Commentary: The Gravest Threats to Campus Speech Come From States, Not Students

America is facing a fundamental threat‌, and it echoes a dark past. In 1633, Galileo was forced to renounce the “false opinion” that the Earth circled the sun since it collided with the prevailing beliefs of the Catholic Church. Shortly after publication in 1859, Charles Darwin’s “On the Origin of Species” was banned from the library of Trinity College, Cambridge.

Each of these episodes of censorship and repression of knowledge reflected the unique social and political tensions of its time. But the proponents of censorship and repression all had one thing in common: they were on the wrong side of history. The mistakes of the past are being repeated in this country, right now.