On institutional neutrality

Amid failures of universities to speak as one voice against the attacks on academic and of law schools to speak as one voice against attacks on law firms and the legal profession, critics complain about institutional neutrality and the Chicago Principles--the supposed view that institutions should not take corporate positions on matters of public concern.

As I wrote a few days after the election, the Chicago Principles do not require institutional silence. The Kalven Report said:

[f]rom time to time instances will arise in which the society, or segments of it, threaten the very mission of the university and its values of free inquiry. In such a crisis, it becomes the obligation of the university as an institution to oppose such measures and actively to defend its interests and its values.

The Administration threatens the university mission by cutting funding and seizing control over hiring and curriculum; Kalven would say a university can (must) defend its interests and values. That universities and law schools have failed to do so reflects not institutional neutrality but cowardice.