AP Photo by Charlie Neibergall
By Christine Tebcherany
At the University of Texas, two roommates seem to be facing a freedom of speech issue, involving Barack Obama posters placed in their window. According to the Associated Press, Connor Kincaid and his roommate and cousin, Blake Kincaidwere told to remove their poster supporting Obama from their dorm room window. The two roommates refused to do so, and as a result school officials banned them from enrolling for spring classes.
President of the University of Texas Bill Powers, had a committee formed to figure out the school’s policies and propose solutions. Powers stated in a written statement that The University of Texas now “expressly allows the display of signs and posters in students' residence hall room windows”.
Conner Kincaid stated that, “This is an important free speech issue”. Kincaid allegedly had seen a supportive ad for John McCain in a different dorm window, which raises the question if the democratic content had anything to do with the uproar.The University declares that the situation was not about the candidates represented in the poster. Jeff Graves the associate vice president for UT legal affairs told the Associated Press that, “UT has had a policy for more than 10 years forbidding the posting of signs in dorm windows in order to control the look of the campus and avoid the appearance that the university is supporting any candidate”.
In response to the situation, the University’s Democrats and Republicans came together to exercise their rights first amendment rights, by motivating students to place posters in their dorm windows as a form of protest.
“It's never been an issue…obviously this is a hot political issue, and it got pushed this time" stated Graves. The University of Texas trusts their policy to be constitutional, however, according to The First Amendment Center, they believe that it is fair to allow posters to be hung up inside individual dorm rooms.
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