The first -- and hopefully last -- I say about Ward Churchill

Tony Rickey has a thoughtful post arguing the case for firing Ward Churchill, on the theory that (a) academic freedom can't be limitless (and that this matter is beyond the limit); and (b) academic freedom isn't such a great thing for conservatives anyway.  It's well worth reading, even though in the end, I still think that Churchill shouldn't be fired for his statement -- which, to be clear, I think is totally reprehensible.  Tony nails the reason for that:

What makes the rant in question intolerable is not that the author makes equivalences between American actions that may have caused death in the Middle East, or questions the root causes of 9/11. What makes it intolerable is its hateful dismissal of the dead, individuals that Churchill has never met and is singularly unqualified to judge.

I have to say, as a matter of tactics, I have a hard time understanding what Churchill expected to accomplish.  There certainly is a plausible case to be made that U.S. foreign policy should be rethought; that by supporting autocratic regimes, we've created the anger and desperation that gave rise to 9/11; and so on.  But that is very different from dancing on the graves of the dead, as Churchill's statement did.

Say you wanted to convince the average American who hasn't given much thought to geopolitics in the Middle East that U.S. foreign policy was a problem.  Do you really think that calling this average American's fellow citizens "little Eichmanns" is going to do the job?   Do you really think that expressing outright glee over the horrifying deaths of this average American's fellow citizens is going to do the job?

Comments

[Kevin Jon Heller]

So if A. Rickey believes that CU should fire Churchill, does he also believe that the University of Western Ontario should fire J. Phillippe Rushton, who believes Africans are genetically inferior to Europeans and Europeans are genetically inferior to Asians? Here's Rushton's description of his own work:

"I consistently find that East Asians and their descendants average a larger brain size, greater intelligence, more sexual restraint, slower rates of maturation, and greater law abidingness and social organization than do Europeans and their descendants who average higher scores on these dimensions than do Africans and their descendants. To explain this pattern I proposed a gene-based evolutionary theory."

Certainly, if we're going to place limits on academic freedom, it seems sensible to stop a professor like Rushton from poisoning the minds of his students -- students who may well be members of the races Rushton believes are inferior.

[Tung Yin]

Well, I'll let Tony speak for himself; since I don't think Churchill should be fired, it stands to reason that I don't think Rushton should be fired either.

But in any event, I think you (Kevin) can come up with a better example than Rushton. While I am highly skeptical of his thesis, it strikes me as quite a bit more plausibly academic in nature than Churchill's deranged rant. To be clear, **I AM NOT ENDORSING RUSHTON'S THEORY IN ANY WAY** But it seems to me that he's proposed some empirical observations and an explanation that can tested. I would expect that his thesis would be proven incorrect. But it's still in the nature of being an academic.

Nor, we should note, does it have the cruel, mean-spiritedness of Churchill's statement.

[Kevin Jon Heller]

The most intellectually dishonest aspect of A. Rickey's argument is the fact that he doesn't even bother to point out that the statements at issue weren't made in the classroom, but in an article and a book. Although I wouldn't support firing Churchill even if he had made the statements in the classroom -- I believe in academic freedom and don't trust self-appointed censors like A. Rickey to decide what kinds of statements qualify as a "legitimate dispute about views -- I would think that someone who believes professors should be fired for making "unacceptable" statements but claims to respect the First Amendment might want to distinguish between a professor's in-class and out-of-class statements.

Or does A. Rickey simply believe that every professor who teaches at a public university in the US -- a group that includes both Tung and myself -- has to check his First Amendment rights at the door when he signs his employment contract?

[Kevin Jon Heller]

So in a world without academic freedom -- or with academic freedom, but freedom that is limited to "legitimate dispute about views" -- Rushton should be able to stand in a classroom and tell black students that they are genetically inferior to white and Asian students?

It's also worth pointing out that the Rushton is the head of the Pioneer Fund, whose incorporation papers state that its goals are to support the "procreation of the white colonial stock" and to finance research into "problems of race betterment" and "problems of heredity and eugenics in the human race."

One could easily argue that Rushton's beliefs are far more pernicious than Churchill's. Churchill is a lone academic with absolutely no power to do anything other than spew his brand of hatred; Rushton is in a position to fund his brand of scientific racism to the tune of millions of dollars.

(For the record, I don't think Rushton should be fired. I'm simply pointing out that deciding who should and should not be protected by academic freedom is far more difficult than arm-chair moralists like A. Rickey believe.)

[Tung Yin]

So in a world without academic freedom -- or with academic freedom, but freedom that is limited to "legitimate dispute about views" -- Rushton should be able to stand in a classroom and tell black students that they are genetically inferior to white and Asian students?

I'm not going to defend Rushton's views, and I don't know enough about his research to be able to say anything other than that I'm quite skeptical of the thesis. Nevertheless, I think the difference I am trying to suggest is that Rushton's thesis, however noxious, is -- the way you've described it -- still something of an *academic* effort.

Look, his empirical data may be all wrong. Or if not, his asserted causal connection may well be wrong. (I would certainly expect at least the latter.) But these can be tested and refuted, and then his thesis will be disproven.

In short, the reason that I don't find Rushton to be a persuasive counterexample to Churchill is not in the relatively "perniciousness" of their beliefs, as you put it, or in whether the beliefs are subject to "legitimate dispute," but rather the *academic* nature of their respective offensive statements. Rushton has proposed a controversial (and presumably incorrect) explanation for difference in performance on standardized tests, etc. He may have base motives for doing so, but at least he's still doing in the forum of academic theory. Churchill's dancing on the graves of the 9/11 victims? Somehow that just seems much less *academic* as opposed to *polemic.*

Now, if turns out that Rushton is cooking his data, that would be grounds for firing him. But that's not about academic freedom.

[A. Rickey]

Dear Prof. Heller:

I find your accusations, both on my blog and yours, intriguing indeed. Given that I linked to over half a dozen summaries of the controversy--from both sides, most of them disagreeing with me--I didn't really feel the need to resummarize in detail the case against Churchill. As I would make my argument whether his statements were made inside or outside the classroom, and you would make yours regardless of that fact as well, please tell me why it was so vitally important that I mention the fact as to constitute "intellectual dishonesty"? From what you say, the point would be irrelevant to either of us.

Of course, your next statement rather suggests that you assumed my argument would change depending upon where he spoke. It does not, so long as he spoke publicly. Or maybe "does A. Rickey simply believe that every professor who teaches at a public university in the US. . . .has to check his First Amendment rights at the door when he signs his employment contract?" was indeed an honest question, in which case I will hazard an answer.

I don't believe that a professor at a state university in the United States should set aside his First Amendment rights. I was addressing, however, the problem of academic freedom--which is not the same thing as First Amendment rights, which apply more generally to the populace at large. A number of private employees--I'm thinking particularly of sports managers or the like--who have been extreme in their language have been let go in the past. In this case there is a state action problem, but prior to consideration of that, there would first have to be the will to remove him. Here the limitation is a concept of limitless academic freedom, not the First. And as I've addressed, I doubt the state action problem is fundamentally insurmountable.

(As an example that I mentioned in comments and was available to you to read, suppose that the University found that Churchill's remarks were beyond the pale and that he should leave, but felt the state action problem was indeed insurmountable. In that case, they might vote to ask for his resignation, and even if he declined, a great degree of the heat would be off the University and face restored. But even the latter is barred by the limitless conception of academic freedom.)

My case on that is adequately stated in my piece, and I feel no need to reiterate it here. Suffice it to say this: academics, and particularly legal academics, are no strangers to reasonableness standards. Nor has Churchill attracted many defenders of his statements, even among those who agree with much of the substance: "little Eichmanns" hasn't built groundswell of support as a rhetorical device. I believe that there would be adequate room for all sorts of diverse opinion within the academy without having some standard for decency: that Volokh's slippery slope is not so fearsome here.

Finally, as for the status of a professor at the University of Western Ontario, I'll say three things. First, I'm unsure of the standards that Canado would actually apply to him: I'm don't know that it's a public university (it appears to be, and I'll go on that assumption), I don't know to what degree Canadian conceptions of academic freedom mix with our own, and finally, I doubt that your first amendment worries apply to our friends north of the border. Given that I don't feel like researching your chosen topic, I'll answer your question assuming he were at an American state university, and leave you the details.

Secondly, I'm certainly not researching into his scholarship, and am taking your one data point as the whole of my knowledge about the man. So if you happen to know that he's written a vitriolic screed full of "little black sambo" references somewhere, suffice it to say you should have introduced that as evidence instead.

Finally, I'd say that what you've presented seems particularly silly to me, and if it is silly, then I'd wonder why UWO gave the fellow tenure (if so they did). Nevertheless, it differs in a very qualitatively from Churchill, as Professor Yin points out. As I stated, and Prof. Yin quoted me saying, the problem is not Churchill's substantive views. (Indeed, they're hardly unprecedented.) Were you to repeat Rushton's statement, but substitute in some racial epithets or other slurs ("little [insert name of suitable dictator of appropriate ethnic background]s" average a larger brain size, etc..."), my view would not change from the above.

Now, I think the distinction between the two is a particularly easy call, even though there may be more difficult cases. A conception of academic freedom that cannot make this distinction seems particularly hollow indeed.

Finally, might you give me some idea of what an "armchair moralist" is, and given that you would not seem to consider yourself one, tell me whether you are in fact not a moralist or if you are, what you do to escape from the armchair? (For that matter, how you know I don't do the same?)

[A. Rickey]

For the avoidance of doubt, when I say:
Were you to repeat Rushton's statement, but substitute in some racial epithets or other slurs ("little [insert name of suitable dictator of appropriate ethnic background]s" average a larger brain size, etc..."), my view would not change from the above.
"The above" means that I would also support political calls for his resignation, if they suggested he had transgressed reasonable social norms in his broader community. It's reasonable to assume that this is the case in Canada, but I wouldn't want to be "intellectually dishonest" by failing to make that assumption explicit.

[Buster]

You know... Were I to be Kevin, I would eventualy tire of being taken behind the woodshed.

[Kevin Jon Heller]

Buster,

Don't worry about my stamina. I consider it an honor when people with your views -- and command of basic grammar -- disagree with me.

[Kevin Jon Heller]

"I don't believe that a professor at a state university in the United States should set aside his First Amendment rights."

But you do. As your comment indicates, you believe that a professor can and should be fired if his exercise of First Amendment rights -- even outside the classroom -- transgresses the boundaries of "acceptable" academic freedom. Only the most desiccated understanding of free speech says "You have it -- but we have the right to fire you from your tenured professorship if you use it in ways we find unacceptable."

Worse, your conception of academic freedom is little more than a convenient straw-man. If CU's Board of Regents wants to pass a non-binding resolution condemning Churchill and asking him to resign, that is its right -- and doing so would not, contrary to your argument, be "barred by the limitless conception of academic freedom." The freedom of a tenured professor, particularly at a public university, is to be able to write and say what he wants without having to fear being fired because people like you decide his comments violate their "standards of decency" -- nothing more.