Does the US Government Have the Right to Condition Funding to Universities?

by Alan M. Dershowitz  •  April 1, 2025 at 5:00 am

• Many left-wing university faculty members... are making the absolutist claim that it is always a denial of academic freedom for governments to pressure universities with a cut-off of funding.

• It doesn't take a lot of imagination to hypothesize the following variation on the current situation: it's the 1950s and 1960s in the Deep South; a formerly segregated university is allowing masked KKK racists to harass Black students, blocking some from attending classes; buildings are occupied by Klansmen demanding a return to segregation; the university is doing nothing to protect the Black students, citing academic freedom and freedom of speech.

• None of these purported factual distinctions justifies the allegedly principled opposition to the Trump administration's employment of pressure to stop anti-Jewish discrimination at Columbia from those who would praise the employment of similar pressure to prevent discrimination against Blacks, gays or other groups favored by intersectionality. It is double standard bigotry against Jews, plain and simple.

• The pressure on Columbia may produce positive results — if it keeps its promises — including more academic freedom and free speech for students who were victimized by Columbia's inaction until it was pressured to act by the threat of defunding. That would be a good thing, just as federal pressure on some southern universities that reduced discrimination against Blacks in the 1950s and 1960s was a good thing.

In the 1950s and 1960s, liberals and civil rights advocates applauded the threats of the federal government against universities, to force them to protect black students. But now that similar threats and actions have been taken to protect Jewish students from masked Hamas supporters at Columbia University, many liberals and civil rights advocates are complaining, alleging interference with academic freedom. Pictured: Alabama Governor George Wallace (L) faces General Henry Graham at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, on June 12, 1963, where he attempted to block the enrollment of two black students, Vivian Malone and James Hood, in defiance of a federal court order. Wallace appointed himself university registrar and blocked the doorway to prevent the black students from registering. President John F. Kennedy federalized the Alabama National Guard and sent 100 guardsman to escort the students into the university, commanded by Graham, who ordered Wallace to "step aside." (Photo by OFF/AFP via Getty Images)

Many left-wing university faculty members (a redundancy if there ever was one) are rebelling against the Trump administration's threat to cut federal funding to universities that tolerate antisemitic actions against their Jewish students. They condemned the acting president of Columbia for accepting some of the administration's conditions for restoring the $400 million that it threatened to cut, and she was forced to resign.

The faculty members are making the absolutist claim that it is always a denial of academic freedom for governments to pressure universities with a cut-off of funding. In making this broad claim, they ignore the lessons of history and the single standard of morality.

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