Heins started as a journalist in the 1970s in San Francisco with publications including the underground
San Francisco Express Times. She was also an anti-war activist during the
Vietnam War.
American Civil Liberties Union In the 1980s as staff counsel at the Massachusetts chapter of the
American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Heins litigated numerous civil rights matters, including
LGBT rights and
free speech. One matter involved a litigation against
Boston University for the discharge of the dean of students on the basis of her complaints about discrimination on the part of the university. This story is told in
Cutting the Mustard (1988). Heins also investigated the Boston Police Department's treatment of the notorious
Carol Stuart murder case, in which a white man murdered his wife but claimed to be a victim of a carjacking by an African American man. She founded and directed the
Arts Censorship Project at the
American Civil Liberties Union from 1991 to 1998, She is also a docent in the Impressionism/Post-Impressionism collection at the
Metropolitan Museum of Art. ==Cases Litigated ==