Assembly set to vote on UW free speech bill

As the Assembly takes up a bill Wednesday to require University of Wisconsin campuses to enforce free speech protections with the threat of expulsion, another debate is raging on the money behind conservative speakers and how well college students really understand the First Amendment.

Republican leaders are pushing Assembly Bill 299 to buttress First Amendment protections for conservative voices — voices they say are being squelched on liberal college campuses by “the heckler’s veto” of disruptive protests.

While campuses already have policies to reprimand students who are disruptive, those policies need more teeth and must be enforced, Republican lawmakers say. Democrats argue the bill isn’t needed and would hinder freedom of speech by threatening to suspend or expel students.

Conservative foundations that for years have quietly given money to help student groups bring speakers to college campuses recently have been under scrutiny in the wake of speaker protests, suggesting the push for conservative views is from off-campus.

The Milwaukee-based Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation in recent years has given Young America’s Foundation tens of thousands of dollars for such activities as increasing the number of conservative-leaning campus events it sponsors, including in Wisconsin.

For example, Young America’s Foundation sought $50,000 from the Bradley Foundation in November 2014. Bradley Foundation staff recommended $10,000, noting that Young America’s Foundation was making efforts to reach more students in the Midwest and was committed to ensuring “increasing numbers of college students gain knowledge about American ideas and institu-

tions.”

Speakers brought to campuses traditionally tend to lean to the left politically, says Donald Downs, a UW-Madison emeritus political science professor known for his First Amendment work.

There’s nothing wrong with outside groups, such as conservative foundations, paying for speakers who may expose students to alternative viewpoints, Downs said.

“This is balancing of the scales,” said Downs, who in the fall of 2006 cofounded the UW-Madison Center for the Study of Liberal Democracy.

The Bradley Foundation has financially backed the center from the start, and earlier this year helped fund a major conference at the Wisconsin Historical Society titled “Free Speech on Campus: Old Challenges, New Threats.”

The UW-Madison center’s primary mission is to promote appreciation and critical understanding of principles and institutions of a liberal democracy, such as freedom and free markets; religion in liberal democracies; and balances among security, liberty, and privacy.

Last month, the center hosted libertarian Charles Murray, the speaker whose visit to University of CaliforniaBerkeley spurred a violent protest several months ago. Only a few protesters showed up for Murray’s visit at the Madison Club.

The Assembly bill

would require campuses to describe free expression policies and rules during freshman orientation so students understand all viewpoints will be allowed on campus, including those that offend, and what will happen if they disrupt speakers.

Downs said making sure incoming freshmen understand the First Amendment through summer orientation is a good idea.

He wrote an essay on the First Amendment that the Division of Student Life included in a series of emails sent to incoming freshman last summer. The essay also was used during the academic year in a one-credit seminar for new students, Counseling Psychology 125 The Wisconsin Experience, according to UW-Madison spokeswoman Meredith McGlone.

Some students are dubious about whether First Amendment education should be part of freshman orientation.

“I think it’s kind of a little bit ‘weird’ is not even the word,” said Richardo de la Cruz II, who will be a senior at UW-Madison in the fall. “One, I don’t think one is going to be really effective. Two, we have bigger issues besides the First Amendment thing that they’re trying to blow up. Bigger, bigger, bigger issues.”

De la Cruz said he thinks free speech might be just another online education component students will “click through to get it over with.”

What should be mandatory is training about multiculturalism and racism, he said.

Asked whether he would consider shouting

someone off stage as violating their First Amendment rights, De la Cruz said he doesn’t think it should warrant the punishment bill sponsors are seeking.

“It’s not violating First Amendment rights, at least in my eyes it’s not.”

The fact speakers are being shouted down on campuses is why it’s time to press for more tolerance, and to make sure students understand the First Amendment, Downs said.

Conservative foundations that put money toward college campus events should not attach strings to it, and speakers should appear on terms set by the university, Downs said.

The Bradley Foundation provides $60,000 to $80,000 a year to the Center for the Study of Liberal Democracy, said Downs. No strings have been attached, Downs said. “They trusted us. We brought in people from across the spectrum.”

UW-Madison Young Americans for Freedom released a statement Tuesday stating the authors of the bills on campus free speech “have not worked with our organization.”

“The use of taxpayer funds to promote liberal ideology while marginalizing conservatives is indefensible,” the statement said. “If not for Young America’s Foundation, (conservative commentator) Ben Shapiro and Steve Forbes would never have had their ideas heard on our campus.”

Young Americans for Freedom is the chapter affiliate of Young America’s Foundation, an ideologically conservative

youth activism organization founded in 1960 as a coalition between traditional conservatives and libertarians on college campuses.

“UW-YAF continues to lead the way in bringing intellectual diversity to our school,” said the statement released by UW-Madison student and group chairperson Abigail Streu.

Downs said he’s uncomfortable with the Legislature intervening with free speech issues on campuses. “I prefer we do it on our own,” he said.

Several states have seen bills addressing campus free speech. The conservative Goldwater Institute think tank in Arizona wrote the model for several of them, including Wisconsin’s, warning that protests against conservative speakers on college campuses endanger democracy.

If Wisconsin’s campus free speech bill passes, the UW System Board of Regents would have to create a discipline policy — including hearing procedures and a range of sanctions — for anyone affiliated with a UW institution who interferes with the free expression of others through “violent, abusive, indecent, profane, boisterous, obscene, unreasonably loud, or other disorderly conduct ...”

The regents also would be required to create a council on free expression with a member from each of the 13 fouryear campuses to annually report to the regents and lawmakers on institutional neutrality, free expression barriers and disruptions, and the handling of discipline related to disruptions.