Marquette U. Professor Who Blasted TA for Gay-Marriage Discussion Is Suspended

An associate professor at Marquette University says he has been suspended with pay for publicly criticizing how a teaching assistant handled the topic of gay marriage in a class discussion, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports.

Last month a student in the teaching assistant’s class confronted her for not allowing more discussion of whether a ban on gay marriage violated the philosopher John Rawls’s equal-liberty principle, after another student suggested it did. The student recorded the conversation, which was reported on by Inside Higher Ed.

It was also the subject of a post on the conservative-leaning blog of a political-science professor, John McAdams. Mr. McAdams said the teaching assistant, Cheryl Abbate, had limited free speech by “using a tactic typical among liberals now.”

In a post published on Tuesday, Mr. McAdams said he had received an email from the dean of the university’s College of Arts & Sciences, Richard C. Holz, telling him that he was suspended with pay and that he should remain off campus “until further notice.”