Summary:
Cunningham credits her Catholic education for her affinity to social justice issues. After a brief stint in Chicago, she returns to Louisville in 1968 and becomes involved in the “coffee house movement” and eventually begins working for the Kentucky Civil Liberties Union (KCLU). In the interview, Cunningham offers an insider’s view into the organization’s activities related to school desegregation, improving jail conditions and assisting conscientious objectors. The bulk of the interview deals with the work of the Women’s Right Committee, a new effort at the time within the KCLU that focused on the intersection of civil liberties and women’s concerns and bringing those discussion to the forefront, both in the public arena and in the priorities of the KCLU. Topics include reproductive freedom, the Anaconda Aluminum case, and the growing recognition among women and the general public that gender discrimination existed and that the KCLU sought to be involved in changing the status quo.
