BY RACHEL IDA BUFF We are pleased to announce the publication of Volume 9 of the AAUP’s Journal of Academic Freedom. The journal features recent scholarship on academic freedom and its relation to contemporary crises of austerity, shared governance, tenure, and collective bargaining. This year’s volume focuses on the intersections of academic freedom and free speech,…
BY JOHN K. WILSON Donald Trump has infamously called the media who dare to tell the truth about him “the enemy of the people” and dreamed of repressive measures to silence the press. But so far he’s been too incompetent to actually fulfill his totalitarian wishes. If you want to find a place where freedom…
BY HANK REICHMAN Ontario Conservative Premier Doug Ford has warned the province’s public universities and colleges they will face funding cuts if they fail to adopt free-speech policies that defend controversial speakers on campus. The government announced yesterday that it will give schools four months to design, implement and enforce wide-ranging free-speech policies. Ford had promised…
BY MICHAEL C. BEHRENT Last year, North Carolina became one of the first states to adopt a so-called “campus free speech” law (S.L. 2017-196). This law, like similar legislation that has been proposed or approved in other states, was drafted by a partisan conservative think-tank and supported by sympathetic legislators. Premised on the dubious proposition…
POSTED BY MARTIN KICH Reuters reports that the University of North Florida in Jacksonville has announced that “it had determined after ‘careful consideration’ that the Confucius Institute, which opened a branch there in 2014 to promote language and culture, did not meet the university’s mission”: “‘After reviewing the classes, activities and events sponsored over the…
This past weekend, I was invited by the National Association of Scholars to speak on a panel at their conference at Grove City College, “Capitol Ideas: Government Overreach and Higher Education.” As a progressive, I probably agreed with the title about fearing government overreach in higher education more than almost anyone there, and I spoke…
BY JOHN K. WILSON In a speech yesterday at a Turning Point USA conference, Attorney General Jeff Sessions declared: “We are reaching a pivotal and historic moment. After more than two centuries of defending the right to speak freely, a cadre—mostly on the hard left—has openly and systematically justified action to deny Americans the right…
BY JOHN K. WILSON Today’s CBS Sunday Morning featured a segment bemoaning the loss of civility, which is apparently the great crisis of our times. It included lawyer (and law professor) Alan Dershowitz declaring, “It’s hard to have dialogue without civility.” Dershowitz has complained about being shunned in Martha’s Vineyard for his defense of Donald…
BY JOHN K. WILSON As the 4th of July draws to a close, the day when Americans across the country believe they have a right to launch illicit explosives anywhere they want to, it’s an important time to talk about mistaken beliefs in fundamental rights. A New York Times news analysis last week titled, “How…
BY MARJORIE HEINS Guest blogger Marjorie Heins is the author of six books about civil liberties and civil rights, including Priests of Our Democracy: The Supreme Court, Academic Freedom, and the Anti-Communist Purge, and, most recently, Ironies and Complications of Free Speech. Some issues in the American free-speech universe never die. Does teaching “creation science”…