AU is not a bastion of liberal thought, but rather a place of intellectual diversity, according to professor and Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate Allan Lichtman at a forum Thursday.
"Not here, not now, not ever has a value orthodoxy been imposed" at AU, he said.
Lichtman and panelist Nat Hentoff, a columnist for the Village Voice, debated the subject so vehemently that moderator Catherine Warrick, an AU professor, reminded them that the event was co-sponsored by Civitas, a campus campaign for civility.
Hentoff cited evidence of intellectual discrimination nationwide, from the burning of conservative newspapers at Cornell University to an article in the Chronicle of Higher Education titled "Political correctness lives."
But Lichtman said the examples were few, considering there are thousands of colleges in the country. He said he hasn't seen intellectual diversity squelched on campus in the 32 years he's been at AU.
Two students, however, spoke out during the forum's question and answer session, and said they had an economics professor who injected his political ideas into class discussions, leading one of the students to drop the class.
The event was organized in part to fulfill a new law that mandates every institution that receives any federal funding to hold Constitution-related activities on or around Sept. 17, the day the document was adopted in 1787.
Schools and colleges have leeway as to what kind of events they organize.
The law was a project of Senator Robert Byrd (D-W. Va.) and graduate of AU's Washington College of Law, who inserted the measure into a giant spending bill last year.
Lichtman plans to announce his bid for the Maryland Senate seat on Sept. 28.
