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The Precedent That Wasn't: College Hate Speech Codes and the Two Faces of Legal Compliance

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 April 2024

Jon B. Gould
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Abstract

This article undertakes an empirical investigation into the development and persistence of college hate speech codes, asking why so many elite institutions of higher learning either retained or created speech policies that contradicted a national series of court cases. The method is both quantitative and qualitative, looking for broad patterns of response among the schools and also explaining why individual institutions did or did not comply with the court decisions. In the end, the article not only teases out the why of compliance decisions but also provides a greater understanding of the relationship between legal compliance and judicial impact.

Type
Research Article
Information
Law & Society Review , Volume 35 , Issue 2 , 2001 , pp. 345 - 392
Copyright
Copyright © 2001 Law and Society Association.

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