FIRE Report: 88 Percent of Texas Colleges Restrict Free Speech

PHILADELPHIA, December 10, 2009—Today, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) releases its 2010 report on campus speech codes, revealing that for the second year in a row, the percentage of American colleges and universities that systematically violate students' and faculty members' right to freedom of expression has dropped. Nationally, 71 percent of the 375 campuses analyzed still maintain codes that grant students less freedom of speech than they enjoy off campus. Texas fared even worse than the nation as a whole, with 88 percent of surveyed schools restricting free speech.

Spotlight on Speech Codes 2010: The State of Free Speech on Our Nation's Campuses reports on policies at 375 of the largest and most prestigious American colleges and universities. While the national percentage of public campuses that unconstitutionally restrict student speech dropped from 77 percent to 71, FIRE found that out of 16 colleges rated in Texas, 14, or 88 percent, had speech codes that deny college students the rights enjoyed by their peers who chose not to attend college.

"It is an ongoing scandal that so many public and private colleges and universities maintain rules that so blatantly flout our Constitution and our national traditions of freedom of speech and academic freedom," FIRE President Greg Lukianoff said. "Universities should serve as the ultimate free speech zones for our society."

FIRE's fourth annual report is the largest and most comprehensive effort to date both to quantify the proportion of colleges and universities that restrict free speech and to assess the severity of those restrictions. The report surveys publicly available policies at institutions ranked in the 100 "Best National Universities" and at the 50 "Best Liberal Arts Colleges," as rated in the 2008 " America's Best Colleges" issue of U.S. News & World Report. FIRE also researched codes at more than 200 additional major public institutions. The research was conducted between September 2008 and September 2009. 

All of the policies cited in the report are accessible online in FIRE's searchable speech code database, Spotlight: The Campus Freedom Resource. People interested in drawing attention to their institution's policies can easily do so by adding FIRE's Speech Code Widget to their blog or website. Easy instructions for adding the widget are located here. 

Some of the most outrageous speech codes in force at Texas colleges and universities include:

• Tarrant County College forbids students from "holding rallies, demonstrations, or any other form of public gathering without prior approval of the College," meaning that students must get permission from administrators to protest those very administrators.
• Texas A&M University's policies on Tolerance, Respect, and Civility commands that students show "respect for personal feelings [and] freedom from indignity of any type," meaning that students can be punished based merely on how their words make someone feel.
• University of Texas at Arlington defines "[a]ny lewd, indecent, and/or obscene conduct, expression [including] jokes, pornography, conversation, body language, etc." as punishable harassment, which would make various popular stand-up comedy routines a judicial offense if they were to be performed by a student.

Spotlight on Speech Codes 2010: The State of Free Speech on Our Nation's Campuses also discusses the emerging trend of universities stifling open debate on campus by charging student groups onerous and often unconstitutional security fees for bringing controversial speakers to campus. Such incidents have occurred in the last few years at University of California at Berkeley, University of Massachusetts Amherst, University of Colorado at Boulder, University of Arizona, and elsewhere.

Many of the speech codes at public universities are unconstitutional and likely would not survive legal challenge. FIRE's Speech Code Litigation Project has already led to the demise of similar codes at Texas Tech University, Citrus College (California), San Francisco State University, Shippensburg University (Pennsylvania), SUNY-Brockport, and Temple University.

FIRE's report offers several potential solutions to the problem of speech codes. In addition, in November FIRE published Correcting Common Mistakes in Campus Speech Policies, a practical guide for university administrators seeking to protect freedom of expression on their campuses.

"Thanks in large part to FIRE's work, the percentage of universities maintaining unconstitutional speech codes has decreased for the second year in a row, which is heartening," said Will Creeley, FIRE's Director of Legal and Public Advocacy. "But it remains completely unacceptable that the vast majority of campuses restrict student speech, betraying the university's role as the ultimate marketplace of ideas. FIRE will work to eliminate speech codes until no unconstitutional and illiberal policies remain."

FIRE is a nonprofit educational foundation that unites civil rights and civil liberties leaders, scholars, journalists, and public intellectuals from across the political and ideological spectrum on behalf of individual rights, freedom of expression, academic freedom, due process, and rights of conscience at our nation's colleges and universities. FIRE's efforts to preserve liberty on campuses across America can be viewed at thefire.org.