The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the University of Alabama’s
actions to stop a professor from interjecting religious views in a
physiology class in Bishop v. Aronov.
Academic Freedom Cases
Sweezy v. New Hampshire (1957) stands as the first U.S. Supreme Court case to expound upon the concept of academic freedom though some earlier cases mention it.
Most constitutional academic freedom issues today revolve around professors’ speech, students’ speech, faculty’s relations to government speech, and using affirmative action in student admissions.
Although academic freedom is regularly invoked as a constitutional right under the First Amendment, the Court has never specifically enumerated it as one, and judicial opinions have not developed a consistent interpretation of constitutional academic freedom or pronounced a consistent framework to analyze such claims.
In Board of Regents of States Colleges v. Roth, 408 U.S. 564 (1972), the Supreme Court found that Wisconsin State University at Oshkosh had not violated the rights of an assistant professor of political science David Roth, when it decided not to continue his employment. Roth had criticized the administration for suspending a group of
Especially during his second term, President Donald J. Trump has indicated his displeasure with some of the nation’s leading universities. He has charged that they responded inadequately to antisemitism on their campuses in the wake of the Hamas attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, and they have continued to focus on diversity, equity, and
In rejecting claims that the University of Michigan had violated a student’s property interest or due process rights, in University of Michigan v. Ewing, 474 U.S. 214 (1985), the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the university’s rights to academic freedom in deciding to dismiss a student from an academic program for poor performance. The case arose after