Princeton Targets a Dissenting Professor – WSJ

Everyone knows American universities are dangerous places these days if you dare to express unpopular views. But Princeton University s handling of classics professor Joshua Katz is still shocking for its procedural double jeopardy.

This week brought grim news for Joshua Katz, a classics professor who drew ire on campus in 2020 after criticizing a faculty letter on race relations. The Journal reported Thursday that Princeton president Christopher Eisgruber has asked the university s trustees to fire Mr. Katz, who has tenure. The official complaint is a procedural charge, based on Mr. Katz s supposed noncompliance in an investigation into his relationship with a student.

Princeton found in 2018 that the professor had maintained a consensual sexual relationship with an undergraduate student more than a decade earlier. Mr. Katz was suspended for a year without pay. Yet the university opened a new investigation of his conduct after Mr. Katz publicly criticized a faculty letter on race relations in 2020.

His colleagues decided the second time around that Mr. Katz hadn t been fully forthright in the first investigation, and concluded that he could be punished again. The dean of faculty insists that Mr. Katz s politics is not germane to the case. And if you believe that, you have been living in a cave off-campus.

via www.wsj.com

This story would be discouraging enough if it were about some small and not very cute college in Palookaville, Illinois.