Activism

Bill targeting academic groups that boycott Israel halted in New York Assembly

Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver. (Photo: Associated Press/Mike Groll)
Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver. (Photo: Associated Press/Mike Groll)

There was little notice last week when the New York State Senate took up legislation to prohibit state aid from flowing to academic groups that boycott Israel.  It passed quietly–and overwhelmingly.  But when the same legislation started making its way through the New York Assembly, activists sprung into action–and have stopped it from advancing, at least for now.

Three committees in the New York Assembly did not discuss or vote on the anti-boycott legislation, a victory for the coalition of civil liberties and Palestinian rights groups that mobilized fast over the weekend to stop the legislation from passing. Activists said that Assemblywoman Deborah Glick, the chair of the Higher Education Committee, announced that the anti-boycott bill was taken off the agenda for discussion yesterday. Glick also said that the legislation will be reworked, so it could come back in a different form.

“We hope that New York legislators have realized that it is inappropriate for them to deny state funds to universities in an effort to silence political speech activities that they personally disagree with. The right to engage in human rights boycotts, used to oppose segregation in the U.S. South, the Apartheid regime in South Africa, and now aimed at achieving equal rights for Palestinians, is protected by the First Amendment,” Dima Khalidi, Director of Palestine Solidarity Legal Support and Cooperating Counsel with the Center for Constitutional Rights, said in a statement. “The threat to this right will remain until the New York bill and similar bills in other states are entirely defeated.”

The bill would cut off money to students and scholars from state institutions who need aid to travel to conventions organized by the American Studies Association, the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association and the Association for Asian American Studies, all of which have voted to boycott Israel.  Those three organizations have endorsed the boycott of Israel, and many members of the New York legislature want to cripple the ability of scholars to participate in those academic groups.

The legislation also calls for punishing any school in violation of the ban with a cut-off in state aid and prohibits departments at state schools from paying membership fees to academic groups that boycott Israel. But for now, the broad coalition that pointed out that the legislation was an attack on academic freedom has won out.

Over the weekend and yesterday, many activists called in to various Assemblymembers to express opposition to the bill.  And as the Albany Times Union‘s Casey Seiler reports, a group that is normally an ally of the powerful Assembly Speaker who authored the bill, Sheldon Silver, expressed strong opposition to it.  The New York State United Teachers union issued a statement saying that the bill “violates the principles of academic freedom, the First Amendment protection of speech and protection of association.” The Professional Staff Congress, the union for City University of New York faculty, opposed the bill, and so did groups like Jewish Voice for Peace, the Center for Constitutional Rights and the National Lawyers Guild.

About seventy-five members of the Columbia University faculty also joined the pile-on against the bill.  And the New York Times published an editorial blasting the legislation.  “The New York bill is an ill-considered response to the American Studies Association resolution and would trample on academic freedoms and chill free speech and dissent,” the Times stated.  “Academics are rightly concerned that it will impose a political test on faculty members seeking university support for research meetings and travel.”

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Thank you Alex. If they (big money Zios) can’t get this bill (however egregiously anti-democratic) to pass in the NY Assembly, then the times, they’ve already changed.

Last month (allow me to digress), My wife and I drove to Denver, CO for a wedding- we usually drive if the distance is within 12 hrs because flying is tricky when you’re encumbered by an overtly Muslim sounding name. After having a lamb shank and rice at Jerusalem restaurant (please check it out if you’re ever in Denver), I went to Mr. Medicine Man’s Store for some Marijuana tourism, while in line, a fifty something male turned to me and said “it is so surreal, can you believe it – that we’re in line to buy it legally”

I replied, rather loudly, that maybe Palestine will be free in our life times too! All around was smiles and nodding!

Really tough going for Americans who believe Free speech is a bedrock value of the USA, as the IsraelFirsters are always seeking to carve out more exceptions for rogue Israel. They also have a movement afloat in USA to conflate criticism of Israel and/or the US-Israel special relationship with “hate speech.” For precedent, they are citing Germany and other European countries who outright ban any speech or paraphernalia that is , or may be associated with Nazi Germany.

We shall overcome, some day.

I think that this is a repeating pattern. A legislation like that has much better chances to pass if it can be blocked somewhere, so NY Senate left it for the House to kill it, quietly of course.

It is somewhat surprising that old Jewish men like Silver were promoting this law to begin with. Are they clever or stupid? In “clever” scenario, they maintain good graces and generosity of rich extremist Zionists for trying, while reassuring “do not worry” the other groups. After all, attempts to create North Korea on Hudson are not popular among NY liberals and even conservatives. (The phrasing “This is not North Korea” was used by the previous mayor of NYC when some City Council members wanted to cut funding of Brooklyn College for “sponsoring” seminar talks by BDS supporters.)

But when the same legislation started making its way through the New York Assembly, activists sprung into action–and have stopped it from advancing, at least for now.

There are key differences, but both bills violate specific guidance contained in existing Supreme Court cases on content based exclusions, and the application of the equal protection clause with regard to privileges to use public forums or even limited access forums. The texts of the bills are here:
* http://open.nysenate.gov/legislation/bill/S6438-2013#Text
* http://assembly.state.ny.us/leg/?default_fld=&bn=A08392&term=2013&Summary=Y&Actions=Y&Text=Y&Votes=Y#A08392

Glick also said that the legislation will be reworked, so it could come back in a different form.

If it has the same legislative intent it will still be unconstitutional. So far, it looks like the Assembly is trying to use a state law to outlaw all types of boycotts, even though the Supreme Court has specifically ruled that civil rights and labor boycotts are protected by the 1st amendment. The Senate is trying to limit the content and scope of boycotts to just those two types or to any boycott against a host country listed as a state sponsor of terrorism. This, despite the fact that the Supreme Court has declared similar laws unconstitutional for making an impermissible distinction between peaceful labor picketing and other peaceful picketing.

It is noteworthy that the “activists” were not Jewish identified. They acted on broad liberal grounds, though no doubt many of them were Jewish. JVP opposed the ASA academic boycott, but has been drawn into urging its members to defend the action (“even if you disagree with it personally”) because exposing the rationales and forces at work advances the issue.

This is a sharp, sad contrast to the recent “Jewish declaration” opposing NY Mayor de Blasio’s fealty to Israel. Non-Jewish New Yorkers are reduced to cheering the “good Jews” who proclaim “I’m Jewish and AIPAC doesn’t speak for me!” As if this is the ne plus ultra of morality and politics when it is self-interested and complacent.

New York’s relationship to Israel is, need one say, an urgent matter for all New Yorkers, esp considering that 9/11 was mainly an attack on US patronage of Israel (which fact has disappeared from the culture). It is an urgent matter for all
Americans, not to be delegated to Jewish identity politicians.

The ASA action–against Israeli academia, not “the occupation”–raised broad issues beyond the circumscribed agenda of identity politics.