Lafayette Symposium Speaker: Keith Whittington, “Why We Should Value Campus Free Speech”

Keith E. Whittington is William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Politics in the Department of Politics at Princeton University and author of Speak Freely: Why Universities Must Defend Free Speech, in which he argues that universities must protect and encourage free speech because vigorous free speech is the lifeblood of the university. Without free speech, he writes, a university cannot fulfill its most basic, fundamental, and essential purposes, including fostering freedom of thought, ideological diversity, and tolerance. Whittington has published widely on American constitutional theory and development, federalism, judicial politics, and the presidency. He has been a John M. Olin Foundation Faculty Fellow and American Council of Learned Societies Junior Faculty Fellow, and a Visiting Scholar at the Social Philosophy and Policy Center, and a Visiting Professor at the University of Texas School of Law.