Growing numbers of college students favor regulating speech that is mean-spirited yet still constitutionally protected, a law school dean said in a presentation at Knox College for Constitution Day.

Constitution Day is celebrated annually and commemorates the formation and signing of the U.S. Constitution on September 17, 1787.

Vikram David Amar, dean of the University of Illinois College of Law, spoke on campus September 18, delivering a lecture titled “Today’s Dominant Constitutional Flashpoints: Free Speech and Federalism.” Part of Amar’s presentation focused on what is and isn’t permitted under the First Amendment.

The viewpoints of today’s students about speech differ from the viewpoints of students 25 or even 10 years ago, he said. Amar cited a Gallup survey that found about 70 percent of today’s students think “campuses should restrict language that is potentially offensive to certain groups.”

But the government, including public universities, generally cannot impose restrictions “based on the content or viewpoint of someone’s speech,” he said. That means, for instance, a public university generally cannot stop invited speakers from appearing on campus because of their provocative and upsetting remarks—unless they make threatening or harassing remarks targeted toward individuals.

He noted that his remarks about restricting free speech weren’t making a distinction between public universities, such as the University of Illinois, and private colleges, such as Knox, because private institutions generally “commit to the same free speech norms that public universities are obligated by the law to comply with.”

“It’s part of an ethos of modern higher education,” he said.

Broad free-speech rights and unpopular speakers have played a key role in U.S. history, Amar said. Without them, he added: “You couldn’t have had the civil rights movement, you couldn’t have had the abolitionist movement, you couldn’t have the women’s rights movement.”

Knox student Aqib Hussnain '21 said he enjoyed the presentation, which interested him because of the subject matter and because he wants to attend law school.

“I learned a lot about how you can’t have it both ways—to condemn free speech in some matters of our lives and try to fight for it in other matters of our lives,” Hussnain said.