As a public university, SUNY Binghamton is required to uphold the First Amendment rights of students--which it acknowledges: "The tradition at Binghamton, a public university, is that the full exercise of First Amendment rights is encouraged and protected," states the Student Handbook. But SUNY administrators are not content to stop there. They go on to inform students that the First Amendment is actually a speech code, one that uniquely suits the university's specific ends: "The expectation is that these rights are practiced with respect and responsibility, and with the recognition that abusing the rights of any one person or group ultimately endangers the rights of all. Obscene speech or conduct--that which appeals to prurient interests, is patently offensive, and lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value--is not protected by the First Amendment." One wonders what the courts would have to say of this patently self-serving misrepresentation of students' rights. Speech codes usually at least have the virtue of being obviously recognizable as speech codes. In this instance, a public university has presented its speech code in the worst possible faith, as a reasonable explanation of the First Amendment.

The way this is written, speech is defined as obscene only if it appeals to purient interests AND is patently offensive AND lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value. I doubt if this is what the administration intended to say--perhaps they should consider taking remedial English courses at their own universities.

Also: university systems certainly have General Counsels. I've often wondered if administrators bother to review statements like this with them before issuance. Any competent lawyer should have been able to point out both the misrepresentation of the First Amendment and the bad phrasing.

Actually, the Supreme Court of the United States agrees with Binghamton here.

Ross v. United Staes (1957): "We hold that obscenity is not within the area of constitutionally protected speech."

Miller v. California (1973): “This much has been categorically settled by the Court, that obscene material is unprotected by the First Amendment.”

So, de jure, the First Amendment might protect obscene speech; but de facto, it does not.

I suspect you have the actual situation inverted, "Jonah Goldberg". The case law allows the suppression of obscenity in the abstract but it is difficult or impossible to craft statutes and regulations that pass muster with the imperial judiciary, bar for ordinances which effect to proscribe the traffic in child pornography.

Our moderatrix has forgotten that the text of the First Amendment reads "Congress shall make no law". The application of provisions in the Bill of Rights to state authorities is an innovation in case law that dates from about 1925, 134 years after the adoption of the Bill of Rights and 57 years after the ratification of the 14th Amendment, which putatively requires such application. The New York constitution has provisions which extend freedom to speak and publish. The last time I checked, the provisions were still qualified to allow the suppression of obscenity (though the courts in New York may have effectively nullified them).

BTW, it is difficult to see how a literalist reading of the 1st Amendment would allow the state to enforce defamation judgments, laws against harrassment or disorderly conduct, or laws against contempt of court or contempt of the legislature.

To be free to speak is to be free to participate in a commonwealth governed by deliberative processes. Viewing nude dancing at the Kitty Kat Lounge or playing recordings of George Carlin routines at high decibal do not citizen deliberation make. Were the law just, the state legislature would be within its rights to delegate to the Board of Regents, Broome County, the City of Binghamton, or the Vestal township the discretion to suppress smut in accordance with community standards.

Maybe the university is trying to leave itself enough wiggle room to prevent the students from making life hell for each other.

"Jonah Goldberg" is right, in that the SUNY defintion is right out of the Supreme Court obscenity cases - the trick is, of course, what "obscene" in practice means.

After all, for lawmakers the country over, trying to come up with a secure and workable legal definition of "obscene" has been almost impossible (short of banning things like child porn or the like). Somehow, though, I wager that SUNY will use the secondary Supreme Court definition of obscenity - "I know it when I see it" - to target unprogressive...er, obscene, speech.

Guess we'll see.

Focusing on the restatement of the law in the last quoted sentence is missing the larger point, which is that the first two sentences contradict each other. To say that one not only protects (which is required) but also actively encourages the "full exercise" of First Amendment rights is incompatabile to the point of being mutually exclusive with the whole idea of expecting such rights to be exercied with the PC claptrap of respect, responsibility, abusing the rights of any individual OR GROUP, etc., etc., etc.

One simply cannot both say that one encourages as much speech as possible and at the same time say don't step on anyone's toes. One cannot claim to be a First Amendment absolutist and simultaneously call for speech to be respectful: political speech is sometimes by its nature disrespectful and offensive. That doesn't make it any less political speech.