Students For Academic Freedom

Defending a Leftist's Right to Speak on Campus, 04/07/05 · 07 April 2005

Editor's note: The following letter was sent to Arkansas State University Mountain Home protesting their retraction of an invitation to Nation editor David Corn to deliver a speech on campus. David Corn's original report can be found here and an update can be found here.

April 07, 2005

Mick Spaulding
Vice Chancellor for Development
Arkansas State University Mountain Home
Roller Hall 311
1600 South College St.
Mountain Home, AR 72653

Dear Dr. Spaulding,

I am the national campus director of Students for Academic Freedom, a student organization dedicated to promoting academic freedom, intellectual diversity, and civility on American university campuses. We currently have chapters at 150 institutions of higher learning nationwide.

It has come to my attention that ASUMH recently cancelled a speech that was to be given by David Corn, a political writer and editor and author of the book "The Lies of George W. Bush." Corn claims that you told him that the cancellation was brought about because of material on his personal blog www.davidcorn.com which contains ads for anti-Bush apparel, advertisements for his book, and other left-leaning items, which led him to believe that you cancelled his speech due to his leftist political views. He states that he has tried to contact you several times seeking further explanation for the cancellation, but has not been able to obtain a straight answer.

If Mr. Corn is correct that you cancelled the speech due to his outspoken leftist political views, this is a gross violation of the principles of academic freedom which call for free and open discussion on our college campuses. The Academic Bill of Rights proposed by our organization states that "An environment conducive to the civil exchange of ideas being an essential component of a free university, the obstruction of invited campus speakers, destruction of campus literature, or other effort to obstruct this exchange will not be tolerated."

However distasteful Mr. Corn's views may be to you, he was an invited speaker and has the right to his opinions. It is the responsibility of educational institutions like Arkansas State University Mountain Home to provide their students access to a wide range of views and teach them to respond in a civil and reasoned way. To withdraw an invitation from an invited speaker sends exactly the wrong educational message to students.

We believe that an apology to Mr. Corn is in order and request that your office launch an inquiry to be followed by a public clarification into the reasons why Mr. Corn's speech was cancelled.

We further recommend that Arkansas State University Mountain Home consider adopting the Academic Bill of Rights to ensure that intellectual diversity and respect for all viewpoints remain guiding principles of the institution.


Sincerely,

Sara Dogan
National Campus Director
Students for Academic Freedom

David Horowitz
Sponsor, Students for Academic Freedom


cc: David Corn

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