ACLU of Indiana files new ‘intellectual diversity’ lawsuits against IU, Purdue
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After a previous lawsuit was dismissed last month, two new challenges were filed Friday against Indiana’s recently enacted university “intellectual diversity” requirements.
Like before, the professor-led lawsuits — filed separately against Indiana and Purdue universities — allege the state policies are unconstitutionally vague and infringe upon faculty members’ free speech and academic freedom, violating the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana lodged the complaints on behalf of the professors. The group said it will likely move to consolidate the two cases, but that will ultimately be up to the court to decide.
“As we stated in our initial lawsuit in May, this law puts professors in an impossible situation. One of our plaintiffs has already been the subject of multiple student complaints under the new university policy, all of which were ultimately dismissed,” Stevie Pactor, a staff attorney for the ACLU of Indiana, said in a statement. “Professors should never be put in the position of choosing between their careers and their academic freedom.”
Federal Judge Sarah Evans Barker, of the U.S. District Court in Indiana’s Southern District, declined to issue a preliminary injunction blocking enforcement of the new law in August, citing jurisdictional issues. She additionally said in her ruling that the professors’ allegations were “premature” because their universities haven’t finalized policies implementing the new law.
Now enacted, the new policies are specifically being challenged by the professors.
Legislators approved the law, Senate Enrolled Act 202, in March. It deals with public institutions for higher education and their boards of trustees: altering diversity-oriented positions and policies for tenure, contract renewals, performance reviews and more. The law also establishes new reporting and survey requirements based on “free inquiry, free expression, and intellectual diversity.”
The bill’s supporters said conservative faculty members and students are increasingly ostracized at progressively liberal college and university settings — or at least perceive such shunning. Faculty and students, who overwhelmingly opposed the law, said it would micromanage their institutions and have a “chilling effect” on free expression.
In both lawsuits, IU and Purdue professors maintain the law’s “vague” and sweeping mandates make it “impossible” for the professors to discern what they’re required to do — or refrain from doing — to avoid being deemed to have failed to “foster” these “cultures” under the universities’ policies and the new act.
They argue, too, that their academic freedom to manage the content and pedagogies of their courses is at the core of their role as professors — a freedom they say the new mandates directly “infringe.”
The Indiana Capital Chronicle is an independent, not-for-profit news organization that covers state government, policy and elections.