Michael Capel

Pro-affirmative action editors of the Good 5-Cent Cigar, the student newspaper at the University of Rhode Island (URI), were shocked this month when a militant minority student organization demanded that the paper be shut down. Several members of the student government—which controls the paper’s funding—seemed on the verge of complying. At issue was a cartoon that the students considered "racist."

The students, clad all in black and calling themselves Brothers United for Action (BUA), gathered in the Malcolm X room of the minority student center. There, they read a list of demands and proceeded to march to the Cigar’s offices, bundles of the offending issue in hand. After editors of the paper refused to apologize to the students, they marched to the office of University President Robert Carothers and repeated their demand that the paper be censored.

The cartoon that provoked the students’ ire depicts a University of Texas law school professor telling a black student at the door, "If you’re the janitor, please wait until after class to empty the trash. If you’re one of our minority students, welcome!" The creator of the cartoon, San Antonio Express News cartoonist John Branch, sketched the piece a year ago in response to what he characterizes as bigotry in the context of a backlash against racial preferences. Elizabeth Barker, the Cigar’s managing editor, told the Providence Journal that the paper’s editors intended to impart the same message by printing the cartoon: "We ran this cartoon without malice and in fact intended to convey an antiracist message. We assumed that the cartoon’s pro-affirmative action message would be apparent."

Regardless, BUA members and several student senators called for swift action against the paper. The students—and, in fact, President Carothers—adopted rhetoric familiar for politically correct would-be censors. Student senator Ebony Brown said, "It’s time for a new newspaper. Nobody’s saying, take away freedom of speech or press. They’re just saying, take away that newspaper."

In their book The Shadow University, Alan Kors and Harvey Silverglate note that student governments and administrators virtually always couch their attempts to thwart student speech by saying words to the effect of, "we support free speech, but. . ." President Carothers, quoted in the Brown Daily Herald, tried to invoke such a mythical dichotomy: "we need to protect the First Amendment at the University of Rhode Island. What I will not protect is irresponsible or hateful behavior."

Carothers refused further comment.

BUA member Barry O’Connor, Jr. told senate members that the group "fully supports First Amendment rights. As heirs of slavery and genocide, nobody prizes freedom more than we do," yet the paper should be censored.

Student senator Anna Zielinski told the Journal, "Too many people have been hurt. Are we going to hide behind this freedom-of-speech crap?"

On December 4, hours after the BUA protest, student senate finance Chairman Dennis Guay temporarily froze the Cigar’s budget, jeopardizing the paper’s ability to print. Guay referred to outstanding loans owed by the Cigar and claimed to Campus Report that those financial concerns, not content, was the reason he froze the budget.

At this point, the Rhode Island Press Association and the state chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) intervened, warning the student senate that censoring the paper—URI is a public university—would violate the First Amendment. Senate President Daryl Finizio agreed, warning that to revoke the paper’s funding would be unconstitutional.

Zielinksi replied, "Legally it may be right to follow the Constitution, but morally and ethically, I don’t think it may be. There has to be some kind of repercussion because it was an act of irresponsibility and insensitivity." Senator Emily Roberts added, "We can’t just leave things as they are. I feel the Cigar made [a] really, really, bad mistake."

BUA member Mark Hardge agreed. "Journalistic responsibility is the issue here," he insisted. "Empathy and sensitivity are the issues here."

When the full senate convened on December 9, it arranged a repayment plan and formally asked the paper to apologize for the cartoon, then unfroze the paper’s budget.

It is unclear what the future holds for the Cigar. The paper’s editors suggested that the aggrieved students submit columns to the paper; others suggested that the students start a paper of their own.

Nevertheless, the students vowed to shut the paper down. Outraged BUA members marched single-file out of the senate meeting following the restoration of the budget. They said that they would try to "impeach" the editors via the university committee that oversees student organizations and pursue other steps to silence the paper.

Hardge told the Herald, "The Good 5-Cent Cigar has lost its ethical and moral mandate. The Good 5-Cent Cigar is dead." Gerald Williams, a graduate student adviser to BUA, remarked after the December 9 senate meeting, "Now is the time to consider the demise of the Good 5-Cent Cigar."