Was it a valid exercise of free speech — or harassment that the college should have stopped? See what a court decided.

Walter Kehowski, who teaches math for the Maricopa County Community College District, sent three racially charged e-mails to a distribution list maintained by the district.

In them, he said (among other things) “[o]ur survival depends on discrimination” and “if we don’t pull ourselves out of the multicultural stupor, another culture with some pretty unsavory characteristics … will dominate[.]”

One of the e-mails linked to a website Kehowski maintained on the district’s web server.

The site urged “preservation of White majority” and encouraged people to report illegal aliens. It also said that the “persistent inflow of Hispanic immigrants” threatened the United States.

A group of Hispanic employees sued the district, its president, its chancellor and others, claiming they violated Title VII and their equal protection rights by failing to stop Kehowski’s harassing e-mails and website posts.

When a lower court denied a request by the president and chancellor for pretrial judgment on the equal protection claim, they appealed.

The appeals court ruled for the president and chancellor. Public employees have a right to be free of workplace harassment, but Kehowski’s speech wasn’t unlawful harassment, it said.

Their objections were based on his point of view, but the government can’t silence speech just because it promotes ideas that some people find offensive.

“Those offended by Kehowski’s ideas should engage him in debate or hit the ‘delete’ button when they receive his e-mails,” the court said. “They may not invoke the power of the government to shut him up.”

Cite: Rodriguez v. Maricopa County Community College.

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Tags: free speech, harassment, Maricopa County Community College District