Every spring, University of Pittsburgh faculty members gather to discuss a pressing topic affecting higher education. In 2021, this was antiracism and equity. In 2023, it was generative AI.
Gagging Academia
The right to teach, debate and protest faces a high-stakes challenge in Pittsburgh’s universities and beyond.
This year was academic freedom.
The gathering’s keynote speaker, Michelle Deutchman, said colleges and universities today were facing the “greatest crisis” since the 1950s, when professors on campuses across the nation were accused of being communists or communist sympathizers.
In the last year, campuses and their leaders have been in the hot seat. The current federal administration’s actions have had far-reaching effects on institutions, both locally and nationally. Research funding has been slashed. Diversity, equity and inclusion offices have shuttered. Presidents have resigned under pressure.
Meanwhile, schools are still dealing with the fallout from nationwide student protests against the Israel-Hamas war last spring, which opened up charges of antisemitism and censorship. Pitt is currently facing two lawsuits related to the latter — one from the university’s formerly suspended chapter of the Students for Justice in Palestine club and another from a professor who alleges he was fired over his pro-Palestinian beliefs.
What is academic freedom?
There’s no universally agreed-upon definition of the term. Many academics will point to a 1940 American Association of University Professors’ statement in which the concept is defined through three pillars:
- Teachers’ freedom to research and publish findings
- Teachers’ freedom to discuss relevant issues in the classroom
- Teachers’ freedom to express views as private citizens without censorship or discipline from their employer
Students are notably absent from this evaluation. Academic freedom, as it relates to students, is generally thought to involve the freedom to learn, but what that entails is open to interpretation.
“Academic freedom is an ideal that people have fought hard for, and it’s still elusive,” Cain said.
All of this has placed colleges and universities in a unique position, according to experts. Some like Timothy Cain, a professor of higher education at the University of Georgia, even feel it’s a place the sector has never been in before.
“I think that the moment that we’re in is unprecedented in certain ways,” he told Public Source. “The attack on higher education, which includes an attack on academic freedom, attack on institutional autonomy, is the federal government working to undermine a vital sector of the U.S. economy and of U.S. society — and that has never been done before.”
It threatens to erode the system’s foundation, rather than just remove specific individuals, he said. And that is why academic freedom is critical.
The concept might be centuries old, with the American version dating back to the 1880s but its parameters have never been carved in stone.
How did we choose these moments?
In our search for significant local academic freedom tests, we homed in on times that went beyond protests or solely lined up with social movements. The following had to be at play:
- Various sides of the ideological spectrum were involved
- Faculty members and/or students were affected
- Mass attention was given to the matter by way of media or community concern
- There were threats of or actions taken that amounted to censorship, suppression of information, perspectives or disciplinary action carried out by an institution
“What the history shows us,” said Cain, “… is that [academic freedom is] always contested and it’s always in development.”
This fall, Pittsburgh’s Public Source is exploring academic freedom in the city and beyond in this series, “Gagging Academia.”
To better understand how today’s debates came to be, here are six Pittsburgh-area moments from the last century that challenged what professors and students can say and do on their campuses.
1929: Pitt probed after nixing Liberal Club
On April 22, the University of Pittsburgh’s Liberal Club was set to hold a meeting. The purpose was to advocate for the “unconditional release” of Thomas Mooney and Warren K. Billings, two labor activists who were thought to be wrongly convicted of a deadly bombing in San Francisco.
Three days before the planned meeting, the university withdrew a permit for holding the meeting on campus. Administrators dissolved the club on April 24, after warnings for the club to cease “propaganda activities” were ignored. Pitt expelled leaders of the club on May 2, after the club held its meeting in a non-university-owned parking lot near campus.
Pitt alleged that the club’s president was a communist, and said the club broke university policy of not spreading propaganda, especially ideas considered “disloyal” to local, state or federal government.
After the Liberal Club’s dissolution, Pitt graduate assistant Frederick Woltman released notes from discussions he had with administrators regarding his involvement in the labor movement. Woltman was then fired from the university.
Those events prompted the American Association of University Professors [AAUP] to investigate academic freedom and tenure at Pitt. It wasn’t a “complete and formal” examination because it was conducted at the end of the academic year, but the findings were described in a report as being drawn from a fair sample of faculty members.
AAUP concluded that faculty members felt insecure and timid, needing to be extremely careful when talking about controversial topics, including “relations of labor and capital, government regulation of industry, and the domination of government by financial or business interests.” The report said faculty believed this was discouraged to protect Pitt’s financial interests.
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“The chancellor, in conversation with us, denied that it was the policy of the university to discourage members of the teaching staff from taking part in the discussion of public questions,” the report said. “He insisted, however, that the administration did object when such outside activities were undertaken from a desire for publicity or with the purpose of ‘carrying on propaganda for some organization outside of the university.’”
Pitt Chancellor John Bowman replied in a letter to the AAUP that insinuations, not facts, were stated. He closed the letter by saying the investigation wasn’t conducted in “fairness and executed in a judicial manner.”
1934-36: Pitt firing based on religion or fundraising?
Just five years later, the AAUP returned to Pitt for another investigation. This time it came at the request of history professor Ralph Turner, who was fired by the university in June 1934, just two months after his annual contract had been renewed.
The reason? Bowman said it was over Turner’s “flippant and sneering” anti-religion viewpoints, sometimes referenced in his classes. However, many at the time believed it was due to the professor’s liberal politics.
Turner’s dismissal made national headlines and angered many students, faculty and community members. Bowman, who disliked the way the AAUP handled the 1929 investigation, asked for approval of committee members conducting the probe. This was granted, but did not bring the result he might have hoped for.
The AAUP found that Turner’s firing was “unjustifiable,” and explored other possible reasons for the move. One was a speech Turner gave in April 1934 in front of the Western Pennsylvania Historical Society in which he critiqued capitalism and the growing influence of the ultra-wealthy. The speech upset several attendees, including the society’s president, who expressed this to Bowman.
This speech didn’t name famed Pittsburgh financier Andrew Mellon, who sat on Pitt’s board at the time, but was interpreted as an attack on local powerbrokers such as him and his family.
Another possible reason was tied to the university’s campaign for money to finish the Cathedral of Learning, a building conceived by Bowman. In the AAUP report, Bowman said Turner’s firing “was in no way related” to the campaign.
Instead, Bowman reiterated that all professors should have two qualities: “They must be patriotic and they must be reverent in their attitude toward religion.” Turner, he continued, didn’t possess the latter, and that was the “sole reason for the dismissal.”
Pennsylvania Gov. Gifford Pinchot questioned Bowman over the matter in a letter, notably saying that, “if the Mellons want a school to teach their ideas, then let them support it,” but “the commonwealth cannot.”
In an unpublished letter, Mellon said he wasn’t responsible for Turner’s firing and supported the notion of academic freedom. “If it were Doctor Turner’s political beliefs or statements which caused his dismissal, I should be heartily in favor of his immediate reinstatement,” he wrote.
In 1935, the state launched an investigation into Turner’s firing and academic freedom at the university to determine whether funding should be continued.
The investigation concluded there was too little evidence, and Pitt’s appropriations continued. While releasing the funds, new Gov. George Earle demanded the university restructure its board.
“I will expect full freedom of speech and full academic freedom to be granted and respected by the officials of the University of Pittsburgh,” Earle said. “Suppression of discussion is a violation of constitutional liberty and will not be permitted in any institution which receives state aid and support of the taxpayers.”
Turner continued teaching at other universities and ended his career at Yale.
1984-5: Classified defense research stirs CMU concerns
After much lobbying by Carnegie Mellon University, the U.S. Department of Defense [DoD] awarded CMU a $103 million, five-year research contract in November 1984. The department was expanding its footprint onto college campuses to advance military technology.
CMU’s contract involved the creation of the Software Engineering Institute [SEI]. Before the contract was finalized, students, faculty and staff members expressed concern about the university partnering with the department. A petition signed by 500 campus members was circulated, raising questions for university administrators to consider during contract negotiations with the department.
Chief among these questions was whether research would be fully classified and activities at the institute would contribute to the making of weapons. CMU honored that by ensuring that some of SEI’s research was unclassified — with a caveat.
The contract outlined that the department could review research papers to make comments. Some faculty members worried about potential censorship, noted that foreign scholars couldn’t work on classified research, and questioned whether the contract posed a threat to academic freedom.
“Can the university afford to open the door to possible censorship, exclusion of scientists by national origin and classified research?” asked late CMU Physics Professor Lincoln Wolfenstein.
CMU and DoD officials assured faculty members that most of the work done at the institute would be general research, which would be published. However, the pre-publication review was in place to “ensure the work is performed to specifications and safeguard against the possible release of classified information.”
Beyond this, the contract also stated 20% of the institute’s work would be projects requested by the DoD, leading some faculty members to protest that such stipulations “redefine science to mean research that receives funding.”
Once the contract was announced, CMU’s Faculty Senate requested that the university create an official policy on classified research. This was released in 1988. Despite some hiccups over the course of its decades-long relationship, the DoD has remained a funder of research at the university, which continues to be controversial.
2001-02: A Pitt clinic billed after upsetting lawmakers
Pitt could no longer afford to be associated with its Environmental Law Clinic, and the link needed to be severed, said then-Chancellor Mark Nordenberg in November 2001.
State lawmakers had recently passed Pitt’s appropriations bill and included a line that no money could go to the clinic. Though the clinic was funded primarily by the Heinz Endowments — with state funding making up less than a fifth of its budget — some officials still desired to cut off the supply.
Legislators were displeased with the clinic taking on clients who opposed activities such as logging in the Allegheny National Forest and construction of the Mon-Fayette Expressway. After the bill’s passage, Pitt asked the clinic to pay the university for its overhead costs (nearly $63,000).
Environmental groups protested, and a Pitt faculty senate committee found that the bill for overhead costs violated its academic freedom policy.
To make matters worse, the university prohibited the clinic from seeking funding from local foundations. Then-Provost James Maher said this was simply a rule for every clinic of the law school, established years in advance to prevent units within Pitt from competing with university-wide campaigns.
In a letter distributed to campus members, Maher said the clinic situation wasn’t about academic freedom and instead was about a “very important funder” being angry, cutting off funding and leaving the university to figure out how to pay for it.
While administrators floated the notion of the clinic becoming an off-campus, independent nonprofit, a solution for funding overhead costs through a different source was reached in March 2002. The clinic remained under the law school and is active today.
2005-06: State committee on academic freedom comes to Pitt
In March 2005, then-state Rep. Gibson Armstrong, R-Lancaster, said he’d been contacted by college students who reported feeling uncomfortable and unfairly treated by professors with liberal politics. To address this, he put forth a resolution to create a committee that would investigate such claims at state-related universities, which receive some public funding.
The resolution stated that “students and faculty should be protected from the imposition of ideological orthodoxy,” while “faculty members have the responsibility to not take advantage of their authority position to introduce inappropriate or irrelevant subject matter outside their field of study.”
Many other, similarly framed resolutions were introduced in other states during that year’s legislative session. They were all informed by conservative activist David Horowitz, who sought to reform what he believed was widespread political indoctrination on college campuses by codifying an “Academic Bill of Rights” into law.
A House Select Committee on Academic Freedom in Higher Education began looking into the claims, and held four hearings — including one at Pitt — throughout the year. During Pitt’s hearing, the university’s then-provost, representatives from AAUP and the National Association of Scholars, and two non-Pitt professors were called to testify. Students and faculty members spoke during a public comment period.
The committee ended its work in November 2006, stating in a report that student academic freedom violations were rare. It didn’t recommend legislation, but public higher education institutions were tasked to:
- Check if student rights were included in academic freedom policies, and that steps to file reports of violations were clear
- Let students know about academic freedom policies and ways to report violations during orientation, and post this information online
- Allow students to report academic freedom violations to an official outside of their major
- See if changes to course evaluation forms were needed to leave room for students to write about academic freedom violations
- Keep a record of reports filed under the institution’s academic policy
- Report actions taken to address the above by Nov. 1, 2008.
2009: CCAC moves against gun group draw FIRE
Christine Brashier wanted to start a chapter of the group Students for Concealed Carry on Campus at the Community College of Allegheny County. She made and handed out fliers advertising the club, listing her name and contact information. Soon after, she was told this fell under solicitation, which was against CCAC policy, and that all materials distributed to students had to be approved by administrators.
Brashier claimed she was told her behavior was “academic misconduct,” and discussions of the college’s ban on concealed carry wouldn’t be allowed to continue. After this, she got in touch with the free speech organization Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression [FIRE], which contacted CCAC officials.
First, CCAC told FIRE the issue wasn’t the stance Brashier took on gun rights, but that she didn’t make a distinction that the chapter wasn’t affiliated with the college. FIRE countered on its website that the flyer said the club was “not affiliated with the NRA, a political party or any other organization.”
CCAC also said Brashier did not follow proper protocol to establish a club, which involved completing an application, showing student interest and securing a faculty adviser. Handing out fliers to garner potential recruits wasn’t considered “standard practice.”
FIRE leaders said CCAC violated Brashier’s constitutional rights, adding that “the college’s justifications for its censorship … are not only unconstitutional, they are absurd.” The organization enlisted an attorney to represent Brashier and sent press releases to local and national media outlets, which picked up the story.
Following the increased attention on this issue, CCAC edited its policy around reviewing materials given to students that September. Brashier was able to proceed with forming the group the following year.
Maddy Franklin reports on higher ed for Pittsburgh’s Public Source, in partnership with Open Campus, and can be reached at madison@publicsource.org.
This story was fact-checked by Bella Markovitz.
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