Ohio is the latest state whose lawmakers are fielding a bill to protect students from the bias of a left-leaning professoriate. In January, state Sen. Larry A. Mumper introduced S.B. 24, the Academic Bill of Rights for Higher Education.

Mumper told the Columbus Dispatch on Jan. 27 that he believes that 80 percent of professors are "Democrats, liberals or socialists or card-carrying Communists." Some of the language of his bill reads, "Faculty and instructors shall not infringe the academic freedom and quality of education of their students by persistently introducing controversial matter into the classroom or coursework that has no relation to their subject of study and that serves no legitimate pedagogical purpose."

Yet, the language of S.B. 24 is not original. It comes from the playbook of David Horowitz, a conservative activist who has been pitching his eight-point bill of rights across the country. Students are willing to help carry the water and have formed a group, Students for Academic Freedom, with chapters on 135 campuses. The movement is meeting with some success. The student bill of rights has been adapted and introduced in the legislatures of seven states in addition to Ohio: Colorado, California, Indiana, Florida, Georgia, Minnesota and Missouri.

Leading the fight against S.B. 24 is state Sen. Teresa Fedor (D-Toledo), a former schoolteacher and AFT member. She is the ranking member on the state Legislature's education committee and she plans to sponsor hearings on the bill. Republicans have a 22-11 advantage in the Senate. "Ohio is still the battleground state," says Darold Johnson, the Ohio Federation of Teachers legislative staffer.

Last summer, at the AFT's biennial convention, delegates passed a resolution, "Opposition to Outside Control Over Academic Decision Making Under the Banner of Intellectual Diversity." It reads, in part, that "hiring academic professionals on the basis of their ideology, rather than strictly on the basis of their scholarly and teaching aptitude, is inimical to the fundamental concept of the university in our society." A full copy of the resolution can be found at www.aft.org/about/resolutions/index.htm.