Colleges Must Reject Trump’s ‘Compact’ to Protect Our Democracy

The federal Department of Education first sent this compact to nine universities in October, stating that signatories would receive preferential consideration for federal grants. The compact itself conditions benefits such as federal contracts, tax-exempt status, student loans and student visas on the adoption of various government prescriptions for admissions, hiring, tuition, curriculum, discipline, international student enrollment, grading and free speech.

After the Massachusetts Institute of Technology became the first school to reject the compact, the Trump administration asked all universities to sign. Soon, seven more of the initial schools, including the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Southern California and the University of Virginia, also rejected the compact. A handful of schools, including New College of Florida and Valley Forge Military College, have volunteered to sign, while leaders at other institutions have expressed reservations.

Universities that have balked at – or outright rejected – the compact are correct to do so. The administration’s proposal contains five fundamental causes for alarm:

First, the compact tramples upon the constitutional rights that allow us to debate and disagree without fearing reprisals from our universities or from the government. The compact flagrantly violates the freedoms of speech and association, and of academic freedom, all of which are integral to the pursuit of knowledge and truth that is the foundation of higher education. It is unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination to demand that universities ensure a particular ideological composition of faculty, staff and students, and to require that they protect “conservative ideas” from “belittling.”

Similarly, it mandates a “broad spectrum of ideologies” while excluding (or disciplining) foreign applicants and students who harbor “anti-American” ideas, eschew “Western values” or express “hostility” to the U.S. or its allies. These terms infringe the First Amendment rights of those students and of the American citizens who interact with them. The compact’s nebulous standards – What are “Western values” or “conservative ideas”? – chill the freedom of speech and inquiry that are the bedrock of American higher education.

The compact also violates the Constitution by conditioning federal benefits on the relinquishing of universities’ and their community members’ constitutional rights. And the compact would force state university signatories, as government actors, to themselves violate the First Amendment and state-level protections for free speech.

Second, the compact amounts to a federal takeover of private institutions and state entities. It threatens to withdraw federal benefits from any university that does not submit to the federal government’s demands. Such imposed ideological uniformity would undermine the competition that spurs innovation and empowers students and faculty to “vote with their feet” for the schools that best meet their needs.

Moreover, the compact’s approach to federal funding is unlawful and unconstitutional: Conditions on federal grants to state governments, including state universities, must be clearly stated in advance, related to the funds’ purposes and not unduly coercive. The compact’s vague and manipulable terms instead allow, for example, funding cuts – without prior notice – for medical research, unrelated to the ideological mandates the compact imposes on admissions or hiring.

Third, the compact violates the constitutional separation of powers. Under the Constitution, Congress, not the executive, wields the power of the purse. An executive agency – here, the Department of Education – cannot withhold funds or place new conditions on monies Congress has allocated without clear and explicit legislative authorization. These principles, supported most strongly by conservative Supreme Court justices, have long been central elements of conservative and libertarian constitutional theory.

Fourth, the compact places universities in a dangerous financial position, facing draconian penalties without due process – or any process at all. The compact authorizes the government and private donors to claw back federal dollars whenever federal officials are displeased with a university’s actions. Signatories to this agreement would forfeit their autonomy and the fundamental freedoms of their community members, in exchange for nothing more than a vague assurance of preferential treatment.

Finally, the compact is riddled with internal inconsistencies that render it both incoherent and dangerous. The agreement claims to value “merit” in higher education, but offers preferential consideration for federal grant money based on universities’ adherence to government-mandated ideology rather than scientific excellence. It prohibits discrimination based on “political ideology” while requiring special protection for “conservative ideas,” and exclusion of foreign students based on their speech and political views.

These contradictions undermine laudable objectives that we can all agree upon, such as increasing accessibility for economically disadvantaged students, fostering a diversity of perspectives and funding research based on academic merit rather than ideological conformity. But even these worthy goals cannot be imposed through the federal government’s takeover of private or state institutions.

This administration is not the first to employ heavy-handed enforcement measures, and we recognize prior failures consistently to stand for these principles. Past overreach, however, pales in comparison to the invasive federal oversight this administration now demands.

Universities must unequivocally reject the proposed compact and the invasive federal oversight it entails. In doing so, they will preserve the innovation, research excellence and fearless pursuit of truth that have made American higher education, with all its flaws, the envy of the world. And they will protect the liberties and structural constraints on government power that are vital to our democracy.