In the Virginia state capitol, you will find a bust of James Madison and the first thing that you will notice is that he was a handsome guy. And if you’ve done your due diligence, you will also know that he was very smart and insightful.
Just check out the banner on a column written by the editorial board of The Wall Street Journal on Sept. 19: “James Madison Weeps.” Madison and a few other folks like Ben Franklin wrote that “Freedom of speech is a principal pillar of a free government.”
The editorial board of the WSJ continues on with the following statement: “Imagine what Franklin, James Madison and the other Founders would make of a new Brookings Institution survey showing that American college students have no clue what the First Amendment means.”
John Villasenor, the person who conducted the Brookings survey of more than 1,500 undergraduates, commented, “Most American college students do not know that even hate speech is constitutionally protected. Half agree that it’s OK to shout down a speaker whose views they don’t agree with and one in five of them believe it is acceptable for a student group that opposes a speaker to use violence to keep him from speaking.”
The First Amendment very clearly states, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”
A relevant example of what’s going on at college campuses is what happened at Auburn in April of this year. The university had invited alt-right white nationalist Richard Spencer to give a speech. Even before the speech began, the natives were restless and encircled a Spencer supporter and fists began to fly. Auburn tried four days earlier to cancel the speech but a federal judge forced Auburn to let Spencer exercise his First Amendment right.
A couple of other examples are what happened at the University of California at Berkeley and at Middlebury College in Vermont that I read about in a CNN blog: “The University of California at Berkeley erupted into near-riots in February during a protest against professional provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos over President Donald Trump. When political scientist Charles Murray spoke last month at Middlebury College in Vermont, protesters stormed the event and a professor accompanying him was injured.”
Now is a very critical time when it comes to the future of our country. With the explosion of nuclear-equipped countries, it is critical that we encourage free speech, not only in America but also around the world. North Korea says it will detonate a hydrogen bomb and Iran just tested a long- range ballistic missile and who knows what Bashar Hafez-al-Assad, the 19th president of Syria, is up to? These three regimes do not allow their citizens freedom of speech.
I did a mini-survey with our children, asking them what they thought about what the American college students were doing when it comes to freedom of expression. Here’s my No. 1 daughter’s excellent email reply:
“It is particularly disturbing that this is happening on college campuses, where talking to one another and exchanging ideas is supposed to be encouraged and it’s part of learning. This has been very disturbing to me. As long as there isn’t fraud, libel, extortion, divulging military secrets and incitement to imminent lawless actions, the right to free speech, no matter how much you might disagree with what somebody is saying, is a critical piece of democracy. The first thing dictators do is shut down free speech and criticize their opponents.”
“If freedom of speech is taken away, then dumb and silent, we may be led to the slaughter.” - George Washington
Robert Pembroke is the chairman of Pembroke’s Inc. and considers himself on permanent sabbatical. He can be reached at pembroke894@gmail.com.