Bob understood something else: that “one man with courage makes a majority.” He showed other university presidents how it’s done — what it means to take a stand, how to effectively communicate your beliefs, and when to put your foot down. In contrast to how M.I.T. handled Professor Abbot’s opinions, he responded to a Chicago campus campaign to have Abbot sanctioned with a reminder that “the University does not limit the comments of faculty members, mandate apologies or impose other disciplinary consequences for such comments, unless there has been a violation of University policy or the law.”
People often note that the Chicago Principles have been adopted by scores of universities, and that’s great. But where Bob’s real legacy lies is in the academic leaders who are finally finding their nerve to stand up to the enemies of intellectual freedom. And, in doing so, he showed that a university president who was morally courageous and intellectually cogent would also attract the best students, inspirit the best faculty and regain the loyalty of doubting alumni — because leaders with courage are leaders with followers.
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In short, Bob created an institutional culture that, as Salman Rushdie once said, serves as a safe space for thought, not a safe space from thought. And my question to you, both in the audience and on this stage, is whether you will take inspiration from it in your own lives and careers.
I hope you do, whether you choose to lead a private or a public life. And I hope you do so by writing your own version of “The Joy of Argument” — which is like a similarly titled book from 50 years ago, updated for an era that has become curiously and depressingly afraid of both. The joy of argument is not about “owning” or “destroying” or otherwise trying to disparage, caricature or humiliate your opponent. On the contrary, it should be about opposition and mutuality, friction and delight, the loosening of inhibitions and the heightening of concentration, playfulness and seriousness, and, sometimes even, a truly generative act.
Yes, I am comparing great arguments to great sex. But the analogy bears a brief follow-through because, in the last analysis, the only way in which we are going to create institutions in which independent thought and free expression flourish isn’t through a declaration of principles, however well constructed it may be — at best, those principles can only lay the ground for what we are trying to achieve. Nor can it be on account of some worthy but abstract goal, like the health of democracy — which, again, is wonderful, but rarely motivates people to action.