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I am having a tough week. I was recently compelled to write a column expressing skepticism about the prosecution of former FBI Director James Comey for shell art posted on social media, despite being one of his longest and most vocal critics.
Now, I find myself having to write a column in defense of former Northwestern University President Morton Schapiro, who was just dumped as the commencement speaker for Georgetown Law School. I have criticized Schapiro for years as a major force in destroying the intellectual diversity in higher education. The problem with believing in free speech is that you have to believe in free speech even for those whose speech you abhor. The irony in both cases is crushing. Comey, who targeted President Donald Trump in a baseless Russian collusion investigation manufactured by the Clinton campaign, is now complaining about lawfare against him.
Morton Schapiro, president of Northwestern University, speaks during an interview in New York on April 14, 2010. Schapiro is an economist who has written five books about the financing and affordability of higher education. (Daniel Acker/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Schapiro is even less compelling as a victim in a cancel campaign. While Northwestern president, Schapiro pandered to the left and showed little support for free speech on campus. Schapiro denounced what he called “absolute” free speech positions and endorsed speech sanctions, including treating speech as a form of assault.
Under Schapiro, a wide array of speech was deemed “microaggressive” or intolerable in the interests of harmony and inclusion. He did little to quell the viewpoint intolerance at Northwestern and the virtual purging of faculty ranks of conservative or Republican faculty.
Now the mob has come for Schapiro.
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He was selected to speak at the law school commencement and immediately triggered an outcry. A Jewish academic, Schapiro is viewed as pro-Israel. He was immediately labeled a “Zionist” and an offensive choice by students and faculty.
A petition called on the administration to remove Schapiro, stating “Schapiro is not a lawyer, has no connection to Georgetown, and holds controversial, Zionist, and harmful opinions.”
Of course, past commencement speakers such as Henry Louis Gates Jr. were also non-lawyers with no connection to Georgetown, but there were no protests. That was just last year.
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Every year, commencements remain a virtual lock for liberal and Democratic speakers. After eliminating most conservative faculty members from departments, universities have made commencements the final lessons of ideological indoctrination for students.
This year’s speakers include figures ranging from Nancy Pelosi (Notre Dame de Namur University) to Jamie Raskin (American University and Goucher College) to candidates like James Talarico (Paul Quinn College). There is no subtlety in their selection or their messages. As expected, Pelosi slammed the GOP and Trump while Talarico gave effectively a stump speech on fighting the billionaires.
Anti-Israel protest at Georgetown University and Iranian rally split. (Getty Images)
Schapiro fits within the narrow ideological bandwidth of permissible liberal speakers with one notable complication: he supports Israel.
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Accordingly, Schapiro was unceremoniously dumped and replaced with a Georgetown law professor who has opposed investigations into antisemitism on campuses.
For his part, Schapiro wrote campus leaders: “I have presided over 28 commencements as a president and dean, and those ceremonies are about celebrating the graduates and their supporters. I was looking forward to giving a talk about humility and gratitude, but I don’t want my presence to distract from the day’s festivities. I wish the law school graduates the best of luck in the days ahead.”
It was a gracious and mature response to an adolescent and irrational campaign.
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It was, regrettably, the product of the very same cringing-concession policies I previously criticized Schapiro for enabling at Northwestern.
During his tenure, the university abandoned academic integrity and control to student mobs. One example that I previously discussed involved a Sociology class taught by Professor Beth Redbird that examined “inequality in American society with an emphasis on race, class and gender.” Redbird invited both an undocumented person and a spokesperson for the Immigration and Customs Enforcement. It was precisely the type of balanced discussion that we once valued in higher education, exposing students to vastly different views to allow them to consider the underlying social and political realities.
Various student groups organized protests to stop their fellow students from hearing from the ICE representative. They were greatly assisted by the university itself. As protesters screamed “F**k ICE” outside of the hall, the Dean of Students appeared and told these students that they would be allowed into the class if they promised not to disrupt it. The university simply asked them to stop screaming profanities and told Redbird that they promised to sit quietly in her class.
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Of course, they immediately stopped the class, the ICE official had to be removed, and Redbird was forced to cancel her class. What was most unnerving was not just the passivity of Northwestern (which took no action against the students) but also the sense of entitlement at the university that prevented others from speaking.
A split of the ‘Hey, fascist! Catch!’ flyer from Georgetown’s John Brown Gun Club (left) and a member of Georgetown College Republicans (right)
Sophomore April Navarro rejected the notion that faculty should be allowed to invite such speakers to their classrooms for a “good, nice conversation with ICE.” She added, “We’re not interested in having those types of conversations … We’re not engaging in those kinds of things; it legitimizes ICE’s violence, it makes Northwestern complicit in this.”
Now, it is Schapiro himself being canceled.
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In my book Rage and the Republic, I write about how academic and political figures are ignoring history as they pander to radical groups. Democratic leaders like Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries believe that they can ride a rage wave back into power. What they ignore is how these revolutions ultimately “devour their own.” Today’s revolutionaries become tomorrow’s reactionaries.
Schapiro is only the latest victim of viewpoint intolerance in higher education. Of course, his detractors can quote Schapiro himself in dismissing objections as reducing free speech to mere “slogans or free speech at all costs.” It appears that he is now one of the prohibitive costs to be avoided in our academic echo chamber.
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