Inmates in charge of URI

Apparently the Student Senate of the University of Rhode Island is trying to compel the College Republicans to apologize for constitutionally recognized free speech.

For months, the Student Senate has demanded that the group publicly apologize for advertising a satirical $100 “scholarship” for white, heterosexual, American males.

They actually got over 40 people (American men, I assume) to submit essays highlighting how racial, gender based and nationality oriented scholarships are a form of reverse discrimination. Politically incorrect - yes. Protected speech - yes.

In a meeting on February 19, the Student Senate’s Student Organizations Advisory and Review Committee (SOARC) prohibited the College Republicans from disbursing the money. The group agreed that it would not give out the $100, but SOARC decided that even advertising the satirical “scholarship” violated URI’s anti-discrimination bylaws and demanded that the group publish an apology in the campus newspaper. Unwilling to apologize, Bilodeau appealed SOARC’s decision. The Senate denied that appeal.

Deny appeals, really nice bit of student democracy, there. URI's President tried to reason with the idiots in the Student Senate. He should have just disbanded them.

in a letter dated April 6, President Carothers did indeed instruct the Senate in no uncertain terms to drop its unconstitutional demand for an apology. Carothers wrote that the mandatory apology “does not meet constitutional standards as laid forth in the First Amendment and in subsequent court decisions interpreting the standard.”

But at a meeting on Monday night, SOARC nonetheless unanimously voted to ignore both its constitutional obligations and Carothers’ directive and derecognize the College Republicans for refusing to issue an apology. SOARC’s decision will be voted on by the entire Student Senate on Wednesday, April 25.