Kors, Alan Charles and Silverglate, Harvey A. The Shadow University: The Betrayal of Liberty on America's Campuses. New York: The Free Press, 1998. 415 pages.

Alan Kors, a history professor at the University of Pennsylvania, and Harvey Silverglate, a civil liberties attorney in Boston, compiled this comprehensive account of what's been happening on American campuses over the last 15 years. It seems that the First Amendment is out of favor, and campus administrators have instituted kangaroo courts to enforce speech codes that protect the sensitivities of women, minorities, and gays. This has led to numerous prosecutions of straight white males -- both faculty and students -- for speech or expressive behavior that would have been considered legally protected on campuses just 25 years ago. Even today, as soon as one steps off campus, courts are consistently striking down these repressive speech codes. The problem is that students don't have the resources to pursue their rights off campus, which can take years of effort. This book is peppered with dozens of case histories and incidents on dozens of campuses, which are then juxtaposed with First Amendment case law in the real world (off-campus). What's going on here? The authors trace the problem back to Marcuse's theory of "repressive tolerance," which turned into "progressive intolerance." Not likely; it's rather a case of quotas and multiculturalism gone amuck. The "diversity administrators" on campus are buzzword thugs who know little of Marcuse or the 1960s -- sometimes they seem barely even literate.
ISBN 0-684-85321-3

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