The state of Florida is free to forbid teachers and professors from criticizing the governor in the classroom, an attorney argued on behalf of the state during an appellate court hearing over the Stop WOKE Act — adding that those professors are free to seek work elsewhere if they don’t like a legislature-controlled curriculum.
A panel of three federal appeals court judges appeared divided at a hearing Friday on the constitutionality of a Florida law signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis that would limit what state university professors say to students in the classroom.
Florida’s “Stop Woke” law threatens college teachers and professors with real consequences that include the loss of tenure for offering personal viewpoints or certain teachings on race and gender in class. Professors and students sued to stop the law, leading Chief U.S. District Judge Mark Walker to grant a preliminary injunction months after the law took effect in 2022, calling the Act “positively dystopian” in the 2022 ruling blocking state officials from enforcing it in the state’s colleges and universities.
Referred to by one of the plaintiffs’ attorneys on Friday as a “blacklist of ideas,” the concepts include ideas suggesting that members of one race, color, sex, or national origin are morally superior to others, that a person is “inherently racist, sexist or oppressive” by virtue of his race or sex or that people should feel guilty about the actions of their ancestors.
Charles Cooper (of Cooper & Kirk), representing the state during the appeal, said “In the classroom, the teachers and professor’s speech is the government’s speech, and the government can restrict teachers and professors on a content-wide basis and restrict them from offering viewpoints that are contrary to … ,” which is when one of the judges interrupted him.
The panel asked Cooper whether the state was OK with students in Florida learning entirely different sets of facts than in states with different politics.
“That’s the genius of federalism, your honor,” Cooper said. “These are institutions and the states themselves get to make decisions on the content of the courses taught in their schools, and that includes viewpoints, your honor.”
If professors cannot conform to the state’s commands, Cooper said, they can seek states “friendlier to their viewpoints.”
At least one judge on the panel did not appear swayed. U.S. Circuit Judge Charles Wilson, a Bill Clinton appointee, said ruling in favor of the state would force the appeals court to split with other circuit courts which have recognized that teachers and professors retain First Amendment protections when engaged in teaching and scholarship.
“The classroom is the marketplace of ideas,” Leah Watson, a senior staff attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union’s racial justice program, said. “If classroom instruction were government speech, the government would be expressing contradictory views.”
Plaintiff LeRoy Pernell, a professor at the Florida A&M University College of Law, argued in a written statement that the law puts at stake the ability of society “to learn, discuss, and develop tools for combatting the complex issue of racism in our country without being gagged by those who would dictate that only state-approved thought may be promoted.”
Greg Greubel of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression stated, “You can’t censor your way to freedom. Students expecting free debate.”
Friday’s hearing is a pivotal test for one of DeSantis’ banner policies, the so-called Stop Woke law that the state has been unable to enforce for more than two years.
“The constitutional question in this case thus boils down to this: who decides what is and is not, to be taught in Florida’s classrooms — individual professors or their employer, the State, in prescribing by law the content requirements and standards that govern public universities in setting their course curricula?” attorneys for the state wrote.
The panel did not indicate when they will issue a ruling in the case.