PHILADELPHIA Judge bars university's enforcement of 'acts of intolerance' prohibition

The university's code was sparked, in part, by anti-bin Laden posters.
PHILADELPHIA (AP) -- A federal judge ruled that Shippensburg University cannot enforce parts of what he said was a well-intentioned code of conduct that could curtail students' First Amendment rights.
U.S. District Judge John E. Jones III granted a preliminary injunction barring enforcement of provisions that prohibited "acts of intolerance" including racist, sexist and homophobic speech.
"Regrettably this sword has two edges," Jones wrote.
While no one has been punished yet, "these provisions could certainly be used to truncate debate and free expression by students," Jones wrote in a 32-page opinion.
One student who sued to challenge the code said it was used to ban anti-Osama bin Laden posters after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
The judge said the code sought "to achieve a utopian community" where "students are directed to respect the rights of other students in a world where reasoned, rational debate is the norm."
"I'm very excited about it," Ellen Wray, a plaintiff in the lawsuit, said Friday. "It means the school has to tolerate all types of free speech, all types of opinion."
Wray is a political science graduate of Shippensburg, a 6,200-student state-owned university 35 miles southwest of Harrisburg.
Shippensburg hadn't decided whether to appeal Jones' decision to the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, said Jeffrey Cooper, an attorney for the State System of Higher Education who represented the university.
Sept. 11 cause
Jones barred enforcement of student code provisions banning "acts of intolerance ... for ethnic, racial, gender, sexual orientation, physical, lifestyle, religious, age and/or political characteristics," and acts "that demonstrate malicious intentions" or cause "subordination, intimidating and/or harassment of a person or group."
The code, Jones wrote, "prohibits a considerable amount of speech."
Plaintiff Walter A. Bair, a resident adviser in the university's dormitory system, said the code was invoked when resident assistants were told students must take down posters or messages posted on many doors after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Resident assistants were told posters showing pictures of bin Laden in cross hairs were offensive to other students and violated the code, Bair said in an affidavit. Students took them down, but he said more than one told him "they were only complying with the university's order because of the fear of punishment under the code of conduct."
Jones ruled that the university failed to show that the restrictions were needed to prevent disruption of the school's work or of students' rights.
"What the judge has done is basically declare once again, if it needed to be said, that students are not second class citizens when it comes to rights," said David French, an attorney for the plaintiffs. "A school cannot dictate a point of view to its students."