(U-WIRE) TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — Universities, once free to engage in public debate, are finding this tradition tested in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington, D.C.
Across the nation, college faculty and staff who express opinions on the terrorist attacks and U.S. involvement in Afghanistan are faced with censorship issues that have led to suspension and investigation. Two universities asked two professors to leave as a security measure.
The University of California in Los Angeles suspended library assistant Jonnie Hargis without pay for five days after he criticized U.S. support for Israel in an e-mail. Hargis sent the e-mail on the school’s computers in response to a co-worker’s mass e-mail in praise of America.
The day the university penalized Hargis, the staff also stated that library policy forbade using its e-mail to send unsolicited political or patriotic messages. However, Hargis said he was the only one punished.
In another similar incident, the University of South Florida placed Professor Sami Al-Arian on indefinite paid leave for his safety. University officials acted after receiving a death threat and angry calls following Al-Arian’s appearance on a television news program in which he was asked about his ties to two suspected terrorists.
Al-Arian said he only knew the men as academics and their later links to terrorism shocked him. Al-Arian also founded a now-defunct think tank on Middle East issues that the FBI investigated. He has not been arrested or charged.
Also, a University of New Mexico history professor, Richard Berthold, agreed to leave campus for a week due to violent threats after he told a Western civilization class, “Anyone who can blow up the Pentagon has my vote.”
“I was a jerk,” Berthold said. “The U.S. Constitution’s guarantee of free speech protects my right to be a jerk.”
Thor Halvorssen, head of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, said these incidents highlight an erosion of free academic expression that existed before Sept. 11.
The Philadelphia-based organization finds free legal help for faculty who feel a university infringed upon their First Amendment rights.
A University of Alabama philosophy professor, Norvin Richards, pointed out that some criticize dissenting views as unpatriotic.
“The essence of patriotism is loyalty to the nation’s most fundamental values and a willingness to help it do right by these values, even at cost to oneself,” Richards said. “If so, it is not unpatriotic for a citizen of our nation to speak his or her piece at times like these, especially if he or she believes the nation is following the wrong course. It is patriotic.”
He also said some people think it is improper for state universities to permit dissenting views on the grounds that they are tax-supported and they feel taxpayers should not have to pay for the expression of views they consider “downright treasonous.”
“Universities should be places where we have the opportunity to reason and stimulation to do so, not places where that is cut off,” Richards said.
Richards also acknowledged the belief that those who speak out are damaging the war effort by undercutting the morale of soldiers the nation sends to fight.
“This assumes the dissenters are wrong and the prevailing view is correct. It also assumes that soldiers cannot carry out their tasks unless there is no questioning of their cause and no question but that their cause is just,” Richards said.
“They also paint soldiers as unable to rely on their own sense of what is right, which seems to me to impugn them.”
Richards believes these criticisms fall short of showing that speech should be censored at universities.
University law professor Al Brophy did not see evidence that either universities or the government were censoring speech in any significant fashion. He said sometimes people may be asked to leave temporarily for their safety, but he felt prudence was different from censorship.
“A primary job of the university is to encourage students to think critically about why the world is the way it is. That requires professors to be free to question why those in power make the choices they do,” Brophy said. “There are limits to these rights, however. I question whether someone who advocates violence against the federal government is qualified to hold a position as a university professor.”
Hank Lazer, assistant vice president for Undergraduate Programs and Services, did not agree with universities that have taken action against faculty who express opinions at odds with the U.S. government.
“A university ought to be a site for an open discussion of a wide range of viewpoints. It is especially crucial to protect the rights of individuals who espouse unpopular or controversial viewpoints,” Lazer said. “It would be ironic and sad to fight a war in defense of democracy and freedom while we were engaged at home in abridging the rights of free expression.”
Stuart Rachels, a philosophy professor at the university, agreed.
“The right to criticize the government is one of the greatest rights we have as Americans. Being able to exercise this right is most important when the government engages in controversial action, such as dropping bombs,” Rachels said. “Only people with something to hide try to prevent others from speaking. Defend your neighbor’s right to say things you don’t believe, and your neighbor will let you speak as well.”
Torin Alter, an associate philosophy professor, said universities should encourage free and open debate on matters of national significance.
“Punishing faculty and staff merely for expressing their opinions on such matters, whatever those opinions might be, is antithetical to that goal and clearly unjustified,” Alter said.
Faculty Senate President Norm Baldwin, a political science professor, said difficult times require “the steadfast defense of free speech and other civil liberties.”
“The true test of the beauty and sanctity of our basic civil liberties is not how they fare during the best of time, but how they fair during times of peril and internal dissension,” Baldwin said. “[Philosopher] John Stuart Mill once said that we have to allow citizens to express wrong opinions; otherwise, we lose the clearer perception and livelier impression of the truth produced by its collision with error.”
University psychology professor Jerry Rosenberg agreed it would be irresponsible to divulge information that would put soldiers or others at risk in a time of crisis. However, he believes the presentation of dissenting or alternative ideas is a protected form of speech.
“While not all ideas are of equal merit, the freedom of expression should be protected. I believe this is actually more important at a university setting, where serious thought and truth or the varied presentation of different viewpoints is a cornerstone of what universities should be about,” Rosenberg said.
“No view that is thoughtful should be censored, but where appropriate, dissenting voices should be present to ensure that all ideas are heard and responded to. In times of concerns for national unity and national security, we are working together to protect just those rights that include free speech and the freedom to disagree.”
Rosenberg also feels universities should be more protective in assuring First Amendment rights.
“As long as the ideas are predicated on intellectual honesty and integrity and a search for truth and understanding, then what we stand for as Americans is the protection of those freedoms even when we believe our enemies are at our throat,” Rosenberg said. “If we don’t stand up for what we claim we are protecting, then we have already lost much of the battle.”
