Commentary on Free Speech and the Yale Law School
Yale Law School has seen a series of attacks on conservative speakers by leftist students. Rather than firmly address the disruptive students’ violations of school policies, time and time again Yale administrators found ways to excuse the wrongdoers and intimidate the victims. Yale certainly isn’t alone in this shameful behavior, but it has elevated to an art form, perhaps unmatched in influence, its open hostility toward conservative ideas and open support for leftist disruptions, eggshell outrage, and violence.
We should have seen this coming. Studies have demonstrated that across the country, university administrators are even more liberal than the faculty. There is no greater echo chamber today than higher education, which has felt emboldened to institutionalize management’s intolerance of conservative ideas precisely because there has been no cost to do so.
So, fourteen federal judges are not going to take it anymore and have publicly or privately announcedtheir refusal to hire law clerks from Yale Law School due to the jurists’ shared concerns about the lack of free speech at Yale. On top of the fourteen instances documented by the press, I personally know of two more participating judges.
James Ho of the Fifth Circuit, who started the boycott, has been openly joined by Elizabeth Branch from the Eleventh Circuit, and conservative icon Edith Jones, on the Fifth Circuit with Ho, publicly expressed sympathy for Ho’s concerns.
Far from criticizing Ho and Branch for threatening to depress Yale’s applicant pool, and weaken the career prospects of future students, Gerken has rewarded them with a speaking invitation, presumably to demonstrate Yale’s compliance with their demands.
Ho and Branch were ungracious in return, using their acceptance letter to further condemn Yale’s culture as “among the worst when it comes to legal cancelation,” while adding that the law school’s recent reforms may be “nothing more than parchment promises.”
For the record, I agree with many of Ho and Branch’s criticisms of Yale, about which I have written in the past. But valid complaints must not be pursued through unethical means. …
Ho and Branch should certainly be able to speak without disruption at Yale, or any law school, if invited by a student group, and Yale’s plan for an “ongoing lecture series that models engaging across divides” is a great idea. But it is disappointing to see the dean’s unqualified imprimatur on an event featuring Ho and Branch, which will be countedas a victory for judicial strong-arming.
