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Zero Tolerance: Survey Finds 33 of 65 Academic Departments Lack a Single Republican Professor
Jonathan Turley ^ | November 29, 2022 | Jonathan Turley

Posted on 11/29/2022 10:36:16 AM PST by george76

We have been discussing the virtual elimination of Republican and conservative scholars from many faculties despite the fact that roughly half of the country regularly votes for Republicans or conservative causes. Now a new survey by The College Fix of 65 departments in various states found that 33 do not have a single registered Republican. For these departments, the systemic elimination of Republican faculty has finally reached zero, but there is still little recognition of the crushing bias reflected in these numbers. Others, as discussed below, have defended the elimination of conservative or Republican faculty as entirely justified and commendable. Overall, registered Democrats outnumbered registered Republicans by a margin of over 10-1.

The survey found 61 Republican professors across 65 departments at seven universities while it also found 667 professors identified as Democrat based on their political party registration or voting history.

The survey covered The Ohio State University, University of Nebraska-Omaha, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, University of Georgia, Cornell University, University of Oklahoma and the University of Alaska-Anchorage.

While there may be a couple professors missed on either side of this ideological divide, most faculty will privately admit that it is rare to find self-identified Republicans or conservatives on many faculties. Most faculties are overwhelmingly Democratic and liberal. Diversity generally runs from the left to the far left.

Another survey found that only nine percent of law professors identified as conservative.

The virtual absence of Republican or conservative members on many faculties are just shrugged off by many academics. It is the subject of my recent publication in the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy. The article entitled “Harm and Hegemony: The Decline of Free Speech in the United States.”

Notably, a 2017 study found 15 percent of faculties were conservative. This is the result of years of faculty replicating their own ideological preferences and eradicating the diversity that once existed on faculties. When I began teaching in the 1980s, faculties were undeniably liberal but contained a significant number of conservative and libertarian professors. It made for a healthy and balanced intellectual environment. Today such voices are relatively rare and faculties have become political echo chambers, leaving conservatives and Republican students increasingly afraid to speak openly in class.

The trend is the result of hiring systems where conservative or libertarian scholars are often rejected as simply “insufficiently intellectually rigorous” or “not interesting” in their scholarship. This can clearly be true with individual candidates but the wholesale reduction of such scholars shows a more systemic problem. Faculty insist that there is no bias against conservatives, but the obviously falling number of conservative faculty speaks for itself.

The editors of the legal site Above the Law have repeatedly swatted down objections to the loss of free speech and viewpoint diversity in the media and academia. In a recent column, they mocked those of us who objected to the virtual absence of conservative or libertarian faculty members at law schools.

Senior editor Joe Patrice defended “predominantly liberal faculties” based on the fact that liberal views reflect real law as opposed to junk law. (Patrice regularly calls those with opposing views “racists,” including Chief Justice John Roberts because of his objection to race-based criteria in admissions as racial discrimination). He explained that hiring a conservative academic was akin to allowing a believer in geocentrism (or that the sun orbits the earth) to teach at a university.

It is that easy. You simply declare that conservative views shared by a majority of the Supreme Court and roughly half of the population are not acceptable to be taught.

I frankly do not understand why professors want to maintain this one-sided environment in hiring. I was drawn to academia by the diversity of viewpoints and intellectual challenges on campuses. School publications and conferences today often run from the left to the far left. We have discussed a long line of incidents on this blog of conservative faculties being targeted by cancel campaigns with tepid support from their colleagues or administrations. We have become the face of intellectual orthodoxy and it is reflected in these numbers.


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Editorial; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections; US: Alaska; US: Connecticut; US: Georgia; US: Massachusetts; US: Nebraska; US: North Carolina; US: Ohio; US: Oklahoma
KEYWORDS: academia; affirmativeaction; diversity; multiculturalism; professors; tolerance; universities; woke
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To: DannyTN

“How do we fix it?”

That was also my first thought and it something we on FR should have some serious discussion (if that is possible).

College costs have risen astronomically since the feds took over the student loan program. College had a guaranteed sugar daddy called Uncle Sam. So maybe the feds need to get out of the loan business and turn it over to banks where it was originally.

All departments of the government provide grants to universities for research and more. A large amount of the money is wasted on ridiculous pursuits. Trim government money back to the bare bones and let private industry fund the necessary stuff.

State legislatures need to provide tight oversight to colleges and universities. There is tremendous waste. Once tenures some professors only teach one course a semester or become designated as a researcher of some unnecessary or foolish topic. Then they sit around all day doing nothing but championing socialist schemes.

Liberal educators really are trying to change our American culture. They are bad news. I am sure you have other suggestions.

Do these things an you will see more conservatives enter the university picture.


21 posted on 11/29/2022 11:08:12 AM PST by elpadre (W )
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To: TexasFreeper2009

“I frankly do not understand why professors want to maintain this one-sided environment in hiring.”


I admire Prof. Turley, so I hope the above quote of his puzzlement is rhetorical only. The desire to maintain a one-sided environment is necessary for this academic Left to ensure that our future leaders are so well-marinated in the “proper” ideology that over time divergent thoughts, along with free-speech, will be nothing more than an historical anachronism.


22 posted on 11/29/2022 11:10:17 AM PST by JGPhila
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To: DannyTN

It removes the wealth of the Federal government. Feds are the ones funding most public schools by loans, food programs et al.
No more money from a small Cabal(Uniparty) and things will change, because people love their kids.


23 posted on 11/29/2022 11:10:30 AM PST by rellic
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To: george76

“I frankly do not understand why professors want to maintain this one-sided environment in hiring.”

It’s real easy. The left doesn’t have the same value system you do.
People like you invited them in. Once they acquired the power to hire, they eliminated people who don’t think like them.
This is who they are, who they have been and who they ever will be.


24 posted on 11/29/2022 11:16:25 AM PST by Varda
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To: TexasFreeper2009

The claims about diversity were an obvious, overwrought and mendacious coverup of their true activities.

They often used black professors/instructors to spout such misdirection. They’ve been tremendous liars.

Change toward actual diversity and fairness can and should be forced through state and federal funding coercion. Merit should always be the goal.


25 posted on 11/29/2022 11:16:48 AM PST by rx
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To: elpadre
Those are some good suggestions:
26 posted on 11/29/2022 11:17:04 AM PST by DannyTN
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To: george76

If you have a government job, you vote #ComDem.

If you are self employed or work for a privately held company, most vote Republican.

There was a time when almost all Miltary officers voted Republican. Not so now.


27 posted on 11/29/2022 11:27:46 AM PST by Texas Fossil ((Texas is not where you were born, but a Free State of Heart, Mind & Attitude!))
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To: ConservativeMind
Sounds lawsuitable.

EXCEPT:

... "Another survey found that only nine percent of law professors identified as conservative..."

So that has created the atmosphere where the litigation would occur.

28 posted on 11/29/2022 11:29:16 AM PST by gloryblaze
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To: george76

Only 32 to go.


29 posted on 11/29/2022 11:39:05 AM PST by TribalPrincess2U (D.I.S.T.R.A.C.T.I.O.N.S.)
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To: ConservativeInPA; Liz; Red Badger; SunkenCiv

No. It is worse than that.
33 of 65 have NO even GROPElite “Republican” identified professors.
The other 32 college departments have only 2 or 3 self-identified GROPElite repubbies in total.


30 posted on 11/29/2022 11:58:37 AM PST by Robert A Cook PE (Method, motive, and opportunity: No morals, shear madness and hatred by those who cheat.)
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To: ConservativeInPA; Liz; Red Badger; SunkenCiv

No. It is worse than that.
33 of 65 have NO even GROPElite “Republican” identified professors.
The other 32 college departments have only 2 or 3 self-identified GROPElite repubbies in total.


31 posted on 11/29/2022 11:58:53 AM PST by Robert A Cook PE (Method, motive, and opportunity: No morals, shear madness and hatred by those who cheat.)
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To: Robert A Cook PE

How many are ‘Libertarian’?...................


32 posted on 11/29/2022 11:59:26 AM PST by Red Badger (Homeless veterans camp in the streets while illegal aliens are put up in hotels.....................)
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To: george76

Republicans, especially white male republicans, MUST be eliminated for diversity. Diversity uber-alles and you will be destroyed if you don’t hold the Current Thing opinion.

But really. Who would dare say they were a republican on a college campus when the threat of physical violence is very real.


33 posted on 11/29/2022 1:01:32 PM PST by Organic Panic (Democrats. Memories as short as Joe Biden's eyes)
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To: Robert A Cook PE; AdmSmith; AnonymousConservative; Arthur Wildfire! March; Berosus; Bockscar; ...
Thanks RACPE.

34 posted on 11/29/2022 9:23:30 PM PST by SunkenCiv (Imagine an imaginary menagerie manager imagining managing an imaginary menagerie.)
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To: george76

Defund the universities.


35 posted on 11/30/2022 12:22:58 AM PST by FreedomPoster (Islam delenda est)
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To: george76
The statistics for Newspaper newsrooms would be worse... many top newspapers haven't had one conservative in their newsrooms in decades - - some never.

Twitter / Musk wants the Poynter Institute to do fact checking for them? YIKES! Poynter owns the Tampa Bay Times (former St. Petersburg Times) There hasn't been a conservative in that newsroom in over 40 years. Would Musk choose a group to decided 'racial fairness' if that group had not had a black employee in over 40 years?

36 posted on 11/30/2022 5:16:17 AM PST by GOPJ (Unsolved crime? Jump to the conclusion the killer is a LGBTQIA2S+ (Turn about's fair play.))
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To: george76

We need to add political views to protected categories like religion, race, national origin, sex, disability, etc.

Publicly traded companies, educational institutions, and governmental entities need to be made to pay severe financial consequences for this.


37 posted on 11/30/2022 8:04:34 AM PST by unlearner ( Si vis pacem, para bellum. Let him who desires peace prepare for war.)
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