University of Massachusetts at Amherst: Student Government Tries to Punish Conservative Newspaper
Cases
University of Massachusetts - Amherst
Case Overview
University of Massachusetts Amherst student government leader Vanessa Snow was mocked by name in an issue of the conservative campus newspaper The Minuteman. In response, Snow impeded the distribution of the paper by standing on a stack of newspapers and then grabbing copies out of the hands of a student as police detective Lisa Kidwell did nothing. Later, the Student Government Association (SGA) Senate passed a resolution to suspend the Silent Majority, the organization that publishes The Minuteman, unless it wrote an apology addressing the paper's representation of SGA members. After FIREintervened, the university administration rejected the resolution, and Snow reportedly was held accountable for the theft of The Minuteman.