Dan Flynn

University of Dallas administrators suspended a student publication on December 13 that had frequently criticized officials at the Catholic institution. Administrators banned the editors of Justice, a conservative student publication, from publishing or distributing the periodical on campus.

The stated reasons for banning the student newspaper included the publication's policy of accepting off-campus donations and its establishment of a non-profit entity. The university also claimed the publication lacked a faculty advisor, which the paper's editors dispute.

"They want to have complete control over us," Jason Van Dyke, editor of Justice, explained to Campus Report.

Father Charles La Tour, UD's associate dean of students who instituted the ban on Justice, was unavailable for comment.

"The purpose was never to shut the paper down," explained Dean of Students Fred Zucker. "This has nothing to do with content."

The paper, which has come out several times a semester over the past few years, normally featured articles on Catholic issues and questioned the leftward drift of the University administration. Last year, for instance, editor Jason Van Dyke penned an article criticizing the president of the school, Monsignor Milam Joseph, for devoting a homily at a church service to promoting gun control. Other articles discussed speech codes at the University of Dallas and elsewhere, and questioned the school president's efforts to promote race-based preferences.

De Facto Censorship?

Justice's problems began in early December when its editor, Jason Van Dyke, received a call on his cell phone from University of Dallas President Monsignor Milam Joseph. Van Dyke explains that Joseph made vague references to the content of Justice in the call, and informed Van Dyke that he would have to meet with school officials. At the subsequent meeting, Van Dyke was informed that the school would no longer recognize his paper. Van Dyke characterized the school's position at the meeting by stating: "They don't want outside groups influencing campus politics or how the university should be run." Among the outside publications banned at the University of Dallas is Campus Report.

Almost immediately after the meeting, Van Dyke took his fight off campus and began informing outside press agencies and organizations about the school's restrictions on its students' abilities to speak freely.

On its website, www.udjustice.com, the student paper reacted to the school stripping its recognition. "It is our belief that these regulations being applied to Justice amount to 'de facto' censorship of our publication," the joint statement of the paper's staff read. "Because we are being forced to keep all of our money on school grounds, the school is being given complete control over what is essentially our money. What this means is that the minute they don't like what we are saying, they have the capability to cut off our access to our own money."

Tempered Optimism

A month after having his newspaper kicked-off campus, editor Van Dyke now holds some optimism about the prospect of Justice reappearing at UD. "We're in the process of being reinstated," he told Campus Report in early January. Dr. Zucker also is optimistic about the paper's return. "My expectation is that the publication will be back online this spring," Zucker commented.

While Van Dyke is hopeful that the ban on his publication will be lifted, rules devised by administrators make it nearly impossible for any independent publication to survive.

The rules are "overly restrictive," according to Van Dyke, and "make it extremely hard for our newspaper to exist."

An End-Around on Free Speech

Restrictions on the publication abound:

• The rules prohibit Justice from raising money from off-campus organizations at the same time that they bar the publication from raising money on-campus as well. Donations from private citizens, foundation grants, bequests, subscriptions, and allocations from student government are all off-limits to the publication. Advertising and alumni support are the only two authorized methods of raising money to fund printing costs. Even these limited methods of generating operating costs carry restrictions. The school requires that information on the sources of funding from advertising and alumni donations be made available to the Office of Student Life.
• Prior to going to press, Justice is required by the University of Dallas to have its articles, cartoons, and other items reviewed by a UD faculty member. "The administration said that we had to have a faculty member review all content before we went to press," Van Dyke points out. Van Dyke concedes that faculty review has never resulted in any substantive changes to any issue of the paper thus far, however, the idea of outsiders having a say in a student publication strikes him as intrusive.
• Despite the fact that Justice's non-profit fundraising entity is entirely comprised of UD students, the school classifies it as an outside non-student organization and prohibits it from operating on campus. In contradistinction to this, the University claims that since the non-profit group and the UD Conservative Caucus (a UD student group) are made up of the same people, this constituted an independent student organization operating within the university structure, which they say is a violation of school policy. The contradictory position of classifying the non-profit organization as an outside group when it suits the school's purposes for blocking the group's fundraising capabilities, and then classifying it as a student group in order to revoke the student group's charter, has troubled writers for Justice. Additionally, when members of the student group pointed out that there was no written rule barring student organizations to apply for federal non-profit status, the school countered that as a private institution they had the right to devise their own rules at any point.

Administrators contend that Justice played both sides of the fence with regard to its status as a student/non-student organization. But they admit that they prohibit numerous fundraising tactics by registered student organizations. Dean of Students Zucker offered, "We can't have competing 501(c)3's raising money under the auspices of the University of Dallas.... because we can't control that."

Independent Thought or Conformity?

Noting that printing costs alone run $350 per issue, Van Dyke admitted, "It's going to be a lot harder to fund our newspaper." He added: "I've got a highly motivated staff and I'm confident we can do it."

Ironically, Van Dyke transferred from Michigan State to the University of Dallas in part to escape political correctness on the Lansing, Michigan campus. While at Michigan State, Van Dyke was fired from the student newspaper after writing a column criticizing the homosexual movement on campus. At the University of Dallas, which boasts the motto "The Catholic University for Independent Thinkers," Van Dyke thought he would find a more tolerant atmosphere.