On the Use of Cambridge Officers to Police Political Demonstrations at Institutions of Higher Learning

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Over the last week in the City of Cambridge, students of Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have joined a growing student movement at campuses across the country of peaceful assemblies gathering to protest the ongoing atrocities in Gaza, including at Tufts, Emerson, Columbia, NYU, Brown, USC, UC- Berkeley, UNC Chapel Hill, Yale, UT Austin, Emory University, the University of Minnesota, and the University of Michigan; and

These peaceful assemblies reflect the diversity of their respective campuses, including large Muslim and Jewish contingents, and are united in their opposition to the Israeli assault on Gaza; and

Universities elsewhere, including Columbia, NYU, Yale, USC, Emory, Northeastern, Emerson, and UT Austin, have staged violent crackdowns on these peaceful protests, calling police on their students and faculty, and arresting and suspending hundreds for exercising their constitutional rights; and

The City of Cambridge is obliged by law and conscious to uphold the freedoms of speech and peaceful assembly safeguarded by the Constitutions of the United States and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts; and

The Public entrusts a proportion of their authority and wealth to the Cambridge Police Department in order to fairly, impartially, transparently, and consistently protect the Public, maintain the peace, and enforce the restrictions and rights of the law; and

An institution of higher learning’s ability to enforce its code of conduct, resolve internal discord, and achieve a desired public image is not a prerogative of the Public, nor the law enforcement officers it has deputized; and

The use of local law enforcement to resolve these and similar forms of internally defined dysfunction is inherently an imposition on the Public, which in the context of demonstrations or expression of a political nature, may cause the Public to suffer a breach of constitutional liberties thereby exposing the City of Cambridge to costly litigation, damages, and disrepute; now therefore be it

ORDERED: That the City Council go on record urging the City Manager and the administrators of MIT and Harvard to respect the rights of students to advocate for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, and to protest the complicity of their academic institutions and government with the atrocities being endured by the people of Gaza.

History: 04/30/24

City Council

CHARTER RIGHT

Next: 05/06/24