THE PEOPLE V. HARVARD LAW: How America's Oldest Law School Turned Its Back on Free Speech

Polemicists in America's political wars often pick an institution (e.g. the media) and attack it for being dominated by an unwholesome ideology. Thomas, a warrior on the right, targets Harvard Law School, which he sees as in thrall to the mindless radicalism of the left and in particular to the ideology called critical legal studies. Adherents of this theory, according to Thomas, believe in tearing down the country's existing legal system and educating law students to become agents of leftist social change. The legal radicalism at Harvard was revealed most clearly, says Thomas, in 2002, through an incident in which two students and two professors made public statements regarded by black students as offensive. Protests and condemnations followed, leading to support for the adoption of a speech code at the law school. The code, as envisioned by its proponents, would have punished anyone who used words deemed offensive by members of selected minorities, such as African-Americans, women, the disabled or gays. Such a code subverts freedom of speech, says Thomas. (And he suggests that conservatives are the actual threatened minority at Harvard Law.) However, no speech code was enacted, as pressure for it evaporated under criticism from traditional liberals and because of widespread student indifference. The outcome undermines the book's thesis, but that scarcely deters the author from energetic pursuit of his attack. (Mar.)