Law in the Media

The Erosion of Freedom of Speech at American Universities

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August 1 , 2007 The continued erosion of the right to freedom of speech has been increasingly evident in recent years as various laws and policies around the country are changed to place more and more restrictions on the broad freedom granted by the Bill of Rights as added to the American Constitution . The exact wording of the amendment is , Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion , or prohibiting the free exercise thereof or abridging the

freedom of speech , or of the press or the right of the people peaceably to assemble , and to petition the Government for a HYPERLINK "http /www .usconstitution .net /glossary .html " \l "REDRESS " redress of grievances (Bill of Rights 1791

The interesting language of course is that Congress shall make no law .or abridging the freedom of speech . How then , if this is the most supreme law of the land , do we explain the subtle and not so subtle erosion of freedom of speech in recent years ? Congress and the local states have made several laws regarding the freedom of speech , most notably about the use of hate speech . That could be an exhaustive in its own right . Instead , we will look here at the restrictions to freedom of speech placed on people based on their employment status and the location of the speech . Both of these factors have proven to be huge issues on university campuses across the United States . In short , the courts have held or people have guessed , based on indeterminate precedent , that freedom of speech only applies to certain places and certain people and university employees at university campuses are not included

The most notable chilling of freedom of speech which set the precedent for other eliminations of free speech rights came in 1988 , out of a high school in Hazelwood , Missouri . The case was fairly straight forward . The principal of a public high school exercised prior restraint and prevented an article written for the high school news from being published . The principal argued that the school district as de facto publishers of the news , since it was supported by school funds , had a right to exercise editorial judgment over the content . In writing the majority opinion of the Supreme Court of United States , Justice Byron White wrote educators do not offend the First Amendment by exercising editorial control over the style and content of student speech in school-sponsored expressive activities so long as their actions are reasonably related to legitimate pedagogical concerns (Landmark Cases

This is not the first time that Justice White had written an opinion that was unfavorable to journalists . In 1972 , White penned the court 's 5 to 4 decision requiring reporters to reveal confidential sources when summoned by a grand jury . .this case involves no intrusions upon speech or assembly , no prior restraint or restriction on what the press may publish ' he wrote , explaining that the court 's ruling did...