Princeton Free Speech News & Commentary

On December 5, leaders of the Alumni Free Speech Alliance (AFSA), including AFSA president and PFS co-founder Edward Yingling, participated in an important congressional roundtable on free speech on college campuses. 

By Leslie Spencer

As concern mounts about the status of those principles that preserve and honor freedom of expression in American higher education, Princeton’s James Madison Program recently launched the Initiative on Freedom of Thought, Inquiry and Expression. 

Howard claims that the POCC uses the free-speech cause as a mere fig leaf for our “culture war grievances.” The POCC, he says, is simply obsessed with “conservative outrage politics.” Of course, I am dismayed to hear that Howard feels our events are only for students who “ascribe” (sic) to conservative ideals. But this is a silly accusation. The POCC is not simply conservative (the picture is more complicated) and the criticisms Howard proffers are hopeless.

Princeton showed great progress in its positive presentation on free speech during this year's orientation, but much work remains to be done, as shown in the just released annual free speech rankings from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE).

For the first time on a college campus, faculty, students, and alumni have created an organization to promote and defend free speech and academic freedom on their campus.

We have been quite critical of Princeton's orientation a year ago, which contained not one word about Princeton's robust free speech rule and in fact contained a section on racism at Princeton that suggested free speech is a tool for racists. We will not revisit those criticisms here.