Free Speech on Campus

Professor Lee Epstein and Chancellor Andrew D. Martin
Political Science 334
Spring 2023

Group 2. The Professor Who Wouldn’t Write a Letter of Recommendation
(Led by Kate Kostel)

Case-Controversy

John Cheney-Lippold, a professor at the University of Michigan, had agreed to write a letter of recommendation for a student wishing to study abroad. Cheney-Lippold rescinded his offer when he learned the student wanted to study in Israel. In an email to the student, Cheney-Lippold explained why:

As you may know, many university departments have pledged an academic boycott against Israel in support of Palestinians living in Palestine. This boycott includes writing letters of recommendation for students planning to study there.

I should have let you know earlier, and for that I apologize. But for reasons of these politics, I must rescind my offer to write your letter.

Let me know if you need me to write other letters for you, as I’d be happy.

The University of Michigan disciplined Cheney-Lippold: He didn't receive a merit raise in 2018 and was denied a previously scheduled research sabbatical for two years.

After a graduate TA also refused to write a letter for a student planning to study in Israel (about a month after the Cheney-Lippold incident), Michigan's president issued a campus-wide letter:

Withholding letters of recommendation based on personal views does not meet our university's expectations for supporting the academic aspirations of our students. Conduct that violates this expectation and harms students will not be tolerated and will be addressed with serious consequences. Such actions interfere with our students' opportunities, violate their academic freedom and betray our university’s educational mission.

U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel, which advocates boycotting study-abroad programs in Israel, defended the refusal to write letters:

  1. A letter of recommendation is not a right but is written at the discretion of faculty members. Professors, like any other individual, are entitled to hold firm positions on a matter of conscience and act in regard with those principles. Prof. Cheney-Lippold endorses the academic boycott of Israel. In declining to write a letter of recommendation for a study abroad program in Israel, he is aligning his actions with his stated views.

  2. By declining to write a letter of recommendation for a student's participation in a study abroad program in Israel, Prof. Cheney-Lippold is not preventing the student from participating in the program or seeking out other recommenders. Rather his decision is an expression of his own principled opposition to such programs and his unwillingness to be complicit with what he views as an unjust
    international situation.

  3. Prof. Cheney-Lippold's decision is grounded in significant evidence that Israel study abroad programs are not equally accessible to all students attending US universities. Some students, specifically students of Palestinian, Middle Eastern, and Muslim background, who attempt to travel to Israel and the Palestinian territories may be denied visas to Israel or would be denied entry into the country by Israeli customs and immigrations officials as stated in the US State Department travel advisory.

To Help You Prepare Your Class Presentation:

  1. Read the material linked in the case study.

  2. Read Isaac Stanley-Becker, “Michigan Prof. supported a student’s study abroad application—until he realized Israel was her destination," Washington Post, September 20, 2018

  3. Read the AAUP’s Statement on Professional Ethics

  4. Read an interpretation of Academic Freedom, written by the (then) president of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP)

  5. Review class material and readings on expressive conduct, compelled speech, and academic freedom.

Your Presentation Should:

  1. Briefly summarize the case-controversy.

  2. Applying the tools we considered in class, defend the position that professors can refuse to write letters “for reasons of … politics.”

  3. Applying the tools we considered in class, defend the position that professors can’t refuse to write letters “for reasons of … politics.”

  4. Explain which position you think is stronger.

  5. Again, applying the tools we considered in class, consider whether universities should maintain policies on the circumstances under which professors may decline to write letters of recommendation. If so, what should the policies say?