The Crimson reports today that the University supports the dropping of criminal charges against the four protesters who disrupted a speech by FBI director Robert Mueller at the Kennedy School.

“The University is persuaded that more could have been done in the circumstances to apprise the students that they were in jeopardy of arrest,” said a statement released by Harvard last night. “Without condoning the students’ behavior at the Forum, broader principles have led the University to request that the criminal charges against the students be dropped.”

Isn't that a bit like asking the police to read a suspected criminal his Miranda rights before making the arrest?

Apparently because the statement was released late at night—an attempt to bury it, I suppose—the story is short on important details, such as:

Who at Harvard released this statement? Mass Hall? College dean Dick Gross?

What, exactly, are the broader principles involved? The right to shout down an invited speaker?

For, if you watch the video of the event, you can see that that is exactly what occurs.

It will be interesting to see the full text of this statement from the University, but my instinct is that Harvard is making a mistake here.

The students involved are facing a month in jail or a $50 fine. Good. Let them face the legal consequences of their intrusion. Otherwise, how can protest have any seriousness?

I'm sure the protesters are well-meaning. But they seem to have an inflated opinion of themselves and a superficial understanding of the nature of their actions.

“We are looking forward to getting back to our lives,” [protester Michael] Gould-Wartofsky said.

No. After spending some time in the Birmingham jail, Martin Luther King was looking forward to getting back to his life. After 27 years in prison, Nelson Mandela was looking forward to getting back to his life. After a few hours in the Harvard University Police Department, you do not get to say that you are looking forward to getting back to your life.

Here's what one protester, J. Claire Provost, concluded: “In a way it was good to have such an issue made out of this case so that it highlights the issue that we were trying to highlight through our protest—the issue of suppression of civil liberties and the importance of free speech."

Provost says that she and her colleagues are protesting on behalf of free speech...by repeatedly shouting down a speaker in a public forum. If she is aware of the irony, she gives no sign.

“We hope that this will be the last prosecution of peaceful protesters that ever happens on Harvard’s campus,” Gould-Wartofsky said.

But shouting down a speaker is not a peaceful act; it is a violent one. It is aggressive, threatening, unnerving, disturbing, disruptive, and upsetting. And this is precisely why these students chose that route—because they thought that such a disruptive action would be more effective than, say, carrying picket signs outside the school.

Yes, shouting down a public speaker on private property is a form of protest. Just not a protected one.

It will be interesting to hear on what grounds Harvard University defends the violation of free speech.