Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito addressed students at a commencement ceremony for the Franciscan University of Steubenville, a Catholic college in Ohio, by saying that support for freedom of speech is “declining dangerously.”
He appeared to point the remark at colleges’ response to recent campus protests that were in reaction to Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza.
“Right now in the world outside this beautiful campus, troubled waters are slamming against some of our most fundamental principles,” Alito said. “Support for freedom of speech is declining dangerously.”
“Very few colleges live up to that ideal. This place is one of them … but things are not that way out there in the broader world,” Alito said.
Alito also warned of attacks on freedom of religion to the religious college.
“Freedom of religion is also imperiled,” he told the graduating students. “When you venture out into the world, you may well find yourself in a job, or community or a social setting when you will be pressured to endorse ideas you don’t believe, or to abandon core belie …