Tag Archives: ADF: Center for Academic Freedom

Student Free Press Association: “‘[Gender-neutral housing] is just part of the next logical step in a university project that is designed to cause students to rethink essentially everything they knew about sex and gender,’ said [David French], the director of the Alliance Defense Fund, a conservative Christian organization . . . In just five years, the rest of the Ivy League and another 40 other schools have followed suit, thanks in large part to the National Student Genderblind Campaign. The group has campaigned for gender-neutral housing and more relaxed policies because, according to their website, ‘traditional policies are premised upon outdated beliefs and stereotypes about gender and sexuality.’”

ADF Attorney David Hacker writing at Speak Up Movement / University: “Last night, the ADF Center for Academic Freedom filed a Petition for Rehearing or Rehearing En Banc with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in Jonathan Lopez’s case against the Los Angeles Community College District. (The ADF press release is here.) On September 17, 2010, a panel of the Ninth Circuit ruled that Mr. Lopez did not have legal standing to challenge LACCD’s speech code, even though a professor, administrator and two students threatened Lopez with punishment under the code.”

ADF Attorney David French writing at Phi Beta Cons: “Last week, the Alliance Defense Fund, at which I’m the director of the Center for Academic Freedom, released part four of ‘Hanna’s Story,’ our based-on-true-events dramatic series (yes, dramatic series — and I think it’s pretty darn good) about a new student’s struggle to start a pro-life club . . . The conservative academic-freedom movement has come a long way in just a few years. I can remember the good ole days of hardcover books, primitive websites, and using actual Wite-Out on complaints. Now there’s YouTube channels, Facebook pages, and documentary films.

ADF Attorney David French writing at Phi Beta Cons: “Yesterday, the Alliance Defense Fund Center for Academic Freedom launched a new video series, ‘Hanna’s Story,’ that tracks a (fictional) student’s efforts to start a pro-life club on her campus. The series is based on our actual cases. You can watch the first one, which introduces Hanna, here.”

ADF Attorney Gregory S. Baylor writing at Speak Up Movement / University: “A principal purpose of ADF’s Center for Academic Freedom is change the academic culture by confronting the sort of anti-Christian animus Professor Larsen describes in his essay. Such hostility is always wrong, and frequently illegal. We share Larsen’s pessimism that the academy will eradicate the problem on its own. If you experience such animus, let us know. We stand ready to help protect academic freedom and restore the civility and respect that is all too often missing from the academic environment.”

ADF Attorney David French writing at Phi Beta Cons: “Evidence shows that academics have disdain for evangelicals. Evidence also shows that students at secular colleges tend to abandon both their faith and their faith practices. There is also absolutely no doubt that the campus has become quite decadent . . . I don’t know a single serious evangelical leader who believes (as the author asserts) that ‘no degree of accommodation [with academia] aside from outright mass conversion is ever going to be enough.’ In fact, I know quite a few serious Christians — including my colleagues at the Alliance Defense Fund Center for Academic Freedom — who have a much simpler, more modest goals, like free speech, freedom of association, and giving Christian scholars a fair chance at tenure and promotion in the academy.”

Media Newswire: “The court ruled in EMU’s favor and dismissed all claims brought by Ward and the Alliance Defense Fund Center for Academic Freedom. ‘We are pleased that the court has upheld our position in this matter,’ said Walter Kraft, vice president for communications at Eastern Michigan University. ‘Julea Ward was not discriminated against because of her religion. To the contrary, Eastern Michigan is deeply committed to the education of our students and welcomes individuals from diverse backgrounds into our community.’”

ADF Attorney David French writing at Phi Beta Cons: “Late yesterday afternoon, the Alliance Defense Fund Center for Academic Freedom filed a lawsuit on behalf of Augusta State University counseling student Jennifer Keeton. Her tale has to be read to be believed. Essentially, the facts are as follows. Jennifer is a devout Christian and holds biblically orthodox views regarding sexual morality. In the context of classroom discussions of homosexual behavior, she expressed her Christian views, and has also shared those views with her classmates outside of class. … To alter Jennifer’s views, the faculty imposed a ‘remediation plan,’ that included ‘diversity sensitivity training,’ required Jennifer to read at least ten articles in peer-reviewed journals that “pertain to improving counseling effectiveness with GLBTQ populations,” and (my personal favorite) required that she ‘increase exposure and interaction with gay populations,’ including a suggestion that she attend the ‘Gay Pride Parade in Augusta.’”

CNA: “Travis Barham, litigation staff counsel for the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, wrote a letter on July 12 to several officials at the University of Illinois, including the president, the Dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and the head of the religion department. ‘In relieving Dr. Howell of his teaching responsibilities, the University is firing him for teaching Catholic doctrine in a class about Catholic doctrine,’ Barham said. He noted that ‘the University’s only reason for removing Dr. Howell is that other students, faculty, and staff disliked his speech.’ However, he continued, the First Amendment ‘exists precisely to protect controversial ideas from being silenced’ and ‘affords broad protection for a professor’s speech in the classroom.’”

ADF Attorney Joe Martins writing at Speak Up Movement / University: “Today, Peter Schmidt has an excellent article at the Chronicle of Higher Education on the efforts of various professors to shore up academic freedom at their respective universities. This effort is entirely understandable, but I fear will ultimately prove ineffective. … Given the practical shortcomings of institutional protections, it appears this matter needs to be settled by the Supreme Court. For almost half a century before Garcetti, the Court recognized the ‘transcendent value’ of academic freedom and the special place it holds in the First Amendment. The Court needs to clarify that Garcetti did not change this precedent and that the viewpoint of professors’ scholarship and teaching is still protected by the Constitution. The ADF Center for Academic Freedom is currently appealing this precise issue to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit for Dr. Adams because the district court wrongly used Garcetti to quash his First Amendment rights. For the sake of academic freedom, let’s hope the Fourth Circuit—and ultimately the Supreme Court—get it right.”

ADF Attorney David J. Hacker writing at Speak Up Movement / University: “[F]ormer ADF client Scott Savage . . . gave up a big city desk job to become a plain Christian and eventually took a job as a reference librarian at The Ohio State University Mansfield campus, only to be ousted because of his Christian and conservative beliefs . . . Two committee members called Scott ‘anti-gay,’ said his book recommendations were ‘homophobic tripe,’ and accused him of ‘homophobia’ . . . The university eventually dropped the harassment charges after the ADF Center for Academic Freedom intervened on Scott’s behalf. But the university continued to target Scott for his views, making his working environment unbearable, which eventually forced him to resign. He then filed a defamation lawsuit against the university and some faculty members. On Monday, a federal district court in Ohio dismissed Scott’s lawsuit. This dismissal is disappointing and constitutes another troubling step in the direction of eviscerating academic freedom on campus. But from reading news reports on the ruling, you would think nothing significant happened to Scott.”

National Catholic Register: “Eight Canadian university students face expulsion for mounting a pro-life display with pictures of Nazi and Armenian genocides alongside photos of abortion . . . ‘Canadian and American universities have very similar ideological mindsets, but in the U.S. we have more protection for free speech,’ said [David French] of the Alliance Defense Fund’s Tennessee-based Center for Academic Freedom. The center defends pro-life clubs against university administrations in the U.S. on First Amendment grounds.” | For more information see this ADF Alliance Alert compound tag: http://www.alliancealert.org/tag/country-canada+global-sanctity-of-life+topic-education/

ADF Attorney Gregory S. Baylor writing at the Academic Freedom File: “USA Today took on Christian Legal Society v. Martinez (to be heard by the Supreme Court on April 19) in a recent opinion column by Tom Krattenmaker. … First, it is misleading (at best) to suggest that this case is all about the ability of ‘gay students’ to serve as leaders and voting members of CLS. Hastings originally said that CLS could not consider religious belief or same-sex sexual conduct in choosing officers and members. In other words, it could not deny voting membership to an atheist who rejected CLS’s core religious beliefs. Hastings later said that CLS was required to admit anyone to leadership or membership. In other words, it is simply wrong to say that this case is all about ‘gay students.’”

ADF Attorney Casey Mattox writing at the Academic Freedom File: “With two years distance from the DeJohn decision, however, public universities across New Jersey, Delaware, and Pennsylvania continue to hold on to egregiously unconstitutional speech codes that use much of the same language rejected in Saxe and DeJohn and inhibit expression and skew debate on campus by placing students at risk of substantial punishment if someone claims offense at what they say. . . . Research by ADF allied attorneys shows a host of schools in the Third Circuit that retain egregiously unconstitutional speech codes despite clear precedent in the Third Circuit.”

ADF Attorney Greg Baylor writing at the Academic Freedom File: “[Marci Hamilton's] column states that this case will cause the Supreme Court to ‘wade into the culture wars morass.’ To be sure, this case arises out of a leftwing university’s attack on a theologically orthodox religious group. However, the legal principles involved transcend the particular positions taken by the contending sides on religious and moral questions. At stake is the freedom of all student groups to choose leaders who share their respective missions, free from undue government pressure . . . There is no need for the Court to ‘choose sides’ in the culture war. It simply needs to uphold the Constitution.”

Student Press Law Center: “Lawyers for The Liberty, an independent publication at Oregon State University, filed a motion for reconsideration after a judge ruled in favor of the university in a lawsuit filed by the paper . . . Though lawyers for the Liberty filed a motion for immediate relief, which would have required the university to allow the newspaper to again be distributed on campus, it was withdrawn after the university amended its fixed bin policy and allowed the paper to distribute again, said [Heather Gebelin Hacker], an attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund representing the Liberty.”

ADF Attorney David Hacker writing at the Academic Freedom File: “A few weeks ago, Heather Hacker and I sat down with Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse, President of the Ruth Institute, to talk about campus censorship. The podcast is now online and can be found here.”

ADF Attorney Gregory S. Baylor writing at the Academic Freedom File: “The Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT) has wrongly declared that Trinity Western University (TWU) violates academic freedom because of its Christ-centered character. CAUT bases its conclusion upon two facts. First, TWU draws its faculty and staff from among those who voluntarily embrace its Statement of Faith . . . Second, TWU ‘rejects as incompatible with human nature and revelational theism a definition of academic freedom which arbitrarily and exclusively requires pluralism without commitment, denies the existence of any fixed points of reference, maximizes the quest for truth to the extent of assuming it is never knowable, and implies an absolute freedom from moral and religious responsibility to its community.’”

Young America’s Foundation: “Young America’s Foundation has generously given me some space on their blog, and I’m going to use the next few days to introduce you to the ‘Four D’s,’ my shorthand method of guiding conservative activists to effective advocacy. Today, I’ll introduce the concepts, and then from Tuesday through Friday discuss them in detail.”

ADF Attorney Joseph Martins writing at the Academic Freedom File: “Free speech violations manifest themselves in many forms on America’s campuses. Perhaps one of the most frequent—and misunderstood violations—concerns the distribution of student activity fees . . . Take, for example, the Student Government Board (SGB) at the University of Pittsburgh. The SGB initially denied Students For Life’s request for $1,515 to attend the National Students for Life Conference and the March for Life in Washington D.C. on the grounds that the group was ‘proselytizing’ for its cause . . . ”

ADF Attorney Jordan Lorence writing at the Academic Freedom File: “Here are seven reasons why we at the Alliance Defense Fund are battling for the constitutional rights of the Christian Legal Society before the U.S. Supreme Court: 1. The Constitution protects CLS’s rights . . . 2. Universities can deny recognition in order to stigmatize unpopular groups . . . . 3. The policies are illogical and ridiculous . . . 4. Other students can use these policies to undermine or abolish groups they don’t like . . . 5. It debases the discourse on civil rights. 6. It will spread if not stopped here at the university . . . 7. It teaches wrong ideas to the next generation of our nation’s leaders . . . ”

Christian Post: “At least 18 different organizations and 13 state attorney generals are urging the U.S. Supreme Court to protect the constitutional rights of religious groups to set membership and leadership criteria according to the dictates of their religious beliefs . . . Since the federal civil rights suit was filed against school officials, attorneys with CLS and the Alliance Defense Fund Center for Academic Freedom have argued on behalf of the CLS chapter, insisting that the group should be able to decide its own membership and not be required by the college to admit homosexuals and non-Christians as members and officers in order to receive school recognition.”

ADF attorney Jordan Lorence writing at the Academic Freedom File (Jan. 1): “On the other hand, if Respondents [UC-Hasings Law School] were to prevail in this case, it would provoke a collusion between religious freedom and rights of sexual orientation. That would mean, in essence, that when sexual orientation is added to the list of forbidden grounds under non-discrimination laws, religious and other groups that adhere to traditional moral views could be driven from the public square in the name of enforcing non-discrimination. This would raise the stakes in the political battles over sexual orientation discrimination to a dangerous extent . . . ”

Related:

David French: Who is Defending Liberty?

Family Action Council of Tennessee: “Officials at MTSU approved the Pro-Life Collegians’ application, but with a precondition that it had to pay for security for the event . . . Pro-Life Collegians knew that they should not be treated differently from other campus student groups that sponsor events and called on the Alliance Defense Fund’s Center for Academic Freedom (ADF) to help them challenge the university’s discriminatory approval of their application . . . Essentially, according to ADF Litigation Staff Counsel Joe Martins, who wrote the letter, pro-life student groups were being penalized and discriminated against for expressing their beliefs. And the message in ADF’s letter was clear: ‘We’ll sue if necessary.’”

David French, Director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, writing at Phi Beta Cons: “Last semester, Middle Tennessee State University informed the Pro-Life Collegians (PLC) that they could not host a traveling pro-life display without first paying a substantial security fee. Over at the Alliance Defense Fund’s Academic Freedom File, Joe Martins tells the story.”

David French, Director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, writing at Phi Beta Cons: “‘Thrust themselves into the public eye?’ ‘Assumed a public face?’ This is dangerous reasoning. Let’s think for a moment about what actually happened here. The California Supreme Court thrust same-sex marriage onto the people of California in a sterling example of undemocratic judicial activism. At this point, California citizens had a choice to make: take the medicine they’d been given, or ‘assume a public face’ and actually put the matter to a vote. Does that make them ‘fair game’ for threats and intimidation?”

“That organization, the non-profit Alliance Defense Fund, is now undertaking a special campaign on a familiar front of the culture wars. Armed with a $9.2 million donation from an anonymous family plus its own matching funds, the group is stepping up efforts to combat what it says is widespread and unconstitutional censorship at public colleges . . . ” (AZ Republic)

David French, Director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, writing at National Review’s Phi Beta Cons blog: “[I]sn’t Title VI aimed squarely at invidious discrimination? By its terms it’s limited to the identity-based categories of race, color, and national origin. Is it invidious discrimination for expressive organizations to ask that their members and officers agree with the group’s mission and conduct themselves accordingly? I think it’s a mistake to equate such commonsense, mission-based ‘discrimination’ with invidious racial discrimination. Of course, that doesn’t mean the individuals don’t get their feelings hurt when they’re excluded from organizations, but that doesn’t provide a pretext for state action.”

ADF Attorney Jordan Lorence writing at the Academic Freedom File: “Also, the District Court rejected the religious liberty claims under the federal and state constitutions. Again, the court diminishes the impact of the state’s actions against the photography company, with its statements that Elane Photography is merely being asked to photograph something for a fee. There is no sense that people can be asked by their customers to do something with their businesses that violate the business owners’ beliefs. A photographer who is a vegetarian might decline to create photos for the promotional materials of a meat packing plant. If New Mexico law made that an act of discrimination, the District Court opinion says that there is no First Amendment protection. That can’t be right, and that is why we will appeal this decision to the New Mexico Court of Appeals.”

“Do constitutional protections of free speech, free assembly and conscientious religious expression still apply in an academic environment increasingly controlled by Leftist philosophy and the legal hyperventilations of political correctness?”

Joseph Martins writes at the Center for Academic Freedom Blog: “As the Supreme Court has repeatedly held, public universities—like all government entities—need to give private organizations a wide berth for the exercise of First Amendment freedoms, rather than looking for ways to encroach as far as the Constitution will technically permit.”

Greg Baylor writes at the ADF Center for Academic Freedom Blog: “More broadly, the freedom of all religious groups – not just campus organizations – to associate around shared religious commitment is under attack. For example, the ACLU and its allies are working to exclude faith-based social service providers from federally funded programs on the ground that they ‘discriminate’ on the basis of religion and ‘sexual orientation.’”

David French, Director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, writing at National Review’s Phi Beta Cons blog: “At campus after campus, administrators have ‘derecognized’ student groups, and perhaps no student First Amendment controversy has spawned more litigation. A quick survey of ADF Center for Academic Freedom and FIRE cases demonstrates how dominant this issue has been . . . This morning, the Supreme Court announced its plans to step in. It granted the Christian Legal Society’s cert petition and will hear the group’s appeal of the Ninth Circuit’s ruling.”

Mike Adams writing at Townhall: “It’s hard to believe it has been over four years since I spoke at N.C. State. That night, back in August of 2005, I gave a speech calling for a conservative revolution on our college campuses . . . In January of 2006, I got a call from David French of the newly formed Center for Academic Freedom – a branch of my favorite public policy organization, the Alliance Defense Fund. David asked that I help him identify illegal speech codes and brave students willing to fight them. By the end of the year, we had worked together to bring down several speech codes through litigation or, in some cases, the mere threat of litigation.’”

Clarification:   The Alliance Defense Fund is a legal alliance defending the right to hear and speak the Truth through strategy, training, funding, and litigation.

David French, Director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, writing at National Review’s Phi Beta Cons blog: “Student activists — working with allied administrators — removed Steve from office and launched an illegal recall effort after he refused to censor a pro-life display on Constitution Day. David Hacker, an attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund’s Center for Academic Freedom, sent the college a cease-and-desist letter. On Friday afternoon, the university responded.”

LifeNews: “‘Respecting people’s First Amendment rights is worthy of praise, not punishment,’ said ADF Litigation Staff Counsel David Hacker. ‘The recall election against Steve was wrongly motivated and flawed. The entire process against him began because he stood up for the free speech rights of a pro-life group. In their haste to punish him for that stand, ASG members did not follow the law. Though we are pleased that they recognize this problem and reinstated Steve as president, we are disappointed with the ongoing and apparently relentless attempt to punish him by seeking to impeach him from office.’”

ADF attorney Jordan Lorence writing at the ADF Center for Academic Freedom’s Academic Freedom File blog: “Observers of the United States Supreme Court are noting the unusually-long scrutiny the justices are giving to Christian Legal Society v. Martinez, the case where the University of California-Hastings (in San Francisco) denied permission to the Christian Legal Society to meet on campus because it ran afoul of its nondiscrimination policy, as ADF has seen on other university campuses.”

OneNewsNow: “A student council president under fire at Sacramento City College now has legal representation . . . ‘He’s been retaliated against by these school administrators who called into question his faith,” says [David] Hacker. The attorney explains that the administrators ‘have removed [Macias] from student government trips that the group was going [on] . . .’”

David French, Director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, appeared on the Michael Medved Show to discuss this: College launches attack campaign on student body president over pro-life group’s display.

The MP3 runs about 33 minutes.

Daily Vanguard: “The Students Alliance and The Liberty are seeking equal rights to speak on campus according to their attorney, Heather Gebelin Hacker of the Alliance Defense Fund . . . ‘The defendants have been served and their answer to the complaint is due on Nov. 30,’ said Katie Blechacz, media relations manager of the Alliance Defense Fund.”

WorldNetDaily: “‘According to our information, the ASG and several college officials have engaged in a retaliatory and discriminatory campaign to recall Mr. Macias as ASG president simply because he refused to unlawfully censor an off-campus group who participated in the college’s Constitution Day,’ said a letter from the law firm’s litigation staff counsel, David J. Hacker.”

David French, Director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, writing at National Review’s Phi Beta Cons blog: “Late last week, ADF Center for Academic Freedom attorneys issued a cease-and-desist letter in a remarkable case involving Sacramento City College. The story begins, ironically enough, with a request by the Genocide Awareness Project (GAP) to set up a pro-life display on Constitution Day . . . When GAP erected its rather graphic display, members of the campus community reacted with fury. The student-government adviser and at least one member of the administration demanded that Macias have the display removed. Macias refused, rightly noting that doing so would violate GAP’s First Amendment rights.”

LifeNews: “College officials targeted Steve Macias for retaliation after they attempted to censor the speech of an off-campus pro-life group that ASG had already voted to allow to participate in a campus event . . . ‘Respecting people’s First Amendment rights is worthy of praise, not punishment,’ said ADF Litigation Staff Counsel David Hacker. ‘Steve Macias did exactly the right thing in his role as president, and now he is paying the price determined by those who wanted to censor this pro-life group.’”

The State Press: “The [Alliance Defense Fund] disagreed with the court’s decision because a college campus is a public forum for students, as the Supreme Court has ruled for many years, Hacker said. ‘We believe that the court needs to address that issue of whether or not these forums are public forums because it has implications on how heavy-handed ASU can be in the future in regulating student speech,’ Hacker said.”

Academic Freedom File: “On Tuesday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit heard oral arguments in Roman Catholic Foundation, UW-Madison, Inc. et al. v. David G. Walsh, et al., a case involving the viewpoint discriminatory allocation of student activity fees at the University of Wisconsin-Madison . . . ADF Senior Vice President and Senior Counsel Jordan Lorence argued the case on behalf of the student group.”

David French, Director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, writing at National Review’s Phi Beta Cons blog: “It is becoming increasingly common for universities to defend unconstitutional policies (sometimes for years), make changes at the last possible moment, and then seek dismissal of a case. Just last week, ADF Center for Academic Freedom attorneys argued a case against Arizona State University (retired Justice Sandra Day O’Connor presided) in which the university changed its policies (for the second time) after ASU Students for Life filed their appellate brief and now seek dismissal for mootness.”

David French, Director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, writing at Phi Beta Cons: “As I type this post, my colleagues at the Alliance Defense Fund Center for Academic Freedom are arguing a critical case before the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago. The subject: the use and abuse of mandatory student activity fees at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.”

Academic Freedom File: “The audio recording of Tuesday’s oral arguments in ASU Students for Life v. Crow can be found here. ADF Center for Academic Freedom attorney Heather Gebelin Hacker argued on behalf of ASU Students for Life. A decision is expected in several months.”

First Amendment Center: “‘It sounds like you have achieved a victory,’ Alex Kozinski, chief judge of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, told Heather Gebelin Hacker, an Alliance Defense Fund attorney representing the student group. But Hacker said during arguments Oct. 20 at the University of Arizona law college that there’s no certainty that the university won’t change its policies again without a court ruling in favor of protection of free speech on campus. The trial court ruling being appealed went in favor of the university, Hacker noted.”

CitizenLink: “Heather Gebelin Hacker, litigation staff counsel for ADF, said pro-life students should not have a price tag placed on expression of their beliefs . . .”

LifeNews: “Heather Gebelin Hacker, staff counsel with the Alliance Defense Fund, presented oral arguments today in the case. Hacker said, ‘Pro-life student groups shouldn’t have a price tag placed upon expression of their beliefs. Forcing any student group to pay for insurance in order to exercise their right to free speech guaranteed under the First Amendment is unconstitutional.’”

TCU Daily Skiff: “The Alliance Defense Fund Center for Academic Freedom recently issued ‘red lights’ to TCU, the University of North Texas and other local colleges telling them that their free speech codes are unconstitutional.”

Arizona Capitol Times: “Retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor will be hearing cases once more, sitting in for two days on the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. One case involves a right-to-life group that operates at Arizona State University . . . [Heather Gebelin Hacker] said, ‘Pro-life student groups shouldn’t have a price tag placed upon expression of their beliefs. Forcing any student group to pay for insurance in order to exercise their right to free speech guaranteed under the First Amendment is unconstitutional.’”

OneNewNow: “The Alliance Defense Fund is suing Oregon State University on behalf of the campus’ Student Alliance. The Student Alliance publishes an independent paper, but the 2008 fall semester found their campus distribution bins missing. ADF attorney Heather Gebelin Hacker tells OneNewsNow students originally thought the bins were stolen and contacted the police.”

David French, Director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, writing at National Review’s Phi Beta Cons blog: “While there’s no shortage of excellent websites commenting about campus issues, there is a crying need for more places for students to tell their own, first-hand tales of life at the modern leftist university. At the Alliance Defense Fund’s new website, we’re creating a specific space for these stories.”

Student Press Law Center: “The Alliance Defense Fund filed a lawsuit Sept. 30 against Oregon State University on behalf of the school’s unofficial student paper, The Liberty, seeking to reverse the school’s removal of newspaper distribution bins from campus . . . ‘The Liberty and the students really just want to be treated equally,’ said David Hacker, the [Alliance] Defense Fund attorney working on the case. ‘They want to put their bins back on campus and be treated equally with The Daily Barometer.’”

David French, Director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom appeared on The Michael Gallagher Show to discuss the Mojave Desert Cross and the ADF’s $9.2 million grant to defend religious freedom on college campuses.

Jeremy Tedesco ADF attorney Jeremy Tedesco appeared on The Don Kroah Show to discuss the ADF University Project, “the nation’s largest-ever campaign to eradicate unconstitutional public university and college policies designed to silence religious speech and expression.”

OneNewsNow: “Free speech reigns supreme on the campus of Spokane Falls Community College in Washington . . . While the lawsuit was filed in March, the college only recently settled the case after agreeing to a court order to change its policy regarding free speech. Hacker says the original policy — termed the ‘Stop the Hate’ policy — was so broad that an event of any kind could be halted if one person felt offended.”

Star-Telegram: “A national conservative Christian group is calling on several area colleges and universities to drop or change their free speech and expression rules because they could discourage students from voicing opinions about religious beliefs and other issues . . . At times, students with those and other conservative Christian viewpoints may want to publicly express their beliefs. But some school policies are so open to interpretation that students could face punishment if they do, said David French, senior counsel for the Defense Fund.”

The Register-Guard: “Oregon State University students who publish a journal of ‘conservative, libertarian and independent thought’ have filed a federal lawsuit in Eugene, alleging disparate treatment by university officials who have limited its on-campus distribution to two sites . . . Student publishers of The Liberty are being represented in their lawsuit by attorneys from the Alliance Defense Fund, a California-based Christian advocacy organization.”

The Oregonian: “A conservative student group has accused leaders of Oregon State University in federal court of violating students’ right to free speech by restricting distribution of a student-run newspaper on campus . . . ‘In this case, it seems like these students have viewpoints that aren’t favored by the university, and they are being treated differently because of that,’ said Heather Gebelin Hacker, an attorney representing the student group for the Alliance Defense Fund.”

Today, David French, Director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, appeared on the Michael Medved Show to discuss this: Trashing free speech: Oregon State Univ. piles student paper’s distribution bins next to dumpster

The MP3 runs just over 32 minutes.

ADF Litigation Staff Counsel Heather Gebelin Hacker writing at the ADF Center for Academic Freedom’s Academic Freedom File blog: “The Sheeran settlement was a great outcome not just for pro-life students, but for every student at the Community Colleges of Spokane . . . CCS policies actually allowed administrators to require students hosting an outside speaker to present opposing points of view! In fact, that was an administrator’s initial response to Beth Sheeran’s request to hold her pro-life event—it was ‘too one-sided’ and since ‘Washington is a pro-choice state,’ they would also have to include pro-choice information . . . The victory does not come free from a sense of foreboding, however. These ‘Stop The Hate’-type programs seem to have become vogue among administrator-types, and are cropping up at increasing numbers of schools.”

Gazette Times: “The Oregon State University student group that publishes The Liberty, a conservative-leaning journal, has sued OSU officials, arguing that the university has discriminated against the journal by arbitrarily limiting the opportunities for its distribution . . . [Executive Director of The Liberty] Will Rogers is being represented in the lawsuit by attorneys from the Alliance Defense Fund, a national legal alliance founded in 1993 by prominent Christian leaders. One of those attorneys, Heather Hacker, said Wednesday that staff members of The Liberty ‘just basically want to be treated like the Barometer . . . That’s just basic fairness.’”

The paper, The Liberty, had its distribution bins–containing copies of the latest issue of the paper– thrown next to a dumpster by university officials . . . the other student newspaper was left untouched.

Penna Dexter writes at the Christian Post blog, The Way I See It: “Julea sought help from the Alliance Defense Fund’s Center for Academic Freedom. ADF is suing the university asking that Julea be reinstated into the counseling program and for compensatory damages. Senior Counsel David French says the Center has a 100 percent win record when it confronts universities for violations of students’ religious freedom. He maintains that the university is supposed to be a ‘free marketplace if ideas. The liberal university is the intellectual engine of the left in this country. Kudos to brave students, like Julea, and to ADF for standing up to it.”

David French, Director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, writing at National Review’s Phi Beta Cons blog: “Over the past several weeks, defenders of academic freedom have been in an uproar over Harvard Law Review’s unsigned student comment defending speech codes and criticizing the Third Circuit’s landmark decision in DeJohn v. Temple University.”

“A federal court ruled Wednesday that an injunction prohibiting enforcement of a Los Angeles Community College District policy that violates student free speech rights will stand.”

OneNewsNow: “Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) is expanding its program to declare college and university campuses free-speech zones . . . ‘There has been an unprecedented $9.2 million gift to ADF that ADF is committed to matching for a total number of just under $20 million to restore the marketplace of ideas to campus, to roll back censorship against Christian students and Christian professors on campus,’ [David] French says.”

Christian Post: “The grant, given by a family whose name was not disclosed, is matched by the recipient group, Alliance Defense Fund, so nearly $20 million will go towards its University Project. ‘Christians on public university campuses shouldn’t be discriminated against for their beliefs,’ said ADF Senior Counsel David French, director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom.”

David French, Director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, appeared on the Michael Medved Show to discuss the $9.2 million grant that enables ADF to ramp up defense of free speech at universities.

The MP3 runs just under 15 minutes.

Jay Schalin writing at the John William Pope Center: “One incident that threatens some very basic beliefs of a long-established religion is occurring at Belmont Abbey College near Charlotte, North Carolina. It is also one of the latest instances of what David French, a senior legal counsel at the Alliance Defense Fund, says is an emerging battle of ‘freedom of conscience issues in health care.’ In this battle, health care providers and professionals clash with the government over their right to refuse to perform procedures that conflict with their religious convictions.”

Paul Weber, ADF Excutive Vice President of Communications and Development, and David French, Director of the ADF Center for Academice Freedom, appeared on Moody Prime Time America to discuss the $9.2 million grant that enables ADF to ramp up defense of free speech at universities.

The MP3 runs just under 8 minutes.

CitizenLink: “The Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) has received a $9.2 million grant to help fund the fight for religious freedom at public universities and colleges . . . ‘Many colleges and universities across the nation have enacted unconstitutional policies and practices,’ [David French] said, ‘censoring Christian speech, banning Christian groups from campus and punishing professors and students.’”