of item], American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California Records (Collection 900). UCLA Library Special Collections, Charles E. Young Research Library, University of California, Los Angeles.

Background

Scope and content:

Collection consists of legal, educational, and organizational files of the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California. Includes minutes, correspondence, memoranda, clippings, case files, and briefs. Topics covered in case files include the right to counsel, women's rights, Japanese-American relocation during WWII, blacklisting in the film industry, and Crawford vs. LA Unified School District. Also contains materials related to the local and national organizations of the ACLU.

Biographical / historical:

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) was established in 1920. It originally began as the American Union Against Militarism in 1915 and later became the National Civil Liberties Bureau in 1917. The ACLU of Southern California was established in Los Angeles in 1924.

Acquisition information:

Gift of the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California, 1967. Accruals from the ACLU of Southern California were transferred to UCLA Library in 1968, 1969, 1970, 1973, 1974, 1977, 1980, 1985, 1986, 1990, and 1991.

Gift of Eason Monroe, 1966-69.

Processing information:

Processed by Special Collections Manuscripts Division staff. Boxes 1-62 reprocessed by Amy Wong, 1995. Boxes 63-101 reprocessed by Piyapong Phongpatanakhun, 2003.

Partially filled boxes were consolidated during reprocessing, so now boxes 102-110 no longer exist.

Final processing for boxes 419-1525 completed by Preksha Ambrish in consultation with Kelly Besser, 2023.

Collections are processed to a variety of levels depending on the work necessary to make them usable, their perceived user interest and research value, availability of staff and resources, and competing priorities. Library Special Collections provides a standard level of preservation and access for all collections and, when time and resources permit, conducts more intensive processing. These materials have been arranged and described according to national and local standards and best practices.

We are committed to providing ethical, inclusive, and anti-racist description of the materials we steward, and to remediating existing description of our materials that contains language that may be offensive or cause harm. We invite you to submit feedback about how our collections are described, and how they could be described more accurately, by filling out the form located on our website: Report Problematic Content and Description in UCLA's Library Collections and Archives.

Physical location:
Stored off-site. All requests to access special collections material must be made in advance using the request button located on this page.
Rules or conventions:
Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Access and use

Restrictions:

Open for research. All requests to access special collections materials must be made in advance using the request button located on this page.

Terms of access:

Property rights to the physical objects belong to UCLA Library Special Collections. All other rights, including copyright, are retained by the creators and their heirs. It is the responsibility of the researcher to determine who holds the copyright and pursue the copyright owner or his or her heir for permission to publish where The UC Regents do not hold the copyright.

Preferred citation:

[Identification of item], American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California Records (Collection 900). UCLA Library Special Collections, Charles E. Young Research Library, University of California, Los Angeles.

Location of this collection:
A1713 Charles E. Young Research Library
Box 951575
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1575, US
Contact:
(310) 825-4988