Miscellaneous

Charged with racial harassment...

By Walter Olson, Ted Frank, and David Nieporent

...for reading a book? And an anti-racist book at that? That's what FIRE (Foundation for Individual Rights in Education) says happened to Keith Sampson, a student with a sideline job on the IUPUI (Indiana University - Purdue University Indianapolis) janitorial staff who ignored co-workers' objections to a book he brought in to read on his break time about the struggle against the Ku Klux Klan. (Azhar Majeed, "Read a Book, Harass a Co-Worker at IUPUI", Mar. 5; follow-up, Mar. 6 with links to coverage by Paul Secunda and David Bernstein). Note, in the Secunda comments, that the school appears to have later rescinded the discipline and assured Sampson that he is free to read the book -- which the IUPUI library itself stocks -- on break if he likes. And: Eugene Volokh, Howard Wasserman.

Full post as published by Overlawyered on March 07, 2008 (boomark / email).