In Mitchell v. Univ. of N.C. Bd. of Governors, decided April 4 by the North Carolina Court of Appeal, Prof. Alvin Mitchell, "Associate Professor of Justice Studies in the Department of Social Sciences" at Winston-Salem State University, was fired in part based on a letter he sent to Department of Social Sciences co-chair (Dr. Denise Nation). The key facts, from the majority opinion by Judge Toby Hampson, joined in relevant part by Judge Valerie Zachary:
[S]ometime during the 2016-2017 academic year, two students in Petitioner's Research Methods class conducted research to draft a paper. The students learned about a conference in New Orleans—the Race, Gender & Class Conference—where they could present their findings. They approached Dr. Nation to obtain funding to attend the conference, but she did not approve the funding, instead recommending a different conference by the American Society of Criminology (ASC). One of the students believed that Dr. Nation may have encouraged the students to look into the ASC conference because it was primarily Caucasian. When Petitioner learned of the conversation, he wrote a letter to Dr. Nation in response:
Hi Denise, it was brought to my attention that you told a student that the conference I and two of my students are presenting at has no substance or standards, meaning that it is useless and unaccredited, and anyone can present. In addition, you told the student she should try to present at the ASC held in November because it is a better conference and has a lot of substance. You are entitled to your opinion. However, you should not be telling the student things like that, especially with no proof. The Race, Gender & Class conference is locally, regionally, and internationally known and ha[s] scholars from around the world presenting. In addition, the conference has been in existence for over 20 years. Thirdly, this conference does not take anyone. You have to be accepted through their process. It is amazing how you always try to debunk what I do. Yet you complain that I tell students negative things about you. It would have been better to tell the student that you did not want to help fund her instead of telling her falsehoods about the RGC conference and asking her to present on scholarship day. That is not appropriate behavior as a chair.
After all these years, it is amazing that you still think that anything white is better. I looked up the ASC and nothing but a bunch of white men (some white women) are running it. Keep promoting and praising those white folks who are associated with the ASC. As I told you before, you can graduate from and praise their schools, come up with a great theory, hangout with them, praise Latessa and other European professors (you need to ask them about their civil rights record), wear their European style weaves, walk with their bounce, hire them, present at their conferences, and even publish in their journals. In their eyes you will never be equal to them. They still look at you as a wanna be white, an international nigger, an international coon, and an international sambo (lol) because you display that kind of behavior. You will never get it. Wake up.
Mitchell argued that his letter was protected from employer retaliation by the First Amendment, but the majority said no; under the Supreme Court's cases related to public employee speech, such speech is unprotected by the First Amendment unless it deals with "a matter of public concern," and the majority thought this didn't qualify:
