On The Front Lines
The Rutherford Institute Asks Appeals Court to Protect University of Minnesota Student’s First Amendment Right to Academic Freedom
ST. PAUL, Minn.—The Rutherford Institute has come to the defense of Sinan Cingilli, a University of Minnesota (UMN) student who was allegedly threatened with academic reprisal for considering the use of sources of information not approved by the university. The Rutherford Institute has filed a friend of the court brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit in Turkish Coalition of America, Inc. v. Bruininks, arguing that Cingilli's right to academic freedom allowed him to cite information from the Turkish Coalition of America (TCA), an educational organization that seeks to inform the public about Turkey and Turkish Americans. The suit stems from allegations that UMN officials warned students not to use information from the TCA in their research.
"Sinan Cingilli's right to academic freedom was denied by the university," stated John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute. "In the process, a core First Amendment freedom was violated—the right to debate and express ideas contrary to established views. Without this protection, all freedoms will be lost."
In 2006, the Center of Holocaust and Genocide Studies (CHGS) at the University of Minnesota (UMN) published a list of "unreliable websites" which included the TCA website. The disclaimer on the list stated that "Warnings should be given to students writing papers that they should not use these sites because of denial, support by an unknown organization, or contents that are a strange mix of fact and opinion." The decision to place the TCA on the "unreliable websites" list was due to the TCA's suggestion that the issue of whether the deaths of Ottoman Armenians during WWI constituted a genocide is still an open historical debate.
Cingilli, a freshman at UMN, was personally affected by the blacklisting of the TCA when the Director of the CHGS allegedly suggested that he might face academic punishment should he choose to use the TCA as a source of information. Cingilli allegedly faced the prospect of poor academic standing and stigmatization in the academic community should he have used a resource not previously approved by the university.
In November 2010, Cingilli and the TCA filed suit in federal court against UMN as well as University President Robert Bruininks and University Professor Chaouat. The complaint claimed that the TCA had been branded with a "scarlet letter" for being a "denialist" organization. The district court subsequently ruled against the TCA and Cingilli, declaring that the UMN officials had an overriding right to academic freedom.
In weighing in on the issue on appeal to the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals, The Rutherford Institute seeks to defend Cingilli's right to use a variety of sources of information in his pursuit of historical truth. The Institute's brief also challenges UMN's unilateral declaration of illegitimacy of the TCA.
