Daily Archives: May 13, 2017

In a time when free speech in places like Portland, Berkeley, and Middlebury exists only by permission of the mob, and in a time when small business owners who dissent from the sexual revolution often find themselves facing financial ruin, its genuinely refreshing to see free speech win. Earlier today, the Kentucky Court of Appeals ruled in favor of a small Lexington, Kentucky,t-shirt printer called Hands On Originals (HOO), holding that HOO did not violate the citys fairness ordinance when it refused to print t-shirts celebrating the Lexington Pride Festival.

The case presented thecleanest of legal questions can a small business that has consistently refused to print messages that its owners find immoral (including curse words and blasphemous images) lawfullyextend that moral stance to messages celebrating LGBT identity? In its opinion the courtexhibited a level of judicial common sense so rare that I found myself surprised by almost every paragraph. The courtactually read the relevant law, applied it to the undisputed facts, and reached a decision that was legally (not politically) correct.

First, rather than treating public accommodation laws as all-powerful instruments of social justice, the court raised proper alarms:

[I]t is not the aim of public accommodation laws, nor the First Amendment, to treat speech as [discriminatory] activity or conduct. This is so for two reasons. First, speech cannot be considered an activity or conduct that is engaged in exclusively or predominantly by a particular class of people. Speech is an activity anyone engages inregardless of religion, sexual orientation, race, gender, age, or even corporate status. Second, the right of free speech does not guarantee to any person the right to use someone elses property, even property owned by the government and dedicated to other purposes, as a stage to express ideas.

Exactly right. Heres more:

In other words, the service HOO offers is the promotion of messages. The conduct HOO chose not to promote was pure speech. There is no contention that HOO is a public forum in addition to a public accommodation. Nothing in the fairness ordinance prohibits HOO, a private business, from engaging in viewpoint or message censorship. Thus, although the menu of services HOO provides to the public is accordingly limited, and censors certain points of view, it is the same limited menu HOO offers to every customer and is not, therefore, prohibited by the fairness ordinance.

A contrary conclusion would result in absurdity under the facts of this case. The Commissions interpretation of the fairness ordinance would allow any individual to claim any variety of protected class discrimination under the guise of the fairness ordinance merely by requesting a t-shirt espousing support for a protected class and then receiving a value-based refusal. A Buddhist who requested t-shirts from HOO stating, I support equal treatment for Muslims, could complain of religious discrimination under the fairness ordinance if HOO opposed equal treatment for Muslims and refused to print the t-shirts on that basis. A 25-year-old who requested t-shirts stating, I support equal treatment for those over forty could complain of age discrimination if HOO refused on the basis of its disagreement with that message. A man who requests t-shirts stating, I support equal treatment for women, could complain of gender discrimination if HOO refused to print the t-shirts because it disagreed with that message. And so forth. Clearly, this is not the intent of the ordinance.

Clearly not, but dont tell that to the Lexington Human Rights Commission. Like their sister social justice warriors in other states, theyve doggedly pursued a Christian small business, determined to stamp out dissent in the name of equality. The only false note in the case was the courts decision to distinguish (rather than disagree with) a Colorado decision holding that it was unlawful discrimination for a baker to refuse to bake a cake for a gay wedding. Otherwise, however, the reasoning stands as a rebuke to efforts to use nondiscrimination ordinances to overcome traditional constitutional prohibitions against compelled speech.

The case will likely go to the Kentucky Supreme Court, but for now HOO and its lawyers (my old colleagues at the Alliance Defending Freedom) deserve congratulations for an excellent result.

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Free Speech Wins a Round - National Review

In campus clashes from California to Vermont, many defenders of the First Amendment say they see signs that free speech, once a bedrock value in academia, is losing ground as a priority at U.S. colleges.

As protests have derailed speeches by controversial figures, including an event with Ann Coulter last month at the University of California, Berkeley, some fear students have come to see the right to free expression less as an enshrined measure of protection for all voices and more as a political weapon used against them by provocateurs.

I think minority groups and those who feel alienated are especially skeptical about free speech these days, said Jeffrey Herbst, leader of the Newseum, a Washington group that defends the First Amendment. But the powerful can get their message across any number of ways. Its those who feel powerless or alienated who really benefit from enshrined rights.

On Wednesday, students at the historically black Bethune-Cookman University in Florida tried to shout down a commencement address by Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, who said during her speech, Lets choose to hear one another out. Students and alumni had previously petitioned to rescind her invitation, saying she doesnt understand the importance of historically black schools.

While some cast the debate as a political battle, pitting protesters on the left against conservative speakers on the right, First Amendment advocates warn the line marking acceptable speech could slip if more college students adopt less-than-absolute views on free speech.

When UC Berkeley canceled Coulters April 27 speech amid threats of violence, it was only the latest example of a speaker with controversial views being blocked from talking. Since the beginning of 2016, nearly 30 campus speeches have been derailed amid controversy, according to the Foundation For Individual Rights In Education.

In many cases , speakers have been targeted for their views on race and sexual identity.

At Middlebury College in Vermont, author Charles Murray was shouted down by students who accused him of espousing racist views. An event featuring Milo Yiannopoulos at Berkeley was called off after protests over his views on race and transgender people turned violent.

In the past year, other speeches have been disrupted or canceled amid student protests at the University of Wisconsin, UC Davis, Brown University, New York University and DePaul University, among others.

Todays students have developed a new understanding of free speech that doesnt protect language seen as offensive to minorities or others thought to be disenfranchised, said Herbst, also a former president of Colgate University, a liberal arts school in Hamilton, New York.

He sees it as a generational divide, a notion thats supported by some polling data. A 2015 survey by the Pew Research Center, for example, found that 40 percent of people ages 18 to 34 supported government censorship of statements offensive to minorities. Only 24 percent of people ages 51 to 69 agreed.

The literary group PEN America has also warned free speech is being threatened at colleges.

As students and administrators strive to make campuses more hospitable to diverse student bodies, some have wrongly silenced speech that makes certain students feel uncomfortable, said Suzanne Nossel, the groups director.

The university has dual imperatives. It has to be a place that is welcoming and open to students of all backgrounds, cognizant of the barriers that impede students from marginalized groups, she said. But that cannot and must not come at the expense of being an open environment for speech.

The events at Berkeley and Middlebury have drawn scorn from observers across the political spectrum, including some founders of the free speech movement that took root at Berkeley in the 1960s. Jack Weinberg, who was arrested on campus in 1964 for violating school codes on activism and sparked a wave of protests to change them, said he found the whole thing despicable.

When you suppress ideas, you also increase interest in those ideas, Weinberg said. Its understandable that people want to stop it, but it doesnt work.

Still, some students dont see a problem with disrupting provocative speakers. Some say theyre simply invoking their own First Amendment rights, while others say theyre appealing to higher principles that take priority over free expression.

If your goal is to come onto university campuses and put communities at risk, and your goal is to bash and spew hateful, racist rhetoric, then we dont want that, said Richard Alvarado, a junior at Berkeley who protested both recent speeches. We as a community have a moral obligation to hold you accountable for it.

Colleges need to take a harder stance against students who disrupt speeches, some say. Republican lawmakers in Wisconsin are pushing a bill that would force state universities to suspend or expel students who repeatedly interfere with others free speech. Similar legislation was recently approved in Virginia and Colorado, and is being considered in California, Michigan and North Carolina. The bills are modeled after a proposal by the Goldwater Institute, a conservative think tank in Arizona.

Others are calling for colleges to adopt stronger policies in support of free expression, and for primary schools to bolster lessons on the First Amendment.

We are seeing things on an all-too-regular basis which would have been unthinkable just a few years ago, said Floyd Abrams, a prominent First Amendment attorney in New York City. One can only hope that tempers will cool and people will come to accept the virtues of living in a society where even offensive speech is fully protected by the First Amendment.

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Find Collin Binkley on Twitter at @cbinkley.

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Is free speech fading at colleges? Some defenders think so - NRToday.com

UC students, along with The Irate 8, join national anti-racial silent protests. The Enquirer/Pat Brennan

Students and community members protest before a speech by nationally syndicated columnist George Will at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio Wednesday October 22, 2014. Groups on campus are protesting Will's comments on trivializing the problem of campus sexual assault and rape in October 2014.(Photo: The Enquirer/Gary Landers)Buy Photo

Politically charged student protests are nothing new. However,as tensions erupt at campuses liketheUniversity of California, Miami University and Middlebury College the right to free speech gets complicated.

Beyond Civility, a localnonprofit organization, is hosting a programon May 30 to discuss campus protests, public safetyand free speech.

Local university leaders and community members will explore the issueof our desire for respectful speechand First Amendment rights on college campuses.

Participants from the University of Cincinnati,Mount St. Joseph Universityand Miami Universitywill also discusshow universities respondand the roles of the peoplein the middle, which includesstudents, faculty and administrators.

Beyond Civility, which was founded in 2012 in Cincinnati, is working to bringcitizens and civic leaders together to reduce divisive communication, so that even when opinions are polarized, a useful conversation continues, rather than being shut down with combative language. Then,reasonable, evidence-basedcompromises can be explored.

Thomas Jefferson famously said of the University of Virginia,"this institution will be based on the illimitable freedom of the human mind. For here we are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead, nor to tolerate any error so long as reason is left free to combat it."

Beyond Civility is hosting this program to talk about thesharp contrast between this quote and the political correctness that is commanding attention on college campuses across the country.

When: Tuesday, May 30

Who:The panelists include Verna Williams, interim dean of the UC College of Law; James Williams, president ofMount St. Joseph University;JuanGuardia, UC dean of students;John Paul Wright, a UC professor;and Miami University studentNick Froelich.

Where:St. John's Unitarian Universalist Church,320 Resor Ave., Cincinnati, 45220

RSVP:Online at http://mailchi.mp/c940da9d75eb/campus-protests-public-safety-and-free-speech

Read or Share this story: http://cin.ci/2r8kett

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How far should free speech on campus go? - Cincinnati.com

"Excuse me, we have permission for all of this," Fresno State student Bernadette Tasycan be heard saying.

"No, you don't," responds Fresno State assistant professor Greg Thatcher.

It's a phraseTasy will say more than five times in this less than three-minute recording, showing students, then Thatcher, wiping out Tasy's group's pro-life chalk messages on the Fresno State campus.

"You have permission to put it down, I have permission to get rid of it," Thatcher said.

"He indicated that he thought what he was doing was part of his free speech, but what he did was wrong," Tasy said. "The only permit a student needs to speak on campus, is the First Amendment."

University President Dr. Joseph Castro quickly released a statement Thursday, siding with the pro-life student group, saying quote:

"The students who wrote the chalk messages received prior university approval and were well within their rights to express themselves in this manner. Those disagreeing with the students' message have a right to their own speech, but they do not have the right to erase or stifle someone else's speech under the guise of their own right to free speech."

Castro also disputed Thatcher's argument...

"Free speech is free speech in the free speech area, it's a pretty simple concept, OK?" Thatcher can be heard saying to Tasy in the video. "This does not constitute a free speech area, OK?"

Castro says, free speech is not limited to an area.

"University professors should be encouraging free speech on campus, not erasing it from it's existence," Tasy said. "So what professor Thatcher did was wrong."

One of Tasy's attorneys also spoke with us over the phone. He says, incidents like this one, are part of a trend being seen on college campuses.

"That's part of the reason that we brought this lawsuit, to send a message, not just to professor Thatcher, but to professors, officials across the country," Alliance Defending Freedom attorney Travis Barham said. "That if you go out, and you censor student speech, you will be held accountable, and there are consequences."

At just 21-years-old, Tasy's become the face of a lawsuit, but she says, it's not just about her organization or about the pro-life movement.

"You don't have to be pro-life to, to believe that everybody has their right to free speech, and so, my greatest concern is for my club and for other groups on campus, to be able to exercise their free speech," Tasy said. "Because the only permit you need to speak on campus, is the First Amendment."

We also reached out to Thatcher, he says he feels no need to talk, that this has all been quote "blown out of proportion," he even went on to call the lawsuit hilarious.

Tasy and her group are suing Thatcher for allegedly violating their First Amendment rights, they're also seeking an order that would prevent him from interfering with their group again.

Reporting in Fresno, Megan Rupe.

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"What he did was wrong:" Student behind free-speech - yourcentralvalley.com