Since the Framing of the American Constitution there has been a debate over the nature and meaning of the First Amendment. Generally, citizens have enjoyed the right to speak their minds (or write) what they believed, as long as those expressions did not violate defined community standards of decency or morality, urge active participation in the overthrow of the government, or defame publicly (and falsely) another citizen so as to damage or destroy his reputation or good character.

These precisions are far more detailed and complex in law and jurisprudence, but this overall summary, as codified by 2oo years of practice and judicial polity has been something of a constitutional bedrock for Americans. We know that if we publish an article or make a speech critiquing a certain viewpoint or criticizing the person who publicly espouses that viewpoint, that we may do so if we do so properly.

Thus, I may blast away at political candidate X who advocates universal healthcare for all, I may suggest that he is ignorant, a crazy socialist, a senile politician who should stay at home. I may even question whether in the distant past he would have assaulted in one way or another young ladies…at least ask the question. I may do all this, but I cannot assert without any hint of proof that he is a rapist or abuser, which charges, not based on evidence, would damage or destroy his reputation. Beyond Woke Michael Rectenwald Buy New $19.99 (as of 11:37 UTC - Details)

Admittedly, such accusations and any resultant court proceedings tend to be difficult things; slander and defamation of character are extremely hard to prove, and usually require proof that the person engaged in defamation acted willfully, with the intent to do real harm and severe damage to his target.

That may be the reason such proceedings are rare, especially these days when it seems that the American nation is full of millions of Twitter users who take to the Internet to savage not just the ideas of opponents, but their character and reputations. The standards of defamation or slander have, it seems, broadened in our day.

But, nevertheless, the essential right of citizens to express differing views on a wide variety of topics has been considered sacrosanct, at least until recently.

And that brings me to the growing current on college campuses and stated with increasing frequency in Mainstream Media: certain people because of who they are, because they are white or male or Southern or conservative, don’t enjoy or at least should not have the rights of free speech, that they should be banned from speaking on university campuses, forbidden from taking to Twitter or Facebook—because others, those “woke” social justice warriors find what they say or simply who they are to be offensive. Indeed, this new template boldly asserts that speech which opposes the advances and propositions of progressivists is, ipso facto, racist, misogynistic, xenophobic, or homophobic, and thus by definition, must be proscribed and banned.

With growing respectability this narrative of curtailing views considered en dehors de tout debat—outside of all debate—has emerged with force in recent years.

Google Archipelago: Th... Michael Rectenwald Best Price: $4.99 Buy New $8.77 (as of 11:20 UTC - Details) But then, under this new template who then decides, who determines which views are now acceptable and which persons will have the right to express such views? College administrators? The supposedly aggrieved students on campus, themselves? In far too many cases, it has been the highly-organized social justice warriors on campus (and their friends off campus) who have taken matters into their own hands. Opposition in any form to the progressivist agenda is shouted down, that is, when a cowardly administrator does not forbid it because of fear of a campus riot (or that it might somehow infringe upon a minority “safe space” or cause mental “hurt” and “pain” to students who realize that someone might be on the same campus as they and with differing views!).

Our state governments, boards of trustees and governors for our colleges and universities, and most directly, college administrators are all guilty in abetting this—the rise of a kind of rigid and brutal totalitarianism, right in our midst, that in fact destroys the genuine educational experience and the essential liberty that must exist not only on university campuses, but in society at large, if this nation survive.

Already we have seen what failure has produced. More of this will surely be fatal to the country.

On this topic I pass on a new article that I have had published at Chronicles magazine (on the magazine’s Web site). Please keep reading.