Manhattan Institute calls on Trump to reform universities: They 'have contributed to a new kind of tyranny'
The conservative think tank has published the Manhattan Declaration to condemn the ideological drift seen at the nation’s universities.
Pro-Palestinian students at Brown University
A group of intellectuals, academics and civic leaders have presented the Manhattan Declaration on higher education, which details the ideological crisis that universities are currently experiencing.
For the Manhattan Institute, now, the truth is undeniable. Beginning with the George Floyd riots and culminating with the celebration of the Hamas terror campaign, institutions of higher education finally took off their masks and revealed their true spirit: racism, ideology and chaos.
"The problems of the present age are neither light nor passing. Universities have brazenly, deliberately and repeatedly violated their covenant with the American people. They have engaged in a long series of abuses, evasions, and usurpations that, with each turn of the ratchet, have driven our society toward a new kind of tyranny, in which ideology determines truth and the university functions as political agent of the left," states the Manhattan Institute.
The Manhattan Institute in its statement condemns the ideological drift seen at the nation’s universities:
- Universities have capitulated to the radical left’s “long march through the institutions,” which has converted them into laboratories of ideology, rather than institutions oriented toward truth.
- Universities have violated their commitment to serve in a position above day-to-day politics and, instead, have adopted a narrow political agenda and engaged directly in partisan activism, with particularly disastrous results for the humanities and social sciences.
- Universities have built enormous “diversity, equity, and inclusion” bureaucracies that discriminate on the basis of race and violate the fundamental principle of equality—that high prize which was inscribed in the Declaration of Independence and codified into law with the Fourteenth Amendment and the Civil Rights Act.
- Universities have contributed to a new kind of tyranny, with publicly funded initiatives designed to advance the cause of digital censorship, public health lockdowns, child sex-trait modification, race-based redistribution, and other infringements on America’s long-standing rights and liberties.
- Universities have corrupted faculty hiring practices with racial quotas, ideological filters, and diversity statements, which function as loyalty oaths to the Left and have virtually eliminated conservative scholars from the prestige institutions.
- Universities have degraded the liberal arts with reductive ideologies that no longer aim to preserve and discover what is highest in man, but to unleash resentments against Western civilization, from the Greeks and Romans, to the English and the Americans.
- Universities have ceased to represent the nation as a whole; rather, they have divided Americans into “oppressor” and “oppressed,” and have, in effect, declared war on millions of Americans who simply want to live, work, worship, and raise families in peace.
To that end, the Manhattan Institute has called on Donald Trump to draft a new contract with universities, which should be written into every grant, payment, loan, eligibility and accreditation, and sanctioned by revocation of all public benefits:
- Universities should prioritize truth over ideology, with rigorous standards of academic conduct, controls to prevent academic fraud, and merit-based decisions throughout the institution.
- Universities must cease their direct involvement in social and political activism; the appropriate medium for criticism should be through individual academics and students, not the university as a corporate entity.
- Universities must adhere to the principle of equality without regard to race by eliminating diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) bureaucracies, dismantling racially segregated programs, and ending race-based discrimination in admissions, hiring, promotions and contracts.
- Universities must commit to the principle of free speech, not just in theory, but in practice; they must provide a forum for broader debate and protect faculty and students who dissent from the dominant consensus.
- Universities must maintain the highest standard of civil discourse, with swift and meaningful sanctions, including suspension and expulsion, for anyone who disrupts speakers, vandalizes property, occupies buildings, incites violence, or interferes with university operations.
- Colleges must provide transparency about their operations and, at the end of each year, publish comprehensive data on race, admissions and class rankings; employment and financial returns by major; and campus attitudes toward ideology, free speech and civil discourse.
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The Manhattan Institute's mission
The institute's mission is to promote policies that keep America's cities prosperous, safe and free. It brings together academics, journalists and activists to develop research on issues ranging from education reform to public safety to economic growth.
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