The disorder on college campuses in recent months reveals many enduring problems within America’s academic institutions — one is a misunderstanding of how freedom of speech works, both by students and public commentators.
One of the most unjustifiable criticisms of the removal of protestors who were disrupting university operations is that administrators and police were somehow stifling the protestors’ and students’ freedom of speech. But it was the protestors’ actions, not their ideas, which justified the use of force against them.
Freedom of speech is the bedrock of a free society, but like all other fundamental rights, it is not absolute. Nor does the right to free speech exist in a vacuum; rather, it exists within the parameters of other rights, and in the case of a university, free speech rights are limited by property rights, contract rights and the civil right of students to a safe learning environment. In attending their institutions, the students agreed to abide by the rules.
As the libertarian political philosopher John Hospers once wrote, “The right to free speech does not give one the right to say anything anywhere; it is circumscribed by property rights. Persons other than the owner are permitted on property only under certain conditions. If those conditions are violated, the owner is entitled to use force to set things straight. The case is exactly the same on a college or university campus: if a campus demonstrator starts breaking windows or occupying the president’s office, the college authorities are certainly within their rights to evict him forcibly; one is permitted on the college grounds only under specific conditions.”
Both the law and common sense have long recognized the important distinction between speech and conduct. As John Stuart Mill, another staunch defender of free speech, famously wrote: “No one pretends that actions should be as free as opinions. Even opinions lose their immunity when the circumstances in which they are expressed are such as to constitute their expression a positive instigation to some mischievous act … Acts, of whatever kind, which, without justifiable cause, do harm to others, may be controlled by the unfavorable sentiments, and, when needful, by the active interference of mankind.”
The problem with the protestors was their conduct. Setting up encampments, taking over buildings, and disrupting classes are unlawful actions that would justify forcible removal no matter who was committing them, the content of their messages, or the aims of their movement.
The most unfortunate part of it all is that the students who actually went to college to get an education, rather than be political activists, had their learning disrupted when campuses canceled classes because of the protests. Those who worked hard for their degrees even had their commencement ceremonies canceled at numerous institutions. These were substantial harms to the law-abiding students who had a contractual right, for which they paid tens of thousands of dollars, to receive an education, and that warranted removing those who infringed on that right.
The fact that it took administrators so long to call the police to put an end to the disarray is probably a breach of their contractual duties to the students who went to college to actually try to learn something. One Jewish student filed a class-action breach of contract lawsuit against Columbia University for failing to provide a safe educational environment for its students by not enforcing campus rules and policies.
The faculty who staged a walkout and refused to teach in response to the arrest of protestors should also be sued for breach of contract. Their actions show that, like the students who disrupted the education of their peers, many of them care more about the students who went to college to protest than those who went there to actually attend class.
Commenting on the events at Columbia University, American Association of University Professors President Irene Mulvey said, “The idea of calling in police is a remarkably disproportionate response” and that it was “the suppression of speech and silencing of voices.” Criticism of the supposed stifling of protestors’ free speech is ironic given that student activists, and indeed universities in general, have seemed largely uninterested in the actual open exchange of ideas, as evidenced by the fact that speakers are frequently disrupted at events and colleges create atmospheres of self-censorship by stoking fears of committing unintentional “microaggressions.” Furthermore, the disorder on campus was not the environment for calm, rational, discussion and debate, nor were the protestors interested in having such dialogue.
Some critics seem to imply that there is something about using police on students that is inherently wrong. That sounds a lot like saying that being a student makes one above the law. Any other adult who refused to leave a place where they were unlawfully present would be arrested for trespassing. If young adults have not yet learned by the time they reach their 20s that laws and rules apply to them just like everyone else, then college is the time to learn that blunt fact of life.