Supreme Court Affirms Mandatory Activities Fees

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court ruled last month that the University of Wisconsin and other state-run schools can use mandatory activities fees to subsidize campus groups without violating the rights of students who might object.
In a 9-0 decision, the high court reversed lower district and appellate-court rulings that said the university's student fee program violated the First Amendment.
Many public-college officials and campus student leaders were pleased with the case's outcome. State institutions could have been forced to retool, or even abandon, their mandatory-fee policies if the court had ruled the other way. Campus organizations  might have been forced to rely on voluntary contributions from students for their financial support.
The court rejected the argument put forth by a group of Wisconsin students that the college's fee system effectively forces students to financially support groups whose views they might find objectionable on political, ideological or religious grounds.
Judge Anthony M. Kennedy wrote in the court's opinion, "The First Amendment permits a public university to charge its students an activity fee used to fund a program to facilitate extracurricular student speech if the program is viewpoint neutral,"meaning it doesn't discriminate against groups of students.
 "This decision is great news for the university, and for students and for the marketplace of ideas on campus," says Ivan Frishberg, who heads the higher education project of the U.S. Public Interest Research Group, which has dozens of campus-based chapters that rely on student-activity fees for support.
Scott Harold Southworth, one of several current and former Wisconsin students who were plaintiffs in the case, says he views the Supreme Court decision as "a loss," but vowed that "we will move on and keep fighting the battle."             

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