Know Your Rights
Knowledge is power. Download our resources so you can have your rights at your fingertips.
Know your rights:
- Racial Justice Demonstrations In The Time of COVID
- Temporary Housing For Those Who Need Space to Isolate Due to COVID-19
- Gatherings, Social Distancing, and Face Covering Orders in the Time of COVID-19
- What To Do When Encountering Law Enforcement at Airports and Other Ports of Entry into the U.S.
- What To Do When Faced With Anti-Muslim Discrimination.
- Stopped by Police, Immigration Agents, or FBI (English, Arabic, Chinese, French, Korean, Somali, Spanish, Urdu and Vietnamese)
- What to do when questioned by police or FBI
- At demonstrations and protests
- As a photographer/videographer
- During police-pedestrian encounters
- Free speech and political protest at school
- Pledge of Allegiance and the National Anthem at school
- At the Airport
Check our Events page too for occasional “Know Your Rights” trainings we offer in person.
We also provide copwatch trainings, where we explain the constitutional right that people have to record police performing their duties in public—a right we secured through the landmark case Glik v. Cunniffe. Our lawsuit Martin v. Evans asks the court to affirm that it is unconstitutional to enforce the Massachusetts wiretap law against people who exercise their right to secretly record the police in the public performance of their duties, and to order Boston Police Department Commissioner William Evans and Suffolk County District Attorney Dan Conley to end such enforcement. Learn more in the blog You Have Every Right To Photograph That Cop.
These materials tell you about your basic rights. They do not substitute for legal advice. You should contact an attorney if you have been arrested or believe that your rights have been violated.
You may also seek legal assistance from the ACLU of Massachusetts.
To request a Know Your Rights training, contact mallen@aclum.org with the subject line “Training request.”