Kansas Judge Quits KU Law Over Speaker Controversy

Kansas Supreme Court justice Caleb Stegall is leaving his adjunct position at the University of Kansas, rankled by the way administrators handled a controversy over a conservative speaker.

Stegall, who earned his law degree at KU, taught appellate advocacy at the law school.

Stegall sent a resignation letter last week after he chastised KU administrators for the way they handled a visit by a speaker from the conservative legal group Alliance Defending Freedom, who was invited to campus by KU’s chapter of the Federalist Society. KU administrators reportedly pressured the Federalist Society to cancel the event, according to The Kansas City Star.

The ADF, considered a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center, frequently takes anti-LGBTQ+ positions in legal cases and has been the target of campus protests across the U.S.

“KU Law is not serving its students well—nor is it preparing them to take their place as lawyers in the great conversation (or Kansas courtrooms)—when it engages in bullying and censoring tactics, fosters a spirit of fear, drives dissent into a guerrilla posture, and gives institutional backing and support to overwrought grievances which can and do cripple a persons’ [sic] ability to critically engage with ideas or people with whom they disagree,” Stegall wrote in the letter.

The event ultimately went forward as planned despite student protests.