Berkeley Once Stood for Free Speech. Now It Rolls Over.

In the 1960s, students at Berkeley helped change the world by igniting the Free Speech Movement, a seminal moment in the history of 20th-century civil liberties. Fifty years later, Berkeley leftists seem to have decided that free speech was a mistake -- and the administration seems intent on helping them roll it back.

You’ve already read about the riot that attended a speech by conservative stirpot Milo Yiannopoulos. You may have missed the destruction of College Republicans’ property, and the cancellation of a speech by conservative writer David Horowitz, after Berkeley officials told College Republicans that in order to provide adequate security, the speech would have to be held outside the middle of campus, and in the middle of the day, when many students are still in class. Faced with similar demands when proposing to bring Ann Coulter to campus, BridgeUSA, a nonpartisan group, actually agreed to the terms -- and then their event was cancelled anyway. Or maybe just postponed? The administration said it had not had adequate notice to provide adequate security.