Liberté, égalité, fraternité. The conceptions of freedom, equality and fraternity were originally linked by the Most Reverend François Fénelon, Archbishop of Cambrai, at the end of the 17th century. Fénelon, who penned The Adventures of Telemachus while still serving under Louis XIV, could not have predicted the impact that this association would have.
Parisians rallied round the slogan “Liberté, égalité, fraternité, ou la mort!” (Freedom, equality, brotherhood or death) at the outset of the French Revolution and even painted the phrase on their houses. This motto embodied the struggle of a people battling against oppression and tyranny.
This motto would have to be rewritten today; it is far too discriminatory. You see, brotherhood, once a central tenet behind a free and liberal society, has evidently transformed into a source of oppression.
So says the College of Staten Island and the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.
Last Thursday, the Second Circuit rejected Alpha Epsilon Pi’s petition for official recognition. Last week’s ruling overturned a district court’s decision that the university was infringing upon the fraternity’s right to free and intimate association.
The College of Staten Island, a City University of New York school, appealed the district court’s decision on the grounds that recognizing the fraternity would violate the school’s anti-discrimination policy since fraternities discriminate against women.
The federal appeals justices ignored a federal law, which exempts fraternities and sororities from gender discrimination legislation. According to the court, anti-discrimination policies serve the interest of the state, and should be upheld. AEPi, an international Jewish fraternity, has vowed to appeal the decision.
While Greek life enjoys considerable support from the community and administration at Cornell, this ruling has the potential to extend university control over student groups. What makes this even more disturbing is that Ithaca falls within the Second Circuit’s jurisdiction.
The appeals court decision effectively states that CUNY Staten Island, acting under the guise of “fighting discrimination,” can determine which campus groups are allowed to freely assemble.
The appeals court ruling departed from conventional jurisprudence, which has commonly seen the courts rule in favor of student groups. The courts have refuted the notion that anti-discrimination policies, instituted by public universities, can interfere with the Constitutional protection of the first amendment. This departure, however, is not an isolated incident.
When University of California, Hastings College of Law refused to recognize its campus’ chapter of the Christian Legal Society in 2004, CLS brought suit against the university for violating its religious freedom. The university administration took issue with the group’s exclusion of those who engage in or support “unrepentant homosexual conduct;” they also saw the group’s exclusion of non-believers as discriminatory.
The federal judge ruled in Christian Legal Society Chapter of University of California v. Kane that Hastings could deny recognition to the CLS based on the school’s anti-discrimination policy. Furthermore, the university was within its right to mandate that CLS allow homosexuals and non-believers into its ranks. Essentially, Hastings was within its right to transform the identity and principles of any campus group. That is not fighting discrimination; that is coerced conformity.
Anti-discrimination legislation has noble roots. Any reasonable person would agree that individuals should not be excluded based on the color of their skin. Lately, however, anti-discrimination policies have taken a disturbing and most ironic turn. In the quest to achieve perfect “equality,” universities have begun to embrace discrimination.
If a campus group is founded on uniting conservative Christians, the organization is branded intolerant and its speech is stifled by the university. In order to contribute to campus dialogue, the group is forced to abandon its distinctive qualities (e.g. a conservative Christian voice in a secular, liberal institution) and embrace “anti-discrimination” policies, as was the case at Hastings.
Even at Cornell, there has been a movement to remove the Reserve Officer Training Corp. Critics say the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy is at odds with our “Open Doors” program. Cornell’s law school even expressed support for a constitutional challenge to the Solomon Amendment, which mandates that universities receiving federal funding allow military recruiters on campus. Campus liberals and anti-discrimination zealots would rather ban these organizations than afford them the opportunity to debate the merits of their “discriminatory” practices.
When anti-discrimination policies are taken too far, intolerance and coerced conformity become an inevitable result. Fraternities could be banned. Political ideologies could be outlawed on either side of the aisle. Who knows, the Hangovers could be disbanded for discriminating against mezzo-sopranos.
Stifling one group in an effort to eradicate “discrimination” does not bring about the equality that Fénelon envisioned; it merely chips away at freedom.
Bill McMorris is a senior in the College of Arts and Sciences. He can be contacted at bmcmorris@cornellsun.com [1]. John Manetta Once Told Me appears alternate Wednesdays.
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[1] mailto:bmcmorris@cornellsun.com