Balancing First Amendment Rights with an Inclusive Environment on Public University Campuses
By Gerald S. Kerska. Full text here. How should public universities strike a balance between First Amendment values and their mission to establish a diverse and inclusive environment? Recent events from the University of Minnesota bring this question into focus.
Continue ReadingNote: Affirmative Action: The Constitutional Approach to Ending Sex Disparities on Corporate Boards
By Julia Glen. Full text here. Women hold far fewer seats on U.S. corporate executive boards than men, despite composing nearly half of the workforce. In 2015, women held only 16.5% of the top five executive board positions in businesses on the S&P 500, and fourteen percent of all executive board positions. Internationally, governments are instituting…
Continue ReadingAcademic Freedom To Deny the Truth: Beyond the Holocaust
By Robert M. O’Neil. Full text here. The concept of academic freedom is so widely accepted and well established that it may even subvert a commitment to truth, and this freedom cannot be casually disregarded despite a speaker’s dissonance with scientific precept. So it was with Myron Ebell, then-President-elect Trump’s choice to lead the EPA transition…
Continue ReadingFree Speech, Higher Education, and the PC Narrative
By Heidi Kitrosser. Full text here. This Article reviews discussions in the press about campus political correctness (PC) and free speech during two periods of intense interest in the same. The first is the period from 1989–1995, when the term political correctness first came into popular use and as campus communities, politicians, and the public at…
Continue ReadingA Close-up, Modern Look at First Amendment Academic Freedom Rights of Public College Students and Faculty
By Vikram David Amar & Alan E. Brownstein. Full text here. Like many other terms bandied about these days, “academic freedom” is something that means different things to different people, and for that reason is often misunderstood. In this Article, we focus on what, if any, special freedoms of expression are enjoyed under the First Amendment…
Continue ReadingFour Ironies of Campus Climate
By Richard Delgado & Jean Stefancic. Full text here. The controversy over campus climate contains several components, including safe spaces, ethnic studies departments and faculty, trigger warnings, and crackdowns on hate speech and micro-aggressions. Of all these, the last three, which concern speech, have been the most hotly contested. Debates over hate speech and campus conduct…
Continue ReadingCampus Speech and Harassment
By Alexander Tsesis. Full text here. A theoretical question that runs through the debate on the constitutionality of campus speech codes asks whether free speech values are best preserved by categorical rules or balancing factors. Whether campus codes are constitutional should be analyzed through a doctrinal and statutory framework developed outside university settings, in cases involving…
Continue ReadingThe Free Speech Rights of University Students
By Mary-Rose Papandrea. Full text here. As questions regarding the freedom of expression on college campuses grip the country, courts adjudicating First Amendment cases in the higher education setting are struggling to determine the appropriate legal framework. Some courts are relying on Supreme Court cases from the K–12 setting as well as the public employment context;…
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