John Swingle

On November 12, 2002, Steve Hinkle, an undergraduate at California Polytechnic State University, entered a student lounge in the school’s Multicultural Center and attempted to post a flier promoting a speech by Mason Weaver, a prominent conservative author. Weaver’s speech was an approved campus event sponsored by the student government and the Cal Poly College Republicans, of which Hinkle is a member. The flier displayed solely a picture of Weaver (who is black) and the speech’s title “It’s OK to Leave the Plantation” taken from a book by the same name in which Weaver argues that dependence on government puts many blacks in a situation comparable to slavery.

Several black students who had been eating pizza and talking in the lounge when Hinkle entered accosted him and angrily insisted that he not post his “offensive” flier. They falsely claimed that he was in violation of the school’s posting policy, and threatened to call the police if he didn’t leave. When Hinkle left - without posting the flier - to check the relevant policy (which confirmed that he had indeed been in compliance), one student nevertheless called the police to complain about “a suspicious white male passing out literature of an offensive racial nature” as documented by the official police report.

Not surprisingly, the incident prompted the university to take disciplinary action. Strangely, though, it wasn’t being taken against the self-appointed student censors for infringing on Hinkle’s right to free speech and making a frivolous police call, but against Hinkle himself. In a letter dated January 29, more than two months after the flier incident, Judicial Affairs Director Ardith Tregenza informed Steve Hinkle that the university was charging him with “disruption” of a “campus event.” It seems the offended students had been holding a Bible study session in the lounge, and Hinkle’s entrance to post a flier on a public bulletin board had, well, “disrupted” them.

If you think this charge sounds “trumped up,” you’re not alone. That’s exactly how Hinkle’s faculty advisor Laura Freberg described it in an interview with UPI. “The university knows it could not take action against Steve because of the nature of the flier,” Freberg said. “The students originally reported to the police that they were offended by the flier. It was clearly a free-speech, First Amendment kind of issue, and the university knows it can’t do anything with that.”

At Hinkle’s February 19 judicial hearing, which Freberg attended, comments made by Cornel Morton, the Vice President of Student Affairs, seem to confirm Freberg’s allegations that it was indeed the content of Hinkle’s fliers which led to the university’s charges. Hinkle told UPI that during the hearing Morton noted Hinkle’s blond hair and blue eyes and lectured him for failing to recognize that as white male and member of the College Republicans his attempt to post the flier could represent “a collision of experience” to minority students.

Hinkle was found guilty of the disruption charge and ordered to write a letter of apology to the offended students. His letter would be subject to approval by the Office of Judicial Affairs, and Hinkle was informed that there was “guarantee regarding the confidentiality of the letter sent.”

When Hinkle refused to write the apology, he was threatened by W. David Conn, the Vice Provost for Academic Programs, with more severe punishment, including possible expulsion. Hinkle contacted the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), a watchdog group that often deals with free speech issues on college campuses. Greg Lukianoff, FIRE’s Director of Legal and Public Advocacy sent a letter to Cal Poly’s President Warren J. Baker urging the university to overturn the bogus disruption charge and apologize to Hinkle.

Lukianoff’s letter pointed out that the Bible study was an unscheduled event conducted by an unrecognized campus group in a public area, that by all accounts the meeting had not begun when Hinkle entered to post a flier for what was an approved campus event sponsored by a recognized campus group, that the students acknowledge that it was they who accosted Hinkle suggesting that they “they were the cause of their own disruption”, and a number of other factors that made the university’s “case” against Hinkle less than compelling.

Carlos Cordova, Cal Poly’s Legal Counsel, authored the university’s official response. In his reply, which FIRE notes does not “substantively address any of [their] concerns,” Cordova asserts that the disruption charge is a “content neutral” rule and that Hinkle’s right to free speech was not infringed. He also alleges that “many of [FIRE’s] factual assertions concerning the circumstances related to the meeting Mr. Hinkle disrupted are incorrect.” Unfortunately, his letter fails to reveal to which factual assertions he is referring, or to offer a competing account of the evening’s events. And while the rule in question may indeed be “content neutral,” it was most certainly not applied in such a fashion.

Cal Poly’s treatment of Steve Hinkle is outrageous even by the often loopy standards of academia. But if the university’s behavior has been reprehensible, Hinkle’s has been equally commendable. His decision to stand firmly on principle and refusal to be intimidated by the administration are impressive. In an interview with the Washington Times, Lukianoff revealed that while there are currently no plans to take legal action against Cal Poly, it is a possibility should the university fail to correct the situation.