I can hardly believe it, but it has been nearly 20 years since the Supreme Court handed down the landmark decision in Rosenberger v. Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia and said that public universities who allocate mandatory student fees to student groups must do so on a viewpoint neutral basis.  That’s why I was surprised when yet another student group contacted us for help after a university refused to fund its pro-life event on campus.

Earlier this month, we filed a lawsuit on behalf of Students for Life at Eastern Michigan University.  SFL is hosting the Genocide Awareness Project on campus in April and applied for student fee funding to help pay the costs.  GAP is a traveling photo-mural exhibit which compares the contemporary genocide of abortion to historically recognized forms of genocide.  EMU’s student government refused to provide any funding because it said the event was too “biased,” “controversial,” and “one-sided.”  When SFL pressed the matter, the student government pointed to an EMU policy that prohibits funding for any student event that contains “political or ideological” speech.

It’s hard to fathom any college student speech that doesn’t contain some political or ideological message.  Anyone who has walked around a college campus has seen the variety of advertisements for political and ideological events.  Indeed, EMU does provide funding for political and ideological speech of some student groups, but chose to exclude SFL from funding simply because the event, which contains a pro-life message, was too biased, controversial, and one-sided.

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that public universities persist in maintaining these obviously unconstitutional policies.  Last year, Alliance Defending Freedom represented a student group at Texas A&M University after the university denied it funding to bring a socially conservative speaker to campus.  And just a few years ago, we represented the Badger Catholic student group at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in a student fee lawsuit that lasted several years and reached the highest courts in the nation.

We hope EMU will do the right thing, like Texas A&M did last year, and resolve the lawsuit by removing the restriction on political or ideological speech.  If not, we’re prepared to go to the trenches and secure a lasting legal victory for the free speech of all EMU students.

Last fall, I wrote about Non-Discrimination Gone Wild, a decision by Evergreen State College to allow a man to use the girls locker room.  Well it seems my law school alma mater, Washington University in St. Louis, wanted to one-up Evergreen, and hosted a “porn star” panel earlier this month.  The panel was part of the university’s “sex week,” a series of events designed to address “sexual health, sexuality, and societal views of sex.”  The event was hosted in the university chapel and paid for with mandatory student fees.

Wash U’s event follows similar week-long Dionysian festivals at the University of Chicago, the University of Illinois, and Yale.  Often these events are paid for with mandatory student fees.  In fact, CampusReform reports that at Wash U over $10,000 in student fees paid for “sex week.”  You would think that university administrators would question student decisions to spend their parents’ money or student loans on these events, but CampusReform quotes one university official as saying, “The administration is very supportive of any choice the students make when it comes to funding.”  Yet, I’m sure if the event had been “religion week,” the university would have refused to provide any student fee funding.

Most people think student fees pay things like services in the student union, the gym, and occasional funding of student groups conducting a service project.  But universities have turned these mandatory fees in campus slush funds for the left.  What results is student groups like “Sex Out Loud” at the University of Wisconsin-Madison that receive over $100,000 a year in student fee funding to hand out condoms and pamphlets from Planned Parenthood, but groups like Badger Catholic are denied funding to provide free student counseling from a religious perspective.

What can you do?  It’s unlikely mandatory student fees will go away anytime soon.  But the best answer to bad speech is good speech.  If you’re part of a student group on campus, apply to get student fees for your own events that promote decency and respect life.  (And if you need help, contact us.)  If you’re an alumnus of a college that hands out student fees to these types of events, tell your alumni office you’re not giving this year in protest.  Don’t let the left dominate the conversation.

FIRE has released its second annual survey of America’s Best Colleges for Free Speech.  This year, seven colleges receive the rare distinction of being ivory towers that welcome free expression.  FIRE’s President Greg Lukianoff describes the methodology and the results in the Huffington Post.  Be sure to take a look at his article, but for those who cannot wait, here’s FIRE’s list (in no particular order):

• James Madison University
• The College of William and Mary
• University of Mississippi
• Mississippi State University
• University of Tennessee – Knoxville
• University of Virginia
• University of Pennsylvania

Interestingly, Lukianoff points out a trend that when one college revises its policies to be more welcoming to free expression, other colleges in the state begin to do the same thing.  He’s right.  No one wants to be seen as the lone censor of free speech.  For example, in Virginia, we were involved in Rosenberger v. University of Virginia at the U.S. Supreme Court, which ended a discriminatory policy banning religious student groups getting equal access to student fees and campus facilities.  And earlier this year, we scored another win in Virginia when Virginia Tech ended a similar ban on religious student groups accessing student fees.  Colleges follow the free speech leader.

Did your college not make FIRE’s list?  Perhaps you can be the catalyst to encourage your college to set the trend in your state.  Contact us and let us know if you’ve had trouble expressing your beliefs on campus.

Today, Alliance Defending Freedom is launching a new tool with important information and up to date information about your rights on  campus. The Speak Up University Newsletter will cover a range of topics relevant to college students and their parents, as well as faculty and staff, keeping you informed about your constitutional right to Speak Up.

Take a look at the first newsletter here, and sign up to receive the newsletter in your inbox each month.

ADF filed a federal lawsuit this week against Texas A&M University on behalf of the Texas Aggie Conservatives, a conservative student organization.  In December 2011, the Aggie Conservatives applied for student organization funding from Texas A&M to bring a nationally recognized speaker to campus to discuss race, poverty, and social justice.  The university offers student organization funding for a wide variety of issues and subjects, except for political and religious issues.  So the university refused to fund the Aggie Conservatives’ event, despite the fact that the university regularly funds other student group events that address political and religious issues.

Texas A&M is yet another major university that has failed to abide by well-established constitutional standards when allocating campus resources to student groups.  Readers of this blog know that when public universities offer resources, whether meeting rooms or funding, they must provide all student groups equal access.  Just last year, ADF clients prevailed in a four year lawsuit that challenged restrictions on funding religious student groups at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.  We hope Texas A&M will do the right thing and resolve the Aggie Conservatives’ case quickly.

If you know of similar funding restrictions at your university, contact us and let us know.