Former University of Chicago President Robert J. Zimmer led the South Side institution for 15 years as a champion of free speech on campus at a time when the notion was being widely challenged.
“Fundamentally, people are very comfortable with free expression for those that they agree with. And for those that they find disagreeable or wrong, they’re not that eager to have people be able to hear them,” Mr. Zimmer said in 2021. “The whole point of education is focused around ongoing intellectual challenge and open discourse.”
