James V. Shuls speaks with Crosby Kemper III, former director of the Institute of Museum and Library Services, former executive director of the Kansas City Public Library, and co-founder and former chairman of the Show-Me Institute, about the role of American institutions in shaping culture. They explore the impact of libraries, museums, and other cultural pillars on society, the ways in which these institutions influence public discourse and community engagement, the challenges they face in an evolving cultural landscape, and more.

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Produced by Show-Me Opportunity

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Courage does not tremble in the face of coercion. It does not beg for forgiveness for non-existent crimes.  It stands tall in the defense of freedom . . . and in opposition to the dangers of mob rule or jackbooted tyranny.

All of which brings us to the wave of student protests that hit colleges and universities across the country in the fall of 2015. In one college after another, college presidents and administrators capitulated to unreasonable demands and went out of their way to curry favor with unruly protestors. In doing so, the titular leaders of these citadels of higher education acted both unwisely and with a shameful lack of courage.

The wave of protests began at the University of Missouri in Columbia, and it was here that assault on free speech became crystallized in the now-infamous picture of an MU communications professor calling for “some muscle” to bar campus journalists from a public area occupied by protestors.

Showing real courage in the face of taunts and physical intimidation, Tim Tai, a student photographer on assignment from ESPN, refused to leave the scene and asserted his First Amendment right to videotape in a public place—telling the protestors that his desire was to protect free speech for them no less than for himself.

In a quick succession of events in early November, protesters toppled University of Missouri system President Tim Wolfe, who was unpopular for reasons that had little or nothing to do with race. It began when a black graduate student (the son of a wealthy business executive) went on a hunger strike demanding Wolfe’s resignation. A few days later, black football players (coming to the end of a losing season) joined in a sympathy strike—refusing to play and  exposing the university to a $1 million fine if it were forced to forfeit an upcoming game against Brigham Young University. Then head football coach Gary Pinkel (only days before announcing his retirement for health reasons) chose to play Fletcher Christian to Wolfe’s Captain Bligh – supporting his players in the mutiny against a sitting university president. On the very next day, Wolfe resigned—and black football players agreed to end their strike.

Lessons learned?

We are all limited to our own experience, so no one can tell how prevalent bias and racism may be at an institution the size of the University of Missouri (with 35,000 students).  However, putting aside undocumented claims of deep and widespread bias by a few protestors (including a much-trumpeted but spurious report of a large Ku Klux Klan presence on the MU campus), we will cite three lessons.

First, there is a clear free-speech problem at the University of Missouri and other campuses. People are not allowed to express certain opinions, and even media coverage of protesting students is prohibited by those whose self-righteousness is overwhelming.

Second, you can tell that the values of the university have been misplaced—and indeed corrupted—when the football team and its coach play a decisive role in the resolution of a major conflict. 

Third, it seems to us that the obsessive insistence by protest leaders (not just at MU but within the larger Black Lives Matter movement) that almost everything that is wrong in our society reduces to a single problem—white racism and supremacy in an ongoing saga that casts blacks in the role of victims—is not only unfair but truly unhelpful. More than anything else, it is a major distraction in the way of any serious attempt to come to grips with problems that disproportionately affect black people living in poorer neighborhoods—everything from low rates of K-12 educational achievement to high rates of unemployment and crime among black youth, and from government programs that discourage work to the sharp decline in recent decades of intact two-parent families.

At the end of the day, it may be that what happened at Mizzou last November will serve a useful purpose—alerting many people to the danger of falling into an intellectual trap: supporting calls for greater “diversity” that are more realistically described as an attempt to enforce an unquestioning and frightened conformity.

We hope that the new leaders of the university will have the wisdom and courage to reject an anti-free speech conformity that masquerades as a paradigm-busting “diversity.”

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I thought that we as a state were making steady progress toward that end. As I see it, there have been a number of real pluses:

• Over the past couple years, the Missouri legislature responded to a challenging fiscal environment with responsible spending cuts, as opposed to harmful tax increases;
• Missouri is home to a robust Tea Party movement; and
• Missouri fielded a bumper crop of candidates espousing strong free-market principles during the November 2010 mid-term elections.

But now I am wondering how much progress we have really made — given what seems to me the complete abandonment of principle by some self-described conservatives in the legislature. These so-called conservatives have thrown their support behind the proposed bill to grant $360 million in tax credits for the supposed purpose of creating a “China Midwest Hub” or “Aerotropolis” at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport.

This legislation — which may be considered at a special session of the legislature in September — would spawn the largest tax credit subsidy in Missouri history.

The proposed bill is also the epitome of bad public policy. Let me count some of the ways that it fails the test of serving the public good:

• It would take from the many (basically, all Missourians who pay income taxes, as individuals or businesses owners) and give to the few (mostly to owners or developers of warehouses and real estate in designated areas near the airport, some of whom have already received or are in line to receive substantial tax credits);
• The legislation is being rushed to a vote in the absence of anything resembling a serious cost-benefit analysis — and in the absence of any proof the Chinese government or ANY major air carrier is committed to a plan to turn Lambert into a major air cargo hub;
• It therefore represents a huge (and completely misplaced) leap of faith in the ability of our legislators to outsmart and outthink the marketplace in putting taxpayers’ money at risk.

In a positive development earlier this year, top business leaders in the Kansas City metropolitan area called on the governors of Missouri and Kansas to declare an armistice in a senseless “border war” over the use of economic development incentives to poach jobs from one side of the state line to the other. The two-way traffic of companies chasing tax credits has depleted tax revenues in both states without a net increase in wealth or employment. We should all give thanks for this outbreak of common sense.

Now, however, supporters of the Aerotropolis legislation would have us believe that it will create thousands of jobs in the Saint Louis metropolitan area and generate nearly $34 billion in economic activity over a 20-year period — paying back the original investment in taxpayers’ money more than 100 times over. Why, then, is the smart money (private capital) staying on the sidelines? Why hasn’t it acted on its own — given the supposedly fabulous returns cited by supporters?

The answer is clear: The underlying economics is not there. Heavily promoted “investment opportunities” predicated on tax credits or other subsidies are almost always accidents waiting to happen.

A dozen or so years ago, we were told that subsidizing a new runway at Lambert would bring new traffic, and it didn’t. We were also told the Mid-America Airport — deeply subsidized on the Illinois side — would bring huge traffic. Now there is just one subsidized cargo flight a week out of the entire airport.

Karl Marx (not normally someone I quote) said that history repeats itself, “first as tragedy, then as farce.” Let’s hope that history is not about to repeat itself with the misconceived and hugely expensive Aerotropolis legislation.

R. Crosby Kemper III is chairman of the Show-Me Institute, an independent think tank promoting free-market solutions for Missouri public policy.

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