Reaffirming academic freedom

The Student Bill of Rights (SBOR) is a nonpartisan initiative that seeks to reaffirm within the University community the longstanding ideas of academic freedom and intellectual diversity. We wish to promote an environment in which both professors and students can engage in a wide spectrum of ideas and have the freedom to form their own opinions.

We are responding to the often subconscious tendency that promotes a person's beliefs by preventing the expression of another person's beliefs. The March 30 article in The Daily Princetonian, "Vandals remove Pride Posters," is a stark example of attempts to silence the free expression of political ideas and to prevent fair debate between different viewpoints. The SBOR specifically addresses the destruction of campus literature and condemns all such threats to intellectual diversity.

The College Republicans have reached out to groups of all different political thought because we are trying to include all beliefs in this fair fight on the plain of reason. We are trying to promote debate by elevating it above the level where what matters is the affiliation of who is speaking to where what matters is the merit of the ideas being expressed. An audience should not instantly close its ears just because the speaker subscribes to a different set of beliefs.

Princeton is one of this nation's finest institutions of higher education, and its proud tradition of academic excellence has prevented the University from drifting as far from the necessary level of academic freedom as some of the country's other universities have. As such, correcting the problems that do exist does not require the same drastic measures that have been used by Students for Academic Freedom in other cases, and our SBOR reflects this difference. We have no interest in partisan witch-hunts, censoring of professors or ad hominem attacks. SBOR is a statement of principles that can increase consciousness of the importance of intellectual diversity and academic freedom. All students who value such ideals should vote "Yes" on the USG referendum. Wyatt Yankus is the treasurer of the College Republicans. He is a freshman from Bronxville, N.Y. and can be reached at tyankus@princeton.edu.