Is ACLU conduit for leaks of classified info?

NY Times:

Federal prosecutors are trying to force the American Civil Liberties Union to turn over copies of a classified document it received from a source, using what legal experts called a new extension of the Bush administration’s efforts to protect national-security secrets.

The novelty in the government’s approach is in its broad use of a grand jury subpoena, which is typically a way to gather evidence, rather than to confiscate all traces of it. But the subpoena issued to the A.C.L.U. seeks “any and all copies” of a document e-mailed to it unsolicited in October, indicating that the government also wants to prevent further dissemination of the information in the document.

The subpoena was revealed in court papers unsealed in federal court in Manhattan yesterday. The subject of the grand jury’s investigation is not known, but the A.C.L.U. said that it had been told it was not a target of the investigation.

The subpoena, however, raised the possibility that the government had found a new tool to stop the dissemination of secrets, one that could avoid the all but absolute constitutional prohibition on prior restraints on publication.

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The A.C.L.U. said the subpoena was an effort to chill speech about the Bush administration. “The government is involved in a very conscious effort to suppress its critics,” said Anthony D. Romero, the A.C.L.U.’s executive director.

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The A.C.L.U.’s lawyers said in court papers filed Monday that such subpoenas, if upheld by the court, would pose a direct threat to journalists.

“Many of the most important news articles of the past year (such as those concerning N.S.A. eavesdropping, rendition of foreign prisoners of our nation to other nations, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld’s views on the deteriorating situation in Iraq, National Security Adviser Hadley’s assessment of Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki, and the report on the Iraq insurgency’s funding sources) have been based on classified documents leaked to reporters,” the group’s motion said.

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There is more. The description of the ACLU motion suggest that they very well might have been a conduit for leaks of classified documents to the media. The tone of the article also suggest that the NY Times thinks some of its sources for classified documents it has used that had the effect of aiding the enemy may be threatened.