American law schools are graduating the next generation of lawyers who are supposed to protect cherished American liberties such as free speech and political tolerance. But at Northwestern in Chicago, the law school is suffering under a loud militant wave of proto-totalitarian students trying to stamp out opposition while promoting leftist causes, all with the support of the administration.
To appease the Northwestern law students who oppose free speech, the administration is sponsoring a self-proclaimed “Big Gay Dance Party.”
On one hand, speeches and event announcements by conservative groups such as the Federalist Society or Alliance Defending Freedom have been smothered by leftist law students, literally.
On school property, bulletin boards announcing events by conservative organizations have been covered up by free speech opponents concealing announcements with signs containing slogans such as, “Why is Admin Protecting Fed Soc?”
To wannabe totalitarians, “protect” is another way of saying “tolerate.”
Other signs covering announcements of free speech events say, “Fed Soc inviting hate groups twice in one week” with a picture of Satan.
Ironically, one scheduled event at Northwestern law is entitled, “How to Disagree Without Being Disagreeable,” a message that some at the school sorely need to hear.
Another sign placed to cover the announcement of school events says “Fed Soc Loves Hate Groups,” which of course is a lie.
“Hate Group” is a term cooked up by the Southern Poverty Law Center, which is a widely criticized and debunked SPLC program to raise money. Established when multimillionaire Morris Dees ran the SPLC, the program smeared many mainstream organizations because they supported traditional marriage or defended the science pertaining to human chromosome composition.
Floyd Lee Corkins relied on the SPLC’s hate group designation when he tried to kill employees at the Family Research Council and shot a security guard at the organization.
Instead of defending free speech and tolerance, Northwestern’s administration has appeared to take the side of the proto-totalitarian law students.
The leftist flyers smothering event announcements were on display at Northwestern much of last week despite their clear contravention of a public advertising and communications policy.
Northwestern Law School dean, Hari Osofsky, announced this week that the Law School would use its special events budget to subsidize a “Big Gay Dance Party” to protest the Federalist Society.
Osofsky’s self-authored biography is an ideological one:
As dean, she is deeply committed to building legal education for a changing society through inclusive collaboration. Her leadership focuses on preparing students to lead in our changing society and profession; advancing diversity, equity and inclusion and social and racial justice; learning from the COVID-19 pivots; and innovating through interdisciplinary, multi-stakeholder, and international partnerships. She also is very involved in mentorship and sponsorship to support greater diversity in law school and university leadership.
Professors at Osofsky’s school have urged students to skip scheduled classes to attend and “support” their gay classmates, who are apparently terrorized by Federalist Society-sponsored debates on federal pre-emption and religious freedom. The school-sponsored “Big Gay Dance Party” will feature a drag show — all during school hours, with the school’s financial and logistical support.
It is unknown if Osofsky is on the hunt for the speech totalitarians who smothered announcements of campus events with which they disagree in contravention of school rules.
Osofsky, a climate change scholar famous for cooking edible bugs for students, was appointed via an “unprecedented and outrageous” search process run by a self-professed racist interim dean. She has repeatedly allowed professors to cancel classes in order to facilitate participation in ideologically saturated events that resulted in harassment and ideological intimidation of conservative students.
This isn’t the first school Osofksy sought to shift from the traditional legal education toward training radical activists. After the police killing of George Floyd, she used her position as dean at Penn State Law to urge faculty to sign an open letter condemning racist violence, police brutality, and systemic racism.
No word if those who did not sign the letter were denounced or subjected to street trials.
Osofsky now stands by at Northwestern while her ideologically allied students harass and intimidate people with whom they disagree. Where are the ABA accreditation police?
This administration-leftist student-allied attack on free speech isn’t confined to Northwestern, even if the speech-intolerant left enjoys a zealous ally in Osofsky.
Marching orders have gone out to target the Alliance Defending Freedom — a civil rights group that employs some of the most prolific Supreme Court litigators in the United States. Defenders of free speech and tolerance at law schools have been slow to respond as their radical leftist students protest events that are demonstrably unobjectionable.
One thing is for sure; bullies only can be stopped one way.
But at Northwestern law, the most radical, intolerant students have a comrade in Osofsky. At a “listening session” with self-described “queer” students, Osofsky first offered to host the “Big Gay Dance Party.” At the listening session, Northwestern law students openly and repeatedly expressed their conviction that members of the Federalist Society should be driven out of public life and denied legal employment. An administrator “thanked” these students for their activism, indicating that they made the campus “safer.”
I have spoken at Northwestern law twice since 2011. If I were invited again as a current Commissioner on the United States Commission on Civil Rights to speak about tolerance, free speech, and the Western tradition of open free debate without resorting to thuggish tactics, I am not sure I would want to go back given the nasty, intolerant place that law school has become.
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