After giving testimony in the House of Representatives on the state of freedom of speech on American campuses, I received a formal request from the committee for a written response to an additional question submitted to me by Representative Mark Meadows. His question was:
“At what point does speech become hate speech and should be limited?"
Here is the text of my reply, which has now been filed:
“Hate speech” is a phrase with no settled or determinate meaning. Although certain forms of expression (defamation, obscenity, threats, false advertising, etc.) are unprotected under the First Amendment, there is no “hate speech” exception to the Amendment. I regret to say that this is a matter on which even many of our most talented and best educated young people are in error. Many of my own students at Princeton enter my Constitutional Interpretation course erroneously believing that “hate speech” is outside the scope of constitutional protection. One of my first tasks is to disabuse them.
My classrooms are always “free speech zones.” In fact, in my view, every public space on a college or university campus should be a “free speech zone” (which is to say that there should be no need for special “free speech zones” on a campus). Students are free to advocate any view, and, indeed, I encourage students to defend any view they hold, so long as they are prepared to do business in the proper currency of intellectual discourse—a currency consisting of evidence, reasons, and arguments. My Princeton colleague Peter Singer defends the morality not only of abortion but even of infanticide—the deliberate killing of newborn babies. I find his position appalling and even scandalous. But because he is ready, willing, and able to make his case by adducing evidence, providing reasons, and making arguments, I believe he has a right to make it and, indeed, should be encouraged to do so. That I am unpersuaded (and appalled and even scandalized) by such advocacy is neither here nor there; nor does it diminish his right. In fact, I encourage my own students to take Professor Singer’s classes and to consider his arguments in a thoughtful and open-minded manner. Their education is enhanced by considering not only the views and arguments about abortion and infanticide they hear from me, but also the ones they hear from him. I have no desire (and no right) to indoctrinate my students. And if they are to learn to think for themselves and be genuine truth-seekers, it is important for them to be exposed to challenges from the broadest possible range of perspectives. I want them to hear and consider my perspective. But I want them to hear and consider Professor Singer’s too. And I want them to hear and consider the perspectives of others as well.
Of course, someone could say: “Professor Singer is advocating the license to kill an entire class of human beings. That is hate speech. It should not be allowed. His tenure at Princeton should be revoked. He should be fired.” But such a person would receive no support from me. On the contrary, I would insist that Professor Singer’s right to state and defend his views—with evidence, reasons, and arguments—must be strictly respected and protected.
Now, a legitimate question arises about how we distinguish mere demagoguery from genuine intellectual arguments. As a practical matter, however, this is not an issue that has to be resolved to settle campus free speech policy. We must err on the side of free speech. We should fight demagoguery not by prohibiting speech, but by exposing the demagogue. The demagogue appeals to emotion (prejudice, animus, etc.) not reason. His “reasoning” is a counterfeit—indeed a burlesque—of the real thing. So let him speak, but call him out. The danger of restricting demagogic speech—the danger of censorship—is that the authority to restrict demagogic speech can, and quickly will, be used as a pretext for censoring speech that powerful persons or interests on campus abominate.
What I do not permit in my classroom, and what universities may legitimately prohibit (and should prohibit), are such things as assaults (much less actual batteries), intimidation, threats, and raw abuse. These kinds of activities are not even fake reasoning. They are the opposite of reasoning. Calling a person a vile or vulgar name is not stating a reason or making an argument. Threatening or intimidating someone is not giving him a reason to change his mind about something. If that is what someone means by “hate speech,” then, yes, that should be forbidden on campus. It does not advance the intellectual mission of the university, viz. the cause of truth-seeking. On the contrary, it poisons the environment and makes genuine discussion and debate impossible.
But that, of course, is not ordinarily what people mean when they use the phrase “hate speech” and propose to prohibit it on campus. What they ordinarily mean by “hate speech” are positions and views that they detest and want to make it an offense to advocate or defend. They want, in effect, to immunize their own positions and views from critical challenge. This, to me, is simply unacceptable. My admirable friend Professor Allison Stanger was attacked by a mob on her own campus at Middlebury College not because she called someone a disgusting name or threatened or intimidated someone—she has never done and would never do anything of the kind—but because she was willing to engage in reasoned debate and discussion with Charles Murray, some of whose opinions were (to the limited extent that the people who constituted the mob understood them) anathema to them. These misguided souls justified their illiberal and violent actions by claiming to be fighting against “hate speech.”
I hope that these reflections are responsive to Chairman Meadows’ question. If more detail or additional thoughts would be helpful, please let me know. I will be happy to supply them.
Yours sincerely,
Robert George
Monday, August 6, 2018
Pope John Paul II's mighty encyclical letter Veritatis Splendor was released on this date in 1993, and while it is probably best known in moral theology for its rejection of proportionalism (at ¶¶ 79-83: "circumstances or intentions can never transform an act intrinsically evil by virtue of its object into an act 'subjectively' good or defensible as a choice") there are a host of other vital aspects to the document. Here is a rich paragraph from an article by Alasdair MacIntyre, "How Can We Learn What Veritatis Splendor Has to Teach?," 58 The Thomist 171 (1994):
Yet as Catholics we have to listen first to what a very different set of voices have to say to us, those inspired and authoritative voices which declare the Word of God concerning those same moral matters about which our own culture speaks to us so vociferously and about which we have arrived at our own philosophical conclusions. Part of what we have to learn, or rather to relearn, from Veritatis Splendor is that, at least so far as the fundamental and central precepts of the moral law are concerned, the truths about those precepts declared to us by God through Moses and the prophets, in the revelation by Jesus Christ of the New Law and in the teaching of the Catholic Church, culminating in this very encyclical, are no other than the truths to which we have already assented as rational persons, or rather to which we would have assented, if we had not been frustrated in so doing by our own cultural, intellectual, and moral errors and deformations. Yet the encyclical also teaches us that what we encounter in Jesus Christ is immeasurably more than this. We also have to learn of our forgiveness and our redemption and of the transformation made possible in our acknowledgment of law when we come to understand it in the light afforded by Jesus Christ. Nonetheless the law declared to us by God in revelation is the same law as that which we recognize in the moral requirements imposed by our own human practical understanding and reasoning, when they are in good order. So that when we become able to hear and to respond to what Jesus Christ has to say to us, we do not have to leave behind or discard anything that we had genuinely learned concerning the moral law through reasoning. Grace often corrects, as well as completes, what we have so far taken to be conclusions of reason, but, when grace does so correct us, it is always because we have in some way failed as reasoners. And therefore Veritatis Splendor, just because it is true to this biblical teaching, will be grotesquely misunderstood if it is understood as an act of coercive imposition by an external authority, rather than an invitation to become more thoughtful and more perceptive. It does indeed speak in the name of an authority external to us, God, but that to which it invites us--that to which He invites us--is in part an act of moral and rational self-recognition. And Veritatis Splendor as a work of philosophy does itself exhibit just that moral and rational awareness to which as an encyclical it invites its readers.
Friday, August 3, 2018
A shortcoming of the Catholic debate (the past couple of days certainly included) over the death penalty is a frequent lack of attention to distinctly theological questions and how they might inform the debate. The best alternative to that theological sterility, I think, is the Anglican theologian Oliver O'Donovan, who has written perceptively (and ambivalently) about the death penalty for many years. Here is a bit from the conclusion of his essay responding to John Paul II's discussion of the death penalty in Evangelium Vitae:
I return in closing to the theological issue raised at the start: the failure of the encyclical to achieve a clear focus on the resurrection and its tendency to put the cross in its place, central to the salvation history of life but unrelated to the phenomenology of death. Now I can suggest a reason for this. John Paul’s failure, on the side of civil justice, to identify the link between judgment and mortality is reflected in a failure, on the side of death, to link mortality and judgment. Politically we have justice without death, anthropologically death without judgment….
The symbolic links of judgment and execution stand at the heart of what we understand about Christ’s reconciling death. We may be rid of ordinary uses of the death penalty in most Western states; I am glad to live in one where we are. We may one day be rid of it elsewhere, in Third World countries, Muslim societies, and so on. If we can achieve that responsibly, it will be a fine achievement – though we must be on our guard against irresponsible, crusading attitudes which fail to take the context (legal, economic, social, and moral) seriously. But we cannot be rid of the symbolic role that the death penalty plays in relating death to judgment. There will always be a death penalty in the mind – if, that is, we are all to learn to “die with Christ,” understanding our own deaths as a kind of capital punishment.
Oliver O'Donovan, "The Death Penalty in Evangelium Vitae," in Ecumenical Ventures in Ethics: Protestants Engage Pope John Paul II’s Moral Encyclicals, eds. Reinhard Hütter and Theodor Dieter (Eerdmans, 1998), 213–36 .
This is a hard-hitting but, I think, devastatingly on-point evaluation of the "personally opposed but . . ." approach to abortion-regulation that Gov. Cuomo proposed in his 1980s Notre Dame speech and that so many others have adopted since. A taste:
[L]ike Mario Cuomo[,] . . . they claim to be “personally” against abortion, but would leave it up to “a woman and her doctor.” This assumes the division of oneself into personhood, and what else? Granted, one would not want to force into law one’s personal preference or distaste for or against, let’s say, chipotle peppers or disco music, but to treat abortion as a matter of inexplicable, anachronistic religious doctrine; arbitrary preference; or capricious taste is to demonstrate conceptual blindness or bottomless moral cowardice.
If an unborn child were not, as in fact it is slightly more than half the time, of a different sex than the mother; if it did not have a completely different and unique DNA; if it were not viable from the start and would not survive to term and then, statistically, for 80 years more thereafter given only the absence of an act of destruction; if abortion opponents were consistent in using the emotive, Anglo-Saxon word woman and not switching to the Latin fetus instead of baby or child; if the stupidity of the question “When does life begin?” was not affirmed by the fact that the sperm and the egg are alive before the question is unnecessarily formulated; if only one body, not two, gave rise to the conflict; if in common and statute law there were not long-standing strictures upon what we may do even with our own bodies; and if the destruction of one’s progeny were not contrary to every biological imperative, decent human impulse, and civilized principle, only then—and perhaps not even then—the question would not be, is this the taking of an innocent human life, or is it not?
There is a movement underway at a number of Catholic universities that seeks to have these institutions revoke the honorary degrees that they conferred upon Theodore (“Call me Uncle Ted”) McCarrick, the now disgraced Archbishop Emeritus of Washington, D.C., and former member of the College of Cardinals. Last week Pope Francis accepted McCarrick’s resignation from the College, ordered him to refrain from exercising his priestly ministry in public, and instructed him to live a life of “prayer and penance.” This followed on the heels of the Archdiocese of New York’s finding that allegations that McCarrick abused a 16 year old altar boy in 1971 and 1972 to be “credible and substantiated” (see here and here). Since then, a host of allegations have surfaced (some, apparently, having been known and shared among church-insiders for years) that McCarrick was not only a priestly figure who molested teenagers, but a man of power who led a life of dissipation, frequently inviting seminarians and young priests to parties at his beach house on the Jersey shore, where they were also invited to share his bed (see here; Rod Dreher’s reporting has been especially good, see here, here and here).
In light of these developments, Fordham University and the Catholic University of America (see here and here) have rescinded the honorary degrees they once gleefully bestowed upon McCarrick. This is in keeping with a trend among American universities in the wake of the #MeToo movement which has seen Sewanee and Fordham revoke the honorary degrees they conferred upon Charlie Rose (see here and here), and over twenty institutions rescind the degrees they awarded to Bill Cosby (see here).
The University of Notre Dame was among those schools that decided to disassociate itself from Bill Cosby. In announcing the move (see here), Notre Dame President Rev. John Jenkins, C.S.C. assured the Notre Dame community that “[w]hile certainly troubled by serious, public accusations made by multiple women against [Cosby], the University elected to wait until due process had been afforded the accused, and a verdict delivered, before rescinding the honor.”
In response to the revelations concerning McCarrick, some Notre Dame alumni questioned whether the former cardinal’s degree (here) would likewise be revoked (see here). Father Jenkins issued a statement (here) explaining that while the University finds the “alleged actions reprehensible” it “recognizes that McCarrick maintains his innocence and that a final decision in the case will come only after a canonical trial in Rome.”
But the decision to revoke Bill Cosby’s degree and the decision to forego rescinding McCarrick’s degree (at least for the time being) both raise an important question: Why should the University rescind these public honors in the first place? After all, we were told by no less an authority than Father Jenkins that bestowing such a degree does not constitute a statement of approval of all that the person has done or said. Indeed, in defending his decision to honor President Obama in 2009, Father Jenkins insisted (here) that the award of an honorary degree “has never been a political statement or an endorsement of policy.“ Instead, the honorary degree bestowed on Mr. Obama reflected “the University’s expression of respect for the leader of the nation and the Office of the President.”
But by the same logic McCarrick should continue to be an honorary Domer. The University had no knowledge of McCarrick’s perverse conduct when it bestowed the degree (presumably), and now the degree continues to reflect the University’s respect for the leader of a great diocese and the office of bishop.
Many in the Notre Dame community found Father Jenkins’ defense of his decision to honor Mr. Obama wanting, but some explanation was surely necessary given Mr. Obama’s well-known public support for the abortion license through all nine months of pregnancy and beyond (i.e. in the Illinois legislature he rejected measures that would have mandated care for children that survive abortion). Indeed, Mr. Obama’s stance on abortion was not nuanced. His preferred policy plainly contradicted the Church’s teaching regarding the inviolability of unborn human life and the need for the law “to preserve each person’s rights and to protect the weakest” (see here). Even if Father Jenkins did not fully appreciate the depth of Mr. Obama’s commitment to preserving and expanding the legal right to kill unborn children in the womb (a highly dubious suggestion given Father Jenkins’ eminent intelligence), he must have recognized this during the subsequent eight years during which Mr. Obama zealously sought to advance that policy at home and abroad.
So now, if I understand this correctly, the standard that Notre Dame employs in deciding to revoke an honorary degree that the University now thinks was wrongfully conferred is the conviction of the degree-recipient in a court of law (or similar tribunal) for serious crimes, provided that due process has been observed? And that subsequent conduct in support of an “unspeakable crime” (here) that harms the innocent and undermines the common good isn’t grounds for revoking an honorary degree, but discovery of past sinful conduct that harms the innocent and undermines the common good may be grounds for revoking an honorary degree?
Isn’t it marvelous how this standard can justify the revocation of the Cosby honorary degree, leave the door open to revoking the McCarrick honorary degree (while virtue signaling the University’s disapproval of pederasty), and avoid apologizing for a degree that should never have been given in the first place! And isn’t it remarkable that this standard would appear to align perfectly with how Notre Dame perceives its appeal to the preferred donor class!
The lesson being learned in all this – in the conferring and in the taking away of honorary degrees – is a lesson that is as true for institutions as it is for individuals: One is known by the company one keeps.
Thursday, August 2, 2018
A quick thought following today’s announcement from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith that Pope Francis has approved a revision to Section 2267 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
Not much attention has been paid to the text of the letter from the CDF, which warrants a close reading. At Paragraphs 8 and 10 of Cardinal Ladaria’s letter, he states:
8. All of this shows that the new formulation of number 2267 of the Catechism expresses an authentic development of doctrine that is not in contradiction with the prior teachings of the Magisterium. These teachings, in fact, can be explained in the light of the primary responsibility of the public authority to protect the common good in a social context in which the penal sanctions were understood differently, and had developed in an environment in which it was more difficult to guarantee that the criminal could not repeat his crime.
….
10. The new formulation of number 2267 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church desires to give energy to a movement towards a decisive commitment to favor a mentality that recognizes the dignity of every human life and, in respectful dialogue with civil authorities, to encourage the creation of conditions that allow for the elimination of the death penalty where it is still in effect.
Much of the reaction on Twitter and elsewhere seems to be over whether the Pope is “changing” Catholic teaching, breaking with a long tradition in favor of the permissibility of the death penalty, and opening the door to all manner of mischief under the guise of doctrinal development. I think a better way of framing the question and to have a reasonable debate in light of the Church’s moral tradition is to note that the permissibility of the death penalty was understood (by Aquinas, for example) as an *exception* to an otherwise absolute norm against intentional killing, based on an understanding of the dignity of all human life. Summa Theologiae, II-II.64.7 (“As it is unlawful to take a man's life, except for the public authority acting for the common good…it is not lawful for a man to intend killing a man in self-defense, except for such as have public authority, who while intending to kill a man in self-defense, refer this to the public good.”).
And so the question becomes whether Aquinas (or anyone else in the Catholic moral tradition right up to today) can carry off a justification for such an exception—are there ends (pertaining to the common good, public order, and safety) that justify the use of what would otherwise be a forbidden means (intentional killing)? On that question, the prudential weight of doctrinal authority (over the past several pontificates) has swung from in favor (as in Aquinas) to against such justifications, and that is (merely?) what the CDF’s letter and the revision to the Catechism reflects. In at least this respect, then, the revision to the Catechism reflects and deepens the moral principle that one may not do evil that good may come. See John Finnis, Aquinas: Moral, Political, and Legal Theory at p. 282 (“Aquinas therefore fails to reply convincingly to the argument that capital punishment, since it involves the intent to kill as a means, is “doing evil that good may come,” i.e. the pursuit of a good end (the restoration of the order of justice) by inherently immoral means.”).
A final brief note: it is a separate (but timely!) question how, say, a federal judge who is Catholic and accepts that the Catechism is a “sure and authentic reference” (John Paul II, Fidei Depositum IV) regarding Catholic doctrine should understand his or her responsibilities in death penalty cases. A reasonable answer to that question, it seems to me, is that the Constitution (absent an implausible reading of the Eighth Amendment to prohibit capital punishment) leaves the resolution of the death penalty’s permissibility to the political branches and that the judicial role requires an impartial application of what the positive law provides as to criminal punishment.
