A federal judge in Illinois issued a preliminary injunction to halt a community college’s “viewpoint discrimination” against two “social activists” who are part of the group Heterosexuals Organization for a Moral Environment.
The group condemns homosexual behavior through publications such as “The Uncensored Truth about Homosexuality.”
“We are pleased that the district court recognized the value of free speech, provocative or not, in our society,” said John Whitehead of the Rutherford Institute, which has been involved in the case.
“If college administrators today were allowed to have their way, college campuses would be little more than breeding grounds for compliant citizens content to speak only when spoken to, on politically correct topics guaranteed not to cause disruption or disagreement, and in Orwellian areas designated as free speech zones.”
Wayne Lela and John McCartney brought the case against the board of Waubonsee Community College, where officials excluded them “on the basis of the content of their speech.”
In the order, District Judge Robert W. Gettleman noted that “provocative speech is entitled to the same protections as speech promoting popular notions.”
He said the school must submit a written proposal for a “reasonable time, place and manner for such leafleting, consistent with this opinion.”
“As has been held numerous times by courts in this district, the loss or impingement of freedoms protected by the First Amendment, ‘even for minimal periods of time, unquestionably constitutes irreparable injury,'” the judge said. “Given the court’s finding that defendant discriminated against plaintiffs based on the content of their speech, the court finds that plaintiffs have a high likelihood of success on the merits.”
See what’s next for America, in “Police State U.S.A.” by Cheryl Chumley.
The judge said the defendant’s lawyer had stated the two men could not leaflet on campus because their message was “in direct conflict with and disruptive of the college’s mission to uphold and adhere to the legal requirements to maintain a non-discriminatory educational enforcement, free of unlawful hostility.”
The judge said it’s clear it was the content of the message to which the school objected.
“First Amendment rights cannot be vetoed by listeners who, in disapproving of the message, create a disturbance, thereby silencing the speaker. … Defendant’s concern that plaintiff’s presence on campus may cause a negative student response or disturbance was not a constitutional ground for denying them access,” he wrote.
Whitehead said university campuses “once served as the breeding ground for much of the protests that gave rise to needed change in the 1960s – protests that altered the conscience of our nation and created a legacy for future dissenters.”
Waubonsee is a two-year institution in Sugar Grove, Illinois. The case developed a year ago when Lela contacted officials about distribution of his informational leaflets.
The school reviewed the message and denied permission. The claim was that the leaflets were inconsistent with the philosophy, goals and mission of the school.
But the complaint argued the ban was “impermissible viewpoint discrimination on its face.”
