Reader Andy Banducci points out that the "harassment" policy AD42 that Penn State has relied on in censoring student Josh Stulman's exhibit of paintings on the culture of terrorism in the Palestinian Territories is under constitutional attack by the Alliance Defense Fund. You can read the complaint here.

According to this news story, Penn State's response to the complaint states: "It is denied that Penn State maintains a 'speech code policy.'" It will be pretty hard for Penn State to maintain that posture when the email Stulman received cancelling his exhibit apparently stated that his exhibit was in violation of AD42 because it "did not promote cultural diversity" or "opportunities for democratic dialogue."

Not to belabor the obvious, but after federal courts consistently invalidated state university "speech codes" in the 1990s, the universities revived these codes in the guise of antidiscrimination policy. There is no reason to believe that the universities will be any more successful in defending the (barely disguised) codes this time, but neither the Constitution nor common sense seems to be much of a barrier to speech regulation at public universities these days.