FIRE is pleased to announce the publication of Defying the Constitution: The Rise, Persistence, and Prevalence of Campus Speech Codes in the Georgetown Journal of Law & Public Policy. Authored by FIRE’s Azhar Majeed, Associate Director of Legal and Public Advocacy, the article chronicles the existence of college and university speech codes nationwide and argues that maintaining them is untenable, given that every single court decision on speech codes has struck them down as unconstitutional. The article analyzes the First Amendment and free speech problems presented by speech codes, examines the harms that they perpetuate on the college campus, and responds to various arguments put forth by their proponents. It also offers potential ways to eradicate speech codes permanently from college campuses. FIRE expects the article to be an informative contribution to First Amendment scholarship, clarifying the state of the law on speech codes.
Policy Statement on Political Activity on Campus
In recent years, political speech on our nation’s campuses has come under sharp attack. FIRE has investigated open and blatant attacks on political expression at colleges and universities across the country, from a previously unreported case at Oklahoma, to better-known cases at Illinois and Texas, to cases at other schools nationwide. This alarming trend towards silencing political expression prompted FIRE to release a Policy Statement on Political Activity on Campus.