The American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada is one of the Silver State's most active and important non-governmental organizations. It was created by a group of volunteers in 1966 and was formally accepted as the state affiliate of the national ACLU in 1967. By the late 1990s, the ACLU of Nevada was a professionally staffed advocacy organization dealing with a wide range of state and local public policy issues and regularly winning legal challenges in the state and federal courts.