NCJ Number
154424
Journal
Journal of Law and Education Volume: 22 Issue: 2 Dated: (Spring 1993) Pages: 139-154
Date Published
1993
Length
16 pages
Annotation
This article assesses the probable fate of broad campus speech regulations in the wake of various Federal court decisions and reviews the theoretical justifications that have not, thus far, been explicitly rejected by the courts.
Abstract
In the late 1980's, there was an epidemic of racist incidents on college campuses across the Nation. In response to these racist incidents, some universities drafted new regulations that banned expression of racist sentiments. These regulations have taken varying forms. Some regulations apply only to racist speech, and their scope relies on judicially approved limitations on free speech such as obscenity and the "fighting words" doctrine. Other regulations are more expansive, as they ban speech that denigrates a variety of other groups and extends the scope of prohibition. In the two cases so far decided, Federal courts have held against the latter approach. In 1989 a Federal district court found the University of Michigan's speech regulations void for overbreadth and impermissible vagueness in Doe v. University of Michigan. In October 1991 an arguably narrower set of regulations was found overbroad in UWM Post, Inc. v. Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System. Taken together with the U.S. Supreme Court's recent restrictions on the use of the "fighting words" doctrine in R.A.V. v. St. Paul, the decisions suggest that regulations that exceed the scope of that doctrine are unconstitutional. Some speech restrictions may clearly be imposed. In Levin v. Harleston, a City College of the City University of New York professor known for his controversial views on the intelligence of blacks brought suit against the university when it failed to sanction students who had disrupted his classes. The court held that Levin's speech rights had indeed been violated, finding that these students had entered his classroom and began shouting at him with the intent to "silence" him, and that the university, in failing to sanction the students, was responsible for the harm they had caused. Levin thus reaffirms the applicability of time, place, and manner restrictions on speech likely to disrupt the education environment, and first amendment exceptions such as the "fighting words" doctrine still apply; however, the U.S. Supreme Court's approach to first amendment rights in R.A.V. suggests that even these approaches, if applied in a "content-based" manner, may be invalidated. 104 footnotes