Years ago, Abigail Thernstrom described universities as “islands of repression in a sea of freedom.”  More recently, several columnists have highlighted how the effort to indoctrinate students pervades virtually every aspect of campus life.

Last month, George Will’s Washington Post column outlined how campus speech codes actually train students to support censorship.  In so doing, universities stifle the robust debate and exchange of ideas they claim to support.  And because these speech codes affect every aspect of student life—from the classroom to the dorm room—they are a particularly pernicious method for suppressing unpopular ideas.

Just today, Thomas Sowell’s column, The Role of ‘Educators,’ highlights how this indoctrination occurs in the classroom.  After all, far too many professors see them­selves as “agent[s] of change” who are “strategically placed, with an opportunity to condition students to want a different kind of society.”  Of course, some openly ad­mit this.  For example, Richard Rorty—a long-time philosophy professor—explained that he “like most Americans who teach humanities or social science in colleges and universities . . . try to arrange things so that students who enter as bigoted, homo­phobic religious fundamentalists will leave college with views more like our own.”  He even warned parents that he and his colleagues “are going to go right on trying to discredit you in the eyes of your children, trying to strip your fundamentalist re­ligious community of dignity, trying to make your views seem silly rather than dis­cussable.”  As Sowell notes, having discarded the job of teaching people how to think, these professors seek to undermine the values that made America great.

Last week, Jeremy Tedesco’s column at Townhall.com trumpeted Julea Ward’s victory against indoctrination efforts cloaked as practicum assignments.  After she took an unpopular stand for years, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit affirmed her conviction that she should not be forced to endorse behavior she considered immoral by ruling that public universities “cannot compel students to alter or violate their beliefs . . . as the price for obtaining a degree.”  This is a tremendous victory for religious freedom, one that will benefit students far beyond just Eastern Michigan University.

Last month, Mike Adams critiqued the Supreme Court’s unfortunate ruling in Christian Legal Society v. Martinez, which extends indoctrination efforts into the extracurricular arena.  In Cleaning Up After Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Mike highlights some of the flaws of the decision, but he also describes how his university has stretched Martinez to violate the freedoms of religious and political student groups.  In A Queer Need for Rejection, he explains how Martinez exposes some student groups—such as a Christian group that expects its leaders to live by Biblical principles—to harassment and the constant threat of discrimination charges.

Of course, if you have experienced any of these avenues of indoctrination, please contact us.  Your rights may well have been violated, and you may be in a position to secure not only your own freedoms but—like Julea Ward—those of countless others as well. 

The United States Supreme Court decided not to hear a case today.  Alpha Delta Chi (ADX) v Reed.  But that’s not really news considering that they decide not to hear about 99% of the cases brought to them.  What is news though is that the issue in the case of whether religious groups can chose leaders who share their religious beliefs remains hotly contested on the national level.

If you keep up with the news, you know that universities across the country are singling out religious groups and claiming that it is “discriminatory” for them to choose leaders that share the same religious beliefs.  Like in this case where a Christian sorority and fraternity wanted to be lead by Christians.  I know, you are probably thinking—you are kidding me, right?  Isn’t it just common sense that every church, synagogue and other religious group has the right to be lead by pastors, rabbis, etc. of the same religious persuasion?  I mean, wouldn’t we all be shocked if we went to church on Sunday only to find an avowed atheist in the pulpit?  Therein lies the rub.  This is law, not logic.

What’s even more disturbing, and indicative of the hostility that many public universities display toward religion, is that there is no requirement in the law that they prohibit religious groups from choosing like-minded leaders, only that they may—under certain circumstances—prohibit them.   And those circumstances are being fudged.  What do I mean by that?  Last year the Supreme Court held in CLS v. Martinez, based on a stipulation that all groups were required to accept anyone, that no group could then “discriminate” against anyone.  Sound fair?  Not if you dig a bit deeper.

By way of example, let’s examine that issue in this case, ADX.  The university is claiming that they too–like Martinez–have a so-called “all-comers” policy.  But they exempt all fraternities and sororities from the prohibition on gender discrimination, thus not requiring them to accept all-comers, and that is half of all clubs.  And this doesn’t even take into consideration that in real life student groups choose whomever they want, thereby excluding whomever they don’t want.  So it is really a “some-comers,” or more accurately, an “anyone-we-want-comers” policy.  And last time I checked, religious speech and exercise are protected not once, but twice in the First Amendment.   One would think that would weigh heavily in the discussion.

So the Supreme Court’s decision not to hear this case just ensures that the battle continues.  Universities will continue claiming that they have legal cover to discriminate against religious groups, and religious groups will continue to fight to remain, well, religious.  And it is more important than ever for religious groups to continue fighting for this God-given right to be religious.  As the battle rages on, it becomes more and more likely that the Supreme Court will have to weigh in on the issue at some point.

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ADF will continue the fight for the rights of private student organizations to define their membership and select their leaders without interference or retaliation by state university officials.  Please contact ADF if you are encountering similar problems at your state university.

The Supreme Court let stand the lower court decision upholding San Diego State’s discriminatory exclusion of a Christian fraternity and a Christian sorority from access to the channels of communication with students on campus. In a one sentence order with no comment, the Supreme Court declined to hear the case.  San Diego State prohibited campus Christian organizations from requiring their members and leaders to agree with the organization’s statement of faith, but allowed other student organizations to require members and leaders to agree with the viewpoints the groups advocate.  The Ninth Circuit upheld the San Diego’s State’s requirement as constitutional, and ADF appealed to the Supreme Court.

ADF attorney David Cortman issued the following statement in response to the Supreme Court’s actions:

“Public universities should encourage, not censor, the free exchange of ideas. But for now, the supposed marketplace of ideas at San Diego State University will remain a stronghold for censorship. We wish the Supreme Court would have used this opportunity to make clear that the First Amendment protects the right of student groups to employ belief-based criteria in selecting their members and leaders.”

“Throughout the years of defending its policy, the university did not tell the Democratic club it must be led by a Republican, or the vegetarian club that it must be led by a meat-eater, but it did tell Christian groups that they must allow themselves to be led by atheists. Even its purported, 11th-hour policy change made at the doorstep of the Supreme Court continues to treat religious groups less favorably than many other student groups. When political conformity is placed ahead of the constitutionally protected rights of students, all students–including students of faith–suffer.”

ADF will continue the fight for the rights of private student organizations to define their membership and select their leaders without interference or retaliation by state university officials.  Please contact ADF if you are encountering similar problems at your state university.

The U.S. Supreme Court should announce Monday whether it will hear the ADX v. Reed case from San Diego State.   We have discussed this case before and it involves a bad decision by the Ninth Circuit upholding the decision of San Diego State officials to force a Christian fraternity and sorority on campus to allow non-Christians to join, even though SDSU allows secular student groups to exclude from membership and leadership students who disagree with the groups’ viewpoints.  So that means the student vegetarian club can exclude those who advocate for meat eating and animal hunting, but Christian groups cannot exclude those advocating atheism or Buddhism, etc.

This case is a follow up to the Supreme Court’s disappointing decision in Christian Legal Society v. Martinez in June 2010, in which it upheld an “all comers” policy at UC-Hastings Law School in San Francisco, a policy that forced all student groups to allow all students to join their club.   Late last year, San Diego State tried to subvert our appeal to the Supreme Court by abruptly adopting an all comers policy, even though it has defended its religion-specific policy for years in court.  The Supreme Court should realize its orders list at 10:00 am Eastern Time.  Stay tuned.

Charlotte Allen has posted a thoughtful essay about the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s unfortunate June decision in Christian Legal  Society v. Martinez (“More Wreckage from Ginsburg’s ‘Neutral’ Ruling,” September 7, 2010).  Very much worth a read.