Chancellor Martin and Professor Lee Epstein unpack free speech policies on campus

and | Editor-in-Chief and Managing Sports Editor

Chancellor Andrew Martin, Professor Lee Epstein, and senior and Student Union President Hussein Amuri discussed free speech on campus at an event Sep. 4. (Bri Nitsberg | Student Life)

In the last year, university administrators nationwide have come under fire for their handling of campus protests. On Wednesday, Sep. 4, WashU Chancellor Andrew Martin shared his perspective. When asked a similar question that landed some of his colleagues in hot water — like university presidents at the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard University — Martin had a different answer.

“If the question posed to me was the same one that was posed to my colleagues — “Is calling for extermination of the Jews something allowable under the student code of conduct at Washington University?” — my answer would have been, simply, ‘No, not allowable.’”

Martin’s response came during a conversation with Professor Lee Epstein, the Ethan A.H. Shepley Distinguished University Professor at WashU, and Hussein Amuri, Student Union (SU) President and senior. During the talk, which was attended by over 150 people, Martin and Epstein discussed the rights and limitations of free expression on college campuses and shared insights into how WashU creates and enforces its policies. Much of the content of the conversation mirrored the topics taught in a class that Martin and Epstein have jointly taught at WashU every spring since 2020. 

Approximately 15 minutes into the conversation, six student protestors stood up and unfurled a pair of banners that read “WashU Arms Genocide” and “Handcuffs for Protestors, Free Speech for Rapists,” referencing last semester’s arrests of demonstrators who set up an encampment and the University’s continued employment of Professor Philip Dybvig

Epstein asked Martin what he thought about the six students demonstrating.

“I think it’s great,” Martin responded. “You know, this is an opportunity for members of the community to express their opinions, and expressing opinions and thoughts is exactly what academic communities are all about.”

In an interview with Student Life after the event, Martin declined to comment on the content written on the banners. 

Junior Penelope Thaman, who was holding one of the banners, said that representatives from the administration told the student demonstrators that they had to move to the back or face police intervention. The demonstrators stood silently in the back until the end of the event, when they began chanting “Free, free, Palestine” and moving towards the stage. As they approached, Martin left the event through a back entrance, and the protesters dispersed soon afterwards. Though the Washington University Police Department was on site, they did not intervene.

Thaman said afterwards that Martin and Epstein’s response felt hypocritical.

“[Highlighting] that people are so engaged and willing to show their free speech — that, just truly, to me, embodied all the hypocrisy that this entire event was about,” she said.

Protestors held up a banner reading “WashU Arms Genocide” during the talk before being asked to stand in the back of the room. (Bri Nitsberg | Student Life)

Martin told Student Life that WashU’s policies are clear in terms of which protests violate the University’s guidelines — such as the attempted encampment that occurred on April 27 — and which ones don’t. He pointed out that the difference in the April 27 protest was the use of encampments.

“Last academic year, in terms of implementation, we had 30 or 40 protests on campus, similar to the one we had today, that went off without a hitch,” he said. “In the situation that happened in April at the moment [in] which individuals wanted to start putting up tents on the campus and start encampments, that was the line.”

During the event, Martin and Epstein fielded questions from Amuri and the audience. Some students expressed frustration that questions had to be submitted via a QR code on the screen.

“While we did ask questions concerning divestment and student concerns, all of those questions were ignored by the moderator,” Erin Ritter, a graduate student involved in the demonstration, said.

During the talk, Martin said that, as a private institution, WashU has greater flexibility in enforcing free-speech policies than public universities. 

“[The] First Amendment…says nothing about Washington University in St Louis, [or] private institutions. We really can do what we want, and so that does provide some greater flexibility,” Martin said. “At the same time, as we’ve thought about our important policies…we tend to think about it in a First Amendment lens.”

Martin said that University policies have been created with the input of students and faculty members, pointing to examples like restrictions on demonstrations on the South 40 and Village and other content-neutral “time, place, and manner” restrictions. 

Junior Sonal Churiwal, one of the students involved in the demonstration, pushed back on the idea that students had a say in WashU’s policies. Churiwal, who is also a senator in SU, said that the Office of Student Conduct and Community Standards presented new guidelines to SU, and that the student feedback was not implemented.

“[The Office for Student Conduct] might have taken small snippets, but I see none of the overarching changes that we recommended being taken,” Churiwal said. “If anything, the code has become even stricter.”

Amuri asked the panelists if there were any ways in which a student could disrupt the educational mission and not get punished. Though Martin expressed the seriousness of and need for accountability when students disrupt classroom activities, Epstein brought up concerns about what expression is considered disruptive.

“I worry about those buckets — [terms like] ‘substantial disruption’ and the ‘academic mission’ — becoming so expansive that anything can be thrown in there,” she said. 

Another topic of the talk was the responsibility of the University to regulate speech made by faculty members outside of their work as professors. This issue was discussed on campus last winter after controversial posts from Professors Seth Crosby and Bret Gustafson

“[If] their political advocacy is in such conflict with their role as a faculty member, [then] they have an obligation to take a leave of absence or resign from their faculty position,” Martin said. 

Amuri also asked about outside speakers’ right to free speech on campus, referring to the hypothetical of a member of the KKK being invited to speak. Martin shared that WashU, as a private university, is able to prevent speakers from coming onto campus, pointing to the time in 2016 when the University forbade members of the Westboro Baptist Church from protesting at the Transgender Spectrum Conference.

“I think there are probably speakers that we would just say, you know, they’re not adding anything to our academic content, and certainly we’re not going to allow [them] to come here,” Martin said.

Students in the crowd had varied responses and reactions to the event. First-year Mason Klein said that he appreciated having administrators that he feels are in touch with the community.

“I think they have a nice pulse on how people are feeling and changes that have needed to be made or they are willing to make, so that was refreshing to [hear],” Klein said. “They didn’t shy away from certain questions or topics…I can really get behind this sort of community-minded-ness [and] this sense of freedom within reason.”

However, others, like senior Aisha Adedayo, felt that the event was performative.

“I was surprised that they dodged a lot of the questions and kept things pretty vague, which leads me to believe it [was] performative. Because why would you host the event on free speech, invite people for an open dialogue, and not actually discuss the [elephant in the room]?” she said.

Thaman felt that the event was one-sided.

“Now we’re here to talk about free speech, but once again, they will praise us for ‘protesting’ but [won’t] actually ever talk with us,” Thaman said. “There is no speech on our side.”

Amuri, who moderated the event, sees conversations like this as an important way for the University community to come together and address difficult topics.

“In light of everything we went through last year, the way forward is one of empathy and is one where we hope to listen — but, just as important, [where] you hope to be listened to.”

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