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\title{Don't tinker with the First Amendment}

	Supporters of freedom of speech should oppose any
tinkering with the First Amendment at Stanford.  {\bf Thus
Stanford should make no rule for punishing speech that would not
be upheld by the Supreme Court if it were a law of Palo Alto,
California or the U.S.}  It doesn't matter whether the
punishments are under the semi-judicial Fundamental Standard or
purely administrative.  Therefore, the proposed SCLC statement
should be scrapped completely, and the Schwartz-Brest statement
should be re-affirmed.  Here's why.

	1. In the name of diversity and sensitivity and fighting
racism, there is a campaign against freedom of speech in the
American university community.  It is worse at some other
universities, e.g.  the University of Michigan, than at Stanford.
It will get worse before it gets better, and allowing any bending
of the First Amendment will lead to worse restrictions on freedom
of speech than have hitherto been seen at Stanford.

	2. The phrase ``community standards'' is an invitation to
political pressure to suppress anything opposed by the powers that
happen to be at the moment.  Suppose, for example, that Bob Jones
University had been allowed to impose its community standards
that made inter-racial dating an offense against community
morality.

	3. There is an enormous amount of First Amendment case
law that can be used to make decisions in tough cases and which
individuals can use to determine what speech or writing is
punishable.  Stanford doesn't have such case law and doesn't
have the resources to create it.  Since people will not have
enough examples of what is not punishable, authorities, e.g.
deans and dorm residents, will be able to intimidate people
subject to their authority.
\smallskip\centerline{Copyright \copyright\ \number\year\ by John McCarthy}
\smallskip\noindent{This draft of freedo[w89,jmc] TEXed on \jmcdate\ at \theTime}
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