Maybe the most reviled client the ACLU ever took was an American Nazi leader named Frank Collin. In 1977, Collin and a small group of self-styled fascists applied for a permit to march through the Chicago suburb of Skokie, Illinois. More than half of Skokie’s residents were Jewish; several thousand had survived Nazi concentration camps. The Nazis had chosen the venue to cause maximum outrage, and they succeeded. The town of Skokie denied the permit; an Illinois judge later ratified that decision. The ACLU took the case.
