Again: Wall Street Journal on Marquette v. Warrior Blogger

The paper chimes in again:

Marquette and the First Amendment
Wisconsin’s Supreme Court will judge a promise of academic freedom.

A political-science professor who says Marquette University violated his employment contract’s guarantee of academic freedom will get his day in court. Though a judge for a lower state court earlier ruled for the university, last week the Wisconsin Supreme Court agreed to John McAdams’s request that it bypass the appeals courts and take up his suit directly.

Professor McAdams is now in his seventh semester outside the classroom because of a November 2014 post on his Marquette Warrior blog. The post criticized a graduate instructor, Cheryl Abbate, for telling a student with more traditional views that she would tolerate no dissent on same-sex marriage in her class on ethics.

After the post Ms. Abbate received several ugly emails. Mr. McAdams was blamed and punished, though he had nothing to do with those messages. The university contends that Mr. McAdams’s offense is having identified a student by name—Ms. Abbate. The characterization is telling, because though Ms. Abbate was indeed a grad student she was also a paid employee of the university teaching a course. If any student was harmed here, it was the Marquette undergraduate who was told there was no room for his views in Ms. Abbate’s classroom.

No one forced Marquette to enter into an employment contract with Mr. McAdams. But it did. And that contract says he cannot be fired for exercising a right guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution. By any reasonable standard that would include the First Amendment—even at a Jesuit university.

The First Amendment is relevant here since, although Marquette is a private university, faculty have a contractual guarantee of the free speech rights embodied in the U.S. Constitution. This most certainly includes the First Amendment.

Since we did absolutely nothing that would not be protected speech under the First Amendment, Marquette is trying to weasel out of this promise by claiming that we violated some “expectations” that bind faculty. But those “expectations” are not written down anywhere, not supported by any precedent, and were in fact merely concocted because Marquette (under pressure from leftist faculty) wanted to get rid of us.

If Marquette can get away with that, faculty at public universities (who are protected under the First Amendment even without any explicit contractual language) are vulnerable to the same tactic.

President Lovell Attacks Warrior Blogger, We Respond

When the Wall Street Journal came down on our side in our academic freedom case against Marquette, Marquette President Michael Lovell responded with a letter published in the Journal.

The paper then kindly gave us a chance to respond to Lovell. We are reprinting Lovell’s letter, and our response, as well as a few of the comments both letters provoked.

First Lovell:

Your editorial “A Jesuit School Gets Dogmatic” (Jan. 8) describes Associate Professor John McAdams’s interaction with one of our former graduate students as “normal give and take of debate.” That couldn’t be further from the truth. Mr. McAdams inflicted a public and personal internet attack on our student. Instead of expressing his concerns through established internal channels, he chose to blog about our graduate student—publicly shaming her, questioning her values and including a link to her contact information. Through those actions, he exposed her to a flood of violent threats and hateful messages.

In January 2016, Marquette’s faculty hearing committee unanimously concluded in a 123-page report that Mr. McAdams violated his core obligations as a tenured professor when he used his blog needlessly and recklessly to harm our student. In May 2017, a Milwaukee County judge issued a 33-page decision dismissing all claims against Marquette University. The judge’s decision states: “academic freedom does not mean that a faculty member can harass, threaten, intimidate, ridicule, or impose his or her views on students.”

John McAdams has the right to talk about controversial topics on his blog and to disagree with and debate Marquette-related positions freely. But he crossed the line when he launched a personal, demeaning internet attack on a Marquette student, choosing to publicly shame her to advance his narrative and draw attention to himself and his blog. Tenure and the freedoms that come with it also have obligations and responsibilities. These disturbing, harassing actions will never have a place on our campus. Just as they have no place in any work environment.

Michael R. Lovell

President, Marquette University

Now, our response:

Marquette University President Michael Lovell claims to be upset because in a blog post I exposed the misconduct of a graduate instructor who told one of her students that arguing for the Catholic position on gay marriage was forbidden, being “homophobic” and “offensive” (Letters, Jan. 12). The instructor in question (Cheryl Abbate) was 27 years old and had been in the U.S. military. She was the “instructor of record” in the class—to her students “the professor.”

Mr. Lovell claims I had “shamed” and “harassed” Ms. Abbate. But any journalist who exposes misconduct could be said to have “shamed” or “harassed” the subject of the reporting. Journalists (including faculty bloggers) expose misconduct. Exposing misconduct that politically correct folks dislike would never be labeled “shaming” or “harassment.” And I certainly questioned her “values” which are shamefully too prevalent on college campuses. That was why the incident mattered.

The claim that I linked to her “contact information” is flatly false. I linked to her toxic feminist blog post of Sept. 20, 2014 titled “Yes All Men . . . Contribute to the Prevalence of Rape.” Possibly people dug around on her blog and found her email address, or simply used Marquette’s standard formula.

Mr. Lovell claims I should have fought a quiet internal battle for redress. Of course bureaucrats want misconduct in their organizations handled quietly and internally. But journalists are under no obligation to accommodate them.

Mr. Lovell notes that a faculty panel recommended that I be suspended. But academic freedom for conservative faculty is pretty precarious in the hands of other faculty. Further, the faculty panel did not suggest I should render a Stalinist apology to get my job back. That was Mr. Lovell.

John McAdams

Milwaukee

And a few of the more interesting comments:

Responses to Lovell’s letter:

I have been involved and effective at raising millions of dollars for Marquette University. Recently I observed the law of unintended consequences working when a fellow dental alum rescinded his six-figure donation because of President Lovell’s action.

Paul A. Gruber, DDS

---

“But he crossed the line when he launched a personal, demeaning internet attack on a Marquette student”

In other words, he told the truth about a 27 year old graduate student teaching a class. It may be inconvenient to the dual objectives of fundraising from alumni while adhering to campus leftist dogma, but it’s still the truth, n’est-ce pas? — Catherine Pate

---

President Lovell states: The judge’s decision states: “academic freedom does not mean that a faculty member can harass, threaten, intimidate, ridicule, or impose his or her views on students.”

Isn’t that what his leftist graduate student was doing? — Matt Burkholder

---

President Lovell claims that Professor McAdams “shamed” the graduate student. I read the blog and he factually reported what the graduate student did. No one disputes what took place. If what she did was not shameful, then nothing Professor McAdams said could be considered shaming. — Christopher Iliff

---

Comments in response to our letter:

I have fond memories of growing up in Milwaukee in the days when Marquette was still an unabashedly Catholic university. Guess the same folks who brought us Liberation Theology are running the place. — St.Clair Tweedie

---

McAdams was employed by Marquette. As such, he has an implicit responsibility to try to improve the University and at a minimum, not to damage it. He could have done so by going through the appropriate channels to have the situation addressed. He chose not to and his hiding behind his role as a journalist. He had a choice; carry out his responsibilities to his employer, or to pursue his freedom as a “journalist.” He chose to be a “journalist.” Given the potential and apparently intentional damage that he caused to Marquette, he was fired. — Stephen OBrien

---

@STEPHEN OBRIEN It is quite possible he did evaluate how to improve the University and in his own personal determination felt that the best way to do that was to “out” the situation because the sunshine was needed so it didn’t get brushed under the rug. — Michelle Madsen

Wall Street Journal on Marquette Attempt to Fire Warrior Blogger

A Jesuit School Gets Dogmatic
Is Marquette’s promise of academic freedom worth anything

By The Editorial Board

Marquette is a Jesuit university in Milwaukee. Which is appropriate, because jesuitical is the word that fits its explanation for firing a tenured political science professor who defended a student who was badly treated by an intolerant graduate instructor.

The sacked professor is John McAdams, who in 2014 wrote a blog post criticizing by name Cheryl Abbate, who taught a course on ethics. Ms. Abbate had told a student he could not express his disagreement with same-sex marriage in her ethics class because it was “homophobic” and on that issue there could be no debate.

In his post on the incident, Mr. McAdams made no judgment on same-sex marriage. But he noted that liberals are inclined to deem views they disagree with as offensive and then use that to shut down debate. The story went national.

Marquette officials took action—against Mr. McAdams. He was blamed for the hate mail that Ms. Abbate received after he named her, even though there’s no evidence he was part of any of it. Marquette President Michael Lovell gave him an ultimatum: apologize or be suspended without pay indefinitely. Mr. McAdams refused to apologize and has been effectively fired.

He’s also suing, and last May a Wisconsin trial court backed the university’s dismissal. But Mr. McAdams has appealed and wants to go straight to the state Supreme Court. The Wisconsin Institute for Liberty and Law, which has taken his case, says the firing violates Mr. McAdams’s contract with Marquette, which promises freedom from threats of dismissal over constitutional rights such as free speech.

As a private institution, Marquette has the right to set its own employment standards and it needn’t abide by the First Amendment. But it is hard to square Mr. McAdams’s dismissal with any reasonable understanding of Marquette’s contract guaranteeing him academic freedom.

We wish these issues weren’t left for courts. But when institutions such as Marquette are unable to handle what should be the normal give and take of debate, they invite that intervention. How much better we’d all be if Marquette would acknowledge its mistake and give the professor his job back.

Marquette Attempt to Fire Warrior Blogger: More From the Wall Street Journal

From the Wall Street Journal:

May 5, 2016 7:21 p.m. ET

We told you recently about Marquette University professor John McAdams, who writes an independent blog called the Marquette Warrior. In 2014 a Marquette student told Mr. McAdams about an exchange in which his philosophy instructor, a graduate student named Cheryl Abbate, told him that his views about gay marriage were homophobic and not open for discussion in her classroom.

Mr. McAdams blogged about the exchange and Ms. Abbate got nasty letters, a result that prompted the school to suspend Mr. McAdams, bar him from setting foot on campus and threaten him with termination unless he admitted by April 14 that his actions were “reckless.” In a letter to Marquette President Michael Lovell, Mr. McAdams declined to do so. (http://www.will-law.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/2016-04-04-Signed-Letter-to-Lovell.pdf)

The University did not rescind its position and Mr. McAdams Monday filed suit in Milwaukee County Circuit Court on grounds that the school has abrogated academic freedoms it guarantees. As a private university, Marquette is not subject to the First Amendment, but the school guarantees academic freedom by contract.

According to the school’s faculty statutes, “dismissal shall not be used to restrain faculty members in their exercise of academic freedom or other rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution.” The school says it is acting because Mr. McAdams should have known that his blog would generate criticism of Ms. Abbate, but by that standard freedom of speech is limited by what we can predict others in the online free-for-all will say about what we write.

Universities are meant to be bastions of vigorous debate. When a tenured professor can lose his job because of what strangers on the Internet said, what speech is safe?

Tenure Would Protect Some Ideas

A Letter to the Editor in the Wall Street Journal, responding to their editorial about Marquette’s attempt to fire this blogger:

Doesn’t Professorial Tenure Exist for Things Like This?

Tenured Marquette Professor John McAdams punished for blogging, free speech, repression of the non-politically correct

April 14, 2016 1:54 p.m. ET

Marquette University Prof. John McAdams apparently doesn’t understand that academic freedom applies only to correct thought and speech (“Punished for Blogging at Marquette,” Review & Outlook, April 8). He would have been wiser to advocate for something like paying reparations to ISIS for the Crusades. It is discouraging to realize that families and students are impoverishing themselves for an education at Marquette, an institution run by people who seem not to think.

Brian R. Merrick

West Barnstable, Mass.

Wall Street Journal on Marquette Attempt to Fire Warrior Blogger

In the important national outlet, the Wall Street Journal:

Punished for Blogging at Marquette

A tenured professor faces dismissal after a blog went viral.

Blogging can be dangerous to your livelihood—or at least it can at Marquette University, where a professor may lose his job for expressing the wrong political views.

In November 2014 an undergraduate approached philosophy instructor and PhD candidate Cheryl Abbate, after a class on John Rawls’ theory of equal liberty. The student said he objected to her suggestions during the class that same-sex marriage isn’t open for debate and that “everyone agrees on this.”

Unknown to Ms. Abbate, the student recorded the exchange on his cell phone. During the conversation, she told him “there are some opinions that are not appropriate, that are harmful, such as racist opinions, sexist opinions” and if someone in the class was homosexual, “don’t you think that that would be offensive to them if you were to raise your hand and challenge this?”

When the student replied that he has a right to argue his opinion, Ms. Abbate responded that “you can have whatever opinions you want but I can tell you right now, in this class homophobic comments, racist comments and sexist comments will not be tolerated. If you don’t like that you are more than free to drop this class.” The student reported the exchange to Marquette professor John McAdams, who teaches political science. Mr. McAdams also writes a blog called the Marquette Warrior, which often criticizes the Milwaukee school for failing to act in accordance with its Catholic mission.

Mr. McAdams wrote on his blog that Ms. Abbate was “using a tactic typical among liberals now. Opinions with which they disagree are not merely wrong, and are not to be argued against on their merits, but are deemed ‘offensive’ and need to be shut up.” His blog went viral, and Ms. Abbate received vicious emails. She has since left Marquette.

But now Marquette is going after Mr. McAdams. In December 2014, the school sent him a letter suspending his teaching duties and banning him from campus while it reviewed his “conduct” related to the blog post. “You are to remain off campus during this time, and should you need to come to campus, you are to contact me in writing beforehand to explain the purpose of your visit, to obtain my consent and to make appropriate arrangements for that visit,” Dean Richard Holz wrote.

Marquette President Michael Lovell told the tenured professor that he would be suspended without pay and would not be reinstated unless he admitted his conduct was “reckless” and apologized for the unpleasant emails Ms. Abbate received.

All of this seems contrary to Marquette’s Faculty Handbook section 306.03, which says professors may be terminated by the university’s discretion only for “serious instances of illegal, immoral, dishonorable, irresponsible, or incompetent conduct.” The handbook says that “in no case” may just cause for dismissal be interpreted “to impair the full and free enjoyment of legitimate personal or academic freedoms of thought, doctrine, discourse, association, advocacy, or action.”

Mr. McAdams told Mr. Lovell this week that he won’t participate in the “compelled speech” demanded by the university by April 14 in exchange for reinstatement. This is more a test of Marquette and its ostensible free-speech principles than it is Mr. McAdams.

Marquette continues to take a beating in the press for its actions. Just how long are they willing to look like politically correct authoritarians? Given their behavior so far, they seem committed to firing this blogger no matter what the cost. Lovell’s almost hysterical tantrum, posted last week, reinforces this idea. Several people have noted that no competent lawyer, nor any competent public relations professional, would have approved it had they vetted it.

But given that courts will enforce the contractual right of academic freedom Marquette faculty have, this looks like it will be the institution’s Vietnam: a costly and humiliating defeat.