Even convicted felons have more rights than university allowed its students
Do you think Ohio taxpayers are tired of subsidizing the lawless, aloof administrators who run their public universities?
Ohio University has evidently learned nothing from its unconstitutional suppression of the First Amendment rights of students who did absolutely nothing wrong, by its own admission.
Practically daring students to file a lawsuit, administrators suspended the organizational activities of all 15 fraternities in its Interfraternity Council earlier this fall, based on hazing allegations against nine of them, according to The Athens News.
What do these activities include? Not only hosting gatherings but communication with and amongthe group via any social media platform or application, according to an administrators letter to fraternities obtained by the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education.
Taylor Tackett, assistant dean of students and director of community standards and student responsibility (left), literally told fraternities that any communications among members had to be pre-approved by me.
Following FIREs legal warning letter Nov. 12 and pressure campaign against the taxpayer-funded university, interim General Counsel Barbara Nalazek sent back a condescending one-page letter.
She complimented FIREs Zachary Greenberg, a Syracuse Law graduate who previously defended indigent Syracuse residents on misdemeanor charges, for the obvious effort put into the Nov. 12 letter. Nalazek did not respond to the voluminous case law against Ohio University that Greenberg cited.
MORE: Want to see fascism in action? Look what Syracuse did to fraternity members
Instead, she justified the unconstitutional restrictions on students rights by citing the unprecedented number of hazing allegations allegations! the university received this fall. They were only temporary so that the situation could be assessed. A few weeks later, restrictions for most punished organizations had been lifted or significantly modified.
It also removed a frequently asked questions document elaborating on the restrictions, which FIRE had faulted, and clarified with all the organizations that the restrictions on communications had been lifted. Nalazek claimed these restrictions on all social media communications among members were limited.
Showing her amazing skills in half-assing a legal response, the interim general counsel said OU disagrees that the original directives were constitutionally infirm. She failed to explain why, in any level of detail.
Its worth reading Greenbergs Nov. 12 letter in full to see just how much case law Nalazek had to ignore to portray the universitys draconian response to hazing allegations against some fraternities as perfectly acceptable. Willful ignorance of the law may be whats required to become the permanent general counsel.
Out of compliance with its own federal appeals court
It is not a close call that OU has exceeded the lawful scope of its authority under the First Amendment, as Greenberg wrote.
The FAQ document, which purported to clarify the restrictions on associational and speech rights, limited fraternity members to 1:1 conversations between friends on personal topics. It refused to define what the university considers a prohibited chapter event, telling students there was no magic number [if] people could associate it with your organization, fraternities should avoid it.
In other words, OU will arbitrarily decide how many people talking are too many people talking, Greenberg wrote in a Nov. 13 blog post. Its unclear whether they were even allowed to discuss their organizations punishment.
MORE: Syracuse fires prof for disagreeing with punishment of frat members
The justification by Nalazek (right) for the draconian punishments hazing allegations have no bearing on the legal analysis, Greenberg told the university in his Nov. 12 letter. OU effectively bans any communication whatsoever among Group members and thereby threatens their existence as viable student organizations, he wrote: Courts have correctly viewed less onerous restrictions as impermissibly burdening associational freedoms.
The public university is out of compliance with its own federal appeals court, the 6th Circuit, which struck down a Cincinnati ordinance excluding convicted drug dealers from drug-exclusion zones.
If thats an impermissible restriction on associational freedoms, as Greenberg notes, what chance does OU have in court if the fraternities decided to sue for restricting communications that have nothing to do with hazing?
It is difficult to imagine how prohibiting all unofficial meetingsregardless of how brief, innocuous, or unrelated to pledging or university affairsis at all tailored, much less narrowly tailored, to address the universitys cognizable interests. Such wide-ranging restrictions cover a virtually unlimited array of student activity bearing no reasonable relationship to maintaining a safe educational community.
Willfully violating Supreme Court precedent
The university and its interim legal counsel also appear to be contemptuous of Supreme Court precedent.
Greenberg cites the high courts 2016 rejection of a North Carolina law that bans registered sex offenders not just drug dealers! from using websites that allow children to become members orto create or maintain personal Web pages, such as social media.
Such a restriction still violates the First Amendment because social media are integral to the fabric of modern society and culture, the rulings summary says:
Even convicted criminalsand in some instances especially convicted criminalsmight receive legitimate benefits from these means [social media] for access to the world of ideas, particularly if they seek to reform and to pursue lawful and rewarding lives.
Greenberg elaborates on this ruling, known as Packingham, in a footnote:
Considering that OUs blanket ban on social media platforms to communicate is arguably more restrictive than the law in Packingham, and the universitys interests in policing student expression is markedly diminished in contrast to the important interests in warding against convicted sex offenders use of the internet to contact children, OUs restrictions stand on significantly weaker constitutional footing than the law struck down by the Packingham Court.
MORE: Syracuse admits it doesnt protect free speech to get out of lawsuit
The idiotic prior-approval requirement laid down by Tackett, the assistant dean of students, is also plainly unconstitutional. Not only does it encourage self-censorship but fails to set forth any objective criteria for approval, Greenberg wrote leading to a situation where students need permission from the university to criticize the university.
Greenberg portrayed the universitys alleged end to unconstitutional restrictions as a victory for students, even though OU has suffered no consequences for actions it never bothered to defend and will likely repeat.
FIRE and these students sent OU a clear message: administrators cant muzzle student speech and get away with it, he said in a blog post last week. (Except administrators did get away with it.) FIREs reputation and history of successful action no doubt got Ohio Universitys attention and helped restore constitutional rights, said a lawyer for the students, Timothy Burke. (How long will they remain restored?)
FIREs action may have gotten this pitiful, one-page response from the university. But its clear that nothing short of litigation and ruinous damages against individual administrators will ever stop them from willfully and repeatedly violating students rights.
MORE: Frat pledges sue UT for punishing them after flimsy investigation
IMAGES: jorgen mcleman/Shutterstock, Ohio University
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Ohio University refuses to apologize for unconstitutional censorship of innocent students - The College Fix