National Free Speech News & Commentary

Laura Spitalniak
Higher Ed Dive

Excerpt: The University of California system, like many higher ed institutions, has struggled to balance free speech with campus safety as student protests over the Israel-Hamas war proliferated during the spring semester.

The system — home to about 296,000 students across 10 campuses — drew criticism over the violence that broke out during demonstrations and how administrators responded to protests. In the unfair labor practice charge, the associations accused the system of conducting “a relentless campaign” to stop faculty from teaching about the war “in a way that does not align with the University’s own position.″

FIRE

Excerpt: After Pennsylvania state Sen. Doug Mastriano sued Oklahoma historian James P. Gregory Jr. for criticizing his academic research, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression is stepping in to defend James’ First Amendment right to question powerful public officials.

James is a museum director and Ph.D. candidate who did nothing more than raise legitimate concerns about the quality of Mastriano’s academic scholarship, engaging in expression squarely protected by the First Amendment.

Eugene Volokh
Volokh Conspiracy, Reason Magazine

Excerpt: Next week, the entire en banc Fifth Circuit will be hearing Little v. Llano County, a case involving allegations of viewpoint-based book removals in a public library. As I've noted before, the Supreme Court has never resolved whether such removals are unconstitutional. Pico v. Bd. of Ed. (1982), which considered the matter as to public school libraries, split 4-4 on the subject, with the ninth Justice, Justice White, expressly declining to resolve the substantive question.

I'm not sure what the answer here should be. I tentatively think a public school is entitled to decide which viewpoints to promote through its own library: School authorities can decide that their library will be a place where they provide books they recommend as particularly interesting/useful/enlightening/etc., essentially as supplements to the school curriculum (over which the school has broad authority).

Liam Knox
Inside Higher Ed

Excerpt: Selective colleges began unveiling demographic data for the Class of 2028, the first admitted after the 2023 affirmative action ban, just a few weeks ago, and already legal threats are flying.

Students for Fair Admissions, whose lawsuits against Harvard and the University of North Carolina led the Supreme Court to strike down race-conscious admissions last June, wrote letters on Tuesday to the general counsels of Yale, Princeton and Duke Universities asking for details about their admissions processes, accusing them of noncompliance with the ruling. In the letters, obtained by Inside Higher Ed, SFFA president Ed Blum said he was “deeply concerned” that the institutions had violated the affirmative action ban.

Radhika Sainath
Inside Higher Ed

Excerpt: In July, Students for Justice in Palestine at the University of Maryland applied to hold a vigil on Oct. 7. The university granted the application but, after receiving numerous complaints, made a threat assessment, found “no immediate or active threat,” then still canceled the event—and, in an extraordinary and unlawful move, banned all expressive events on campus that are not university-sponsored on that date.

Conor Friedersdorf
The Atlantic

Excerpt: This semester, student protesters opposed to Israel’s war in Gaza have already defaced a statue at Columbia, vandalized an administration building at Cornell, and blocked access to a convocation at Pomona College. Whether they will return to the tactic of erecting protest encampments, as happened on nearly 100 campuses last spring, is uncertain.