How American College Campuses Have Become Anti–Due Process

Submitted by Mastodon on Fri, 2016-08-05 19:36

Article here. Excerpt:

'On April 4, 2011, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) released a document dramatically reinterpreting Title IX, the federal law that prohibits gender discrimination in colleges and universities that receive federal funds. The document issued by the OCR was a “Dear Colleague” letter, an allegedly informal agency guidance that Department of Education officials claimed did not need to follow notice-and-comment rulemaking pursuant to the Administrative Procedure Act.

The “Dear Colleague” letter specified the procedures that the OCR believed colleges and universities should follow in sexual assault cases in order to comply with Title IX. Although two Department of Education officials have publicly noted that the letter does not have the force of law, this concession does not change its practical effect, which is to coerce universities into compliance. Moreover, each change in Title IX requirements found in the letter increases the likelihood of a guilty finding in a campus sexual assault case.'

Like0 Dislike0

Comments

The only thing that irritates me about this essay is this closing sentence:

"Sexual assaults on college campuses do occur and are a serious issue, but justice requires procedures that afford due process both to accusers and to the accused."

First, why must every essay on the rights of men give a statement that sexual assaults are serious. It is as if that is a required statement to make before voicing any concern. Just once, I would like to see the concern voiced, in and of itself.

Second, it irritates me how "due process" is now accorded to the accuser. Process rights are those to prevent the government from acting tyrannical toward the accused. I suppose one could contrive a justification by saying that alleged victims are violated by an indifferent government. However, by and large, in jurisprudence, due process rights are the rights of the accused. It irritates me that feminists attempt to milk more rights when men stand up for their own.

Like0 Dislike0
Submitted by ThomasI on Sat, 2016-08-06 09:10