The eyes of the Fifth Circuit are upon you

The University of Texas’s rules about campus speech did not fare well in Speech First, Inc. v. Fenves, in which the Fifth Circuit found that a preliminary-injunction action could proceed. The Court found that the case was not moot and stated a strong claim on the merits: “Of course, not every utterance is worth protecting under the First Amendment. In our current national condition, however, in which ‘institutional leaders, in a spirit of panicked damage control, are delivering hasty and disproportionate punishment instead of considered reforms,’ courts must be especially vigilant against assaults on speech in the Constitution’s care. Otherwise, the people may not be free to generate, debate, and discuss both general and specific ideas, hopes, and experiences,’ to ‘transmit their resulting views and conclusions to their elected representatives,’ ‘to influence the public policy enacted by elected representatives,’ and thereby to realize the political and human common good.”  No. 19-50529 (revised Oct. 30, 2020) (footnotes omitted).