A Teachable Moment For Our Universities And Their Students - Universities must uphold free speech without abandoning the rule of law.

When college and university students — whose historical and constitutional 
obliviousness is matched only by their self-assured morality of outrage and 
entitlement — face no discipline from the adults who have abandoned education 
in favor of indoctrination, the barbaric antics now on display are the 
inevitable result. 

The worst, and perhaps only, lesson these students have learned is that 
speech is violence if they disagree with it, and violence is speech if it 
serves their cause. The Marxists’ “long march through the institutions” may 
be a pyrrhic victory ending in the destruction of the very institutions they 
sought to control, if university presidents fail their students again by not 
enforcing sane policies and the law. 

The purpose of education is to instill in the next generation the civic 
virtues necessary to live as free men among free men. On many university 
campuses today, we see the result of abandoning those fundamental precepts.

Free speech is an essential component of a free society. Such a statement is 
as self-evident a truth as those named in our Declaration of Independence. 
There is no “hate speech” exception to the First Amendment, nor should there 
be.

To revile another person, a fellow image bearer of God, for his ethnicity or 
religion is arguably the lowest form of human speech and indicative of a much 
deeper stain on the human condition.

“For out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.” So said the 
central figure in the history of the world, a Jewish carpenter, in His most 
famous sermon. The Judeo-Christian principles so prevalent in the minds and 
writings of the founding generation led to the establishment of our nation 
not as a theocracy, but a republic. One in which our Constitution is 
recognized as the highest civil law of the land, empowering government to 
protect the God-given rights of the people. 

Anti-Semitic speech, as ignorant and hateful as it is, remains protected 
speech. But that does not give the speakers free rein to incite violence, 
trespass on school property, damage or destroy university property, or 
physically harass and intimidate Jewish students or block them from entering 
campus, as we have seen at Columbia, UCLA, and elsewhere.

University presidents should use their authority to distinguish between 
simply despicable words and clearly illegal actions — and act accordingly. 
Some of the most valuable lessons in life are learned the hard way, and 
university presidents should be teaching some of their students a hard and 
valuable lesson right now.

The University of Chicago, and the University of Florida stand out as 
examples of rational leadership demonstrating the proper balance between 
respect for free speech and the rule of law. 

There is no right to a college education in our Constitution, or in the “laws 
of nature and of nature’s God.” To foster an environment of learning and 
peaceful interaction requires discipline of those who disrupt that 
environment.

Expulsion from the university is a necessary first step, while criminal 
penalties for criminal action can be left to local prosecutors. Anyone guilty 
of a crime while here as a guest of our nation through a student visa should 
lose the privilege immediately.

Aristotle once said, “It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to 
entertain a thought without accepting it.” Centuries later, our nation’s poet 
laureate, Robert Frost, would echo Aristotle when he stated, “Education is 
the ability to listen to almost anything without losing your temper or self-
confidence.”

Judging by this standard, many of our universities have failed to truly 
educate our youth. Trigger warnings, safe spaces, and speech codes have 
sprung up like weeds to choke out free expression and civil discourse.

What we are witnessing on college campuses across our nation is the 
fundamental misunderstanding of the right to free speech and its accompanying 
duties and limits. Worse, we’re seeing that combined with indoctrination into 
the toxic, Marxist ideology incompatible with a free, civil society and a 
constitutional republic. Those who have sewn to the wind for decades are now 
reaping the inevitable whirlwind.

Yet, even amidst this chaos, there is a teachable moment to restore ordered 
liberty and return to the classical liberal tradition. These principles, 
deeply rooted in American soil, are not dormant. If we muster the moral 
courage and clarity to cultivate them, our nation can renew the bloom of 
Western Civilization and human flourishing once again.

--
Let's go Brandon!