Lucille Bernheimer Milner

Lucille Bernheimer Milner (born Lucille Bernheimer, June 9, 1888 – August 14, 1975) was a cofounder of the American Civil Liberties Union.

Biography Milner was born on June 9, 1888, in St. Louis, Missouri. At the age of 16 she moved to Colorado where she was treated for tuberculosis, returning to St. Louis until she moved to Mobile, Alabama to live with relatives. In 1912, she married her first cousin (Reece Bernheimer or Maurice Lowenstein depending on the source). Milner refers to her first husband only as "Reese" in her autobiography. He died the same year.

Milner had a long association with the ACLU. Her relationship grew strained in the 1930s when the ACLU began removing members of the organization who were known members of the Communist party. Specifically, the ACLU forced the resignation of Harry F. Ward and Elizabeth Gurley Flynn. Milner quit the organization in to protest the ACLU's advocacy for the rights of American fascist groups in the 1940s.

In 1954, she wrote an autobiography entitled The Education of an American Liberal.

She died of a heart attack on August 14, 1975, in New York City.