http://news.nky.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?...S0103/604140420

In a later article it was found that she participated in the destruction (and was photographed by a reporter for the school newspaper 'caught in the act' as they say). She claims it's her 'Freedom of Speech' to destroy the display.

Questions:

Do you believe as she says, it was her Freedom of Speech to destroy the memorial?

If so - why?

If not - why?

And if you believe it isn't, do you think she should be punished for her actions?

Do you believe as she says, it was her Freedom of Speech to destroy the memorial?

If so - why?

If not - why?

And if you believe it isn't, do you think she should be punished for her actions?

I think we’re going to have to wait and see how the lawyers on both sides argue this.

Apparently, U. S. Supreme Court has ruled otherwise, but I don’t think the crosses should have been on the property of a state university in the first place. How may I ask, does this display contribute to the learning process? I don’t have to like an existing Supreme Court decision anymore than some conservatives.

If this had been a private university, I would see it differently.

It’s the ongoing battle of when to apply the free exercise clause and when to callout the establishment clause. The two seemingly conflict at times.

BTW: I just picked Newsweek managing editor up Jon Meacham’s new book American Gospel that attempts to bring the sides polarized by the free exercise vs. establishment clauses back to the center. It’s a short book of only 250 pages. I’ll report on it when I’m finished.

The students who put up the display were given permission by NKU officials. This was not the school its self putting up the display but a group of students.

Although the Professor(who is an employee of the school) invited other students to destroy the display.

Free speech is no longer free when it tramples upon another's right to have free speech.

I don't need to wait for a group of attorneys. I can decide on this for myself.

That's very good Sleeper. You are entitled to your opinion.

What we won't know until this plays out in court, is whether destroying signs is just as much free speech as putting them up. Further, we will not know the legal outcome of disciplinary action against the professor (if indeed there is any) until her right to due process is exhausted. That would include hearings within the University as well as remedy in court.

I will make a prediction. This is a hot potato issue. If the university is considering disciplinary action against the professor, it will be the bare minimum--a verbal reprimand at most, if the issue isn't dropped altogether.

Do you believe as she says, it was her Freedom of Speech to destroy the memorial?
No.

If not - why?
To start with, symbolic speech is protected in two flag-burning cases: Texas v. Johnson (1989), and United States v. Eichman (1990). Even saluting the flag is regarded as a form of speech because it is “a means of communicating ideas.” (Link) However, I’m not aware of any court case that considers destruction of someone else’s property/symbolic expression a guaranteed right. Had the students hung hangers off the crosses, which is what I would’ve done, the pro-life side, well, it would be interesting to see that case go to court. The law is on the pro-life group’s side in this case.

And if you believe it isn't, do you think she should be punished for her actions?
That is up to her employer. It appears some faculty are sympathetic towards the pro-choice movement evident by employees creating the Educators for Reproductive Freedom group and meeting with the ACLU and Planned Parenthood, which is the reason why students formed the Northern Right to Life group. If the faculty doesn’t want harm to come to their agenda I would call for Jacobson’s termination.

This, by the way, is one of the most egocentric, logically bankrupt statements I’ve read in two days:


How does she figure the Northern Right to Life group feels any less emotionally invested?

And if you believe it isn't, do you think she should be punished for her actions?

You did not define punishment. If the university wants to discipline the professor, they have standard procedures that must be met.

Please note Sections C-7 and G-2&3 of the Northern Kentucky University Human Resources Manual. Because of the procedures in place to protect due process of employees, the possiblility of legal action, etc., I don't expect her to receive much more than a slap on the wrist.

http://access.nku.edu/hr/

I am moderately "pro-choice," but let me say as clearly as possible that I do not accept the destruction of legal symbols as a form of "free speech." There seems to be no question that the "pro-life" group had the right to put up this display.



Jacobsen undermines her own case with this statement:



You do NOT have the right to pull down a legal Nazi display, no matter how offensive you may find it. You have the right to put up your own counter-display. The "pro-choice" folks should have done so. Instead, they chose to make themselves look bad.

Obviously some form of disciplinary action against those who destroyed the display is appropriate.

Do you believe as she says, it was her Freedom of Speech to destroy the memorial?

No. Freedom of speech cannot be construed as freedom to censor.

Rather then tearing down the crosses, she ought have just made her own counter construction.

And if you believe it isn't, do you think she should be punished for her actions?

Destruction of property is a legal offense, so yes.

Do you believe as she says, it was her Freedom of Speech to destroy the memorial?

No. I'm not necessarily opposed to her action - I wouldn't compare this to destroying a display someone put up on their lawn, for example - but she should have the guts to admit it was monkey wrenching, and take the punishment proudly. Instead, she's trying to claim it's an expression of her first amendment rights? She obviously doesn't understand even the basics of the first amendment.

Go ahead and tear it down if you feel strongly about it, just don't try and weasel out of taking your medecine when the time comes to pay the piper.

Do you believe as she says, it was her Freedom of Speech to destroy the memorial?

Freedom of speech does not include freedom to destroy the property of others. It is simply beyond me how a "professor" could so wrongly interpret things. Maybe in her view killing people is within her freedom of speech rights? Maybe just showing them her views by "roughing them up"? Destroying property is not an enumerated right, no matter the motive.

What she could have done (or should have done) is put up a counter "memorial". I guess a professor of literature and language doesn't understand that there is a marketplace (or battlefield) of ideas in which the destruction of your opponent is achieved through words, not by physically attacking them or their property.

And if you believe it isn't, do you think she should be punished for her actions?

Does this not fall into the category of vandalism? This is a civil matter, not an employment matter. Of course she should be held responsible. She has admitted to inciting her students to destroy property. She needs to be held responsible.

I don’t believe it should be a right to destroy any memorial or other statuary based on Freedom of Speech, and apparently the law would agree. Try to destroy the Vietnam Memorial in D.C. because you opposed the war and I’d guess you’d end up with a quarter for the one phone call.

Would agree with BoF that the error in judgment was approving this in the first place. I’ve worked on several political campaigns in Northern Kentucky and know it’s very conservative on both sides of the aisle (and a huge catholic population). My guess is the “approver” was pro right to life, but a public university isn’t the place for a political memorial (see following paragraph). Protests and marches sure, but not a standing memorial. I’ve been critical of this generation for being politically limp, but at least they did something. So kudos to students on both sides of this issue even though one side was a bit misguided.

And when I read this it reminded me of an opposite but similar situation. The controversy at the University of Washington where a few members of the student council are against erecting a statue of alumni Pappy Boyington because he was a marine fighter pilot who “murdered” and it’s not the image they want to project. Amazing.

The professor should be tried in criminal court for vandalism/destruction of property and reprimanded according to university policy. If the university doesn't take action it could send the wrong message.

This sounds reasonable. A reprimand would be in order, but I sense some people are out for blood.

That the professor (allegedly) violated someone's freedom of speech does not nullify her right to due process in accordance with University policies or regarding possible charges in misdemeanor court. I say alleged, because I don't think freedom of speech guarantees anyone a microphone, a platform or space to erect a monument on public property.

It is entirely within the rights of anyone, including anti-abortion advocates, to go to any public place, such as the NKU campus, and espouse their points of view in person. NKU as a public educational institution should facilitate such advocacy as much as possible.

I would further argue that on every campus there should be some common facility, such as a large, public bulletin board, for political and other signage, open even to Nazis. (My experience with such a facility on one major campus has been that there is vigorous and sometimes underhanded competition for space there.) But no public institution is obliged to lay open its grounds and buildings to any piece of political advertising whatever, and certainly not to a major installation such as this "memorial."

It is no one's right to establish a substantial, unsanctioned semi-permanent work of political art, such as this, on any public property anywhere. That NKU permitted such an installation amply demonstrates NKU's implicit approval of the "memorial's" message (and probably says much about state politics in Kentucky). The same is further demonstrated by NKU's hostile reaction to the "memorial's" removal.

I very much doubt, for example, that a set of crosses memorializing those many dead from inhaling tobacco smoke would have been allowed to stand on the campus of any institution of higher learning in Kentucky -- or that anyone who removed it would have aroused the ire of the University.

Therefore, actions of Professor Jacobsen were injurious not to the persons who established the "memorial" -- which would not have been permitted but for NKU's support of it -- but to NKU itself. What if, for example, the people who removed the crosses did so because they wanted to sit upon, or walk across, the grass where they were placed? It is just as if someone had taken chalk and written political messages on the sidewalks of NKU. Would anyone who subsequently erased those messages, whether intentionally or unintentionally, be guilty of suppressing the rights of speech of those who wrote them? If NKU explicitly or implicity invites someone to establish a work of art, political or otherwise, on its campus, and someone then destroys that work, the injured party is NKU, not the artist.

Whether NKU has a civil cause against Professor Jacobsen that is likely to succeed in the courts of Kentucky is a question that I cannot answer; but I very much doubt that the people of Kentucky have a criminal cause against her.

I will finally remark that it is an absurdity to refer to property rights in political displays that are effectively abandoned on public property. Any person interested in preserving such "property" could easily have done so by keeping it in the trunk of his car.

It looks like she and her students who participated in this destruction will face prosecution. The Dean has pressed for a full investigation and the police have said that this constitutes a felony for those involved.

http://www.lifenews.com/state1588.html

Above is a link from the YahooNews story (which link I can't seem to find now - though I do remember reading it offa the 'Latest News' on my Yahoo homepage). There are also photos of the professor and her students caught in the act of destroying the memorial.

Do you think that NKU would have given permission to anyone to set up a similar display, memorializing the many thousands of persons who have died from inhaling tobacco smoke? (Kentucky is the nation's leading tobacco producing state.)

It's funny you should bring up such an example, as such a display did, in fact, appear in the state of Montana.

Link



I think it can be argued that a shopping mall is less of a public forum than a state university.

Let me make it clear here that I consider the display of crosses to mark legal abortions a great oversimplification of a complex problem. The fact that I do not agree with such a display does not mean that I would remove it from the campus. (If the university refused to allow a symbolic display from the pro-choice side, we would have a problem. There is no indication that this is the case.) The whole incident is a black eye for the pro-choice side.

Perhaps I am more sensitive to this issue than some folks because I have had an organization to which I belong victimized in the same way. Each year, during the holiday season, openly religious messages are allowed to appear in the Wisconsin State Capital. In the interest of equal time, the Freedom From Religion Foundation, to which I belong, puts up a message stating that no supernatural entities exist. This message is invariably vandalized. Should I protest such a crime, but allow those on my side to do the same thing to others? No.