Judge Sam Cummings does it again.

For those that do not know who Judge Sam Cummings is, click here, and to give credit where it is due, No-Neck sent this in:

Victory for Free Speech at Texas Tech
Federal Judge Strikes Down Speech Code

LUBBOCK, Texas, October 5, 2004

"In the third victory in the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education's (FIRE's) ongoing legal campaign for free speech on America's public campuses, a federal judge struck down Texas Tech University's speech code. The judge also ordered large areas of the university to be opened to free expression and prohibited the university from enforcing several other severe limitations on speech. The case against Texas Tech was coordinated by FIRE and filed by the Liberty Legal Institute and the Alliance Defense Fund against Texas Tech President Donald R. Haragan as part of FIRE's ongoing Speech Codes Litigation Project.

"FIRE is turning the tide in the battle for free speech on campus," remarked David French, president of FIRE. "As one court after another strikes down public college and university speech codes in response to FIRE's Speech Codes Litigation Project, college and university administrators are rapidly becoming aware that neither the public nor the courts will support unconstitutional restrictions of basic freedoms on campus."

U.S. District Judge Sam R. Cummings of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas ruled on September 30, 2004, that many of Texas Tech's policies were unconstitutional. Along with striking down a speech code that banned, among other things, "insults," "ridicule," and "personal attacks," Judge Cummings determined that a university policy requiring students to get prior permission before engaging in even casual free expression was not sufficiently "narrowly tailored" to be enforced against students at this public university. Judge Cummings stated that "the Prior Permission section?sweeps too broadly in imposing a burden on a substantial amount of expression that does not interfere with any significant interests of the University." The judge found a policy limiting the distribution of pamphlets unconstitutional for the same reason. Read the opinion in Roberts v. Haragan here. [1.2 MB PDF]"

Hmm, and to think I had a full letter grade lowered in one of my history courses in college, in part, because of this type of crap, it is good to see it changing.

Of course, that socialist-bastard professor thought the epitome of civilization was 16th and 17th century France...

--WP