How do we explain the assault on freedom of thought and expression that pervades our college and university campuses? How do we explain that significant numbers of students are supportive of speech codes, that faculties are often the authors of such codes, and that college and university presidents are willing to withdraw speaking invitations and are loath to intervene when speakers are shouted down?
At least a partial explanation for widespread acceptance of restrictions on free speech and academic freedom lies in a seemingly unrelated development of the past four decades. Beginning in the 1970s, higher education undertook to eliminate racial discrimination in hiring and admissions. Because many black students (and other minorities) had been deprived of educational opportunities that would have prepared them for college and graduate school, affirmative actions were taken to increase minority enrollments. These affirmative actions were challenged as discriminatory against white applicants leading eventually to a Supreme Court ruling that race could be taken into account in admissions. Colleges and universities responded to this ruling with policies and institutional arrangements that have, it turns out, invited restrictions on free speech and academic freedom. So how did the noble cause of eliminating racial discrimination from higher education contribute to today's restrictions on freedom of expression?
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