## Facts

- The Minnesota Daily was the student newspaper at the University of Minnesota’s Twin Cities campus and was funded through a mandatory student-activity fee allocation.
- Near the end of the 1978–79 academic year, the Daily published a “humor issue” widely criticized as offensive, including explicit sexual references and a blasphemous satire.
- Following public controversy, the University’s Board of Regents changed the Daily’s funding from a compulsory, non-refundable fee allocation to a refundable system allowing students to request a refund of the portion supporting the Daily.
- The Regents publicly stated the change was meant to accommodate students who objected to being compelled to subsidize a newspaper they did not want.
- Record evidence included statements by Regents expressing that students should not be forced to support a “vulgar and sacrilegious newspaper,” and the refund policy was implemented only on the campus where the Daily operated.
- The Daily’s editors and related plaintiffs sued under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging the funding change was content-based retaliation and viewpoint discrimination.

## Issues

1. Whether a public university violates the First Amendment by changing a student newspaper’s funding mechanism when the change is substantially motivated by hostility to the newspaper’s editorial content.
2. Whether a facially neutral refund-based fee scheme is unconstitutional when adopted selectively and in response to public outrage over protected speech.

## Decision

- The Eighth Circuit reversed the district court and held the funding change violated the First Amendment.
- The court found the record supported a firm conviction that the refund policy would not have been adopted absent the public outcry over the humor issue’s content.
- The court rejected the district court’s reliance on the fact that the Daily’s overall funding increased, holding that the constitutional problem concerned the content-driven restructuring and its chilling effect, not the nominal dollar amount.
- The case was remanded for proceedings consistent with the appellate ruling.

## Legal Principles

- A public university is a state actor bound by the First Amendment when it structures financial support for student expression.
- Although a university need not fund a student newspaper, once it provides support it may not use funding mechanisms to discriminate based on content or viewpoint.
- Indirect burdens on speech—such as restructuring funding to permit withdrawal of support in response to disfavored expression—can violate the First Amendment when motivated by content hostility.
- Evidence of selective application, timing tied to controversy, and decisionmaker statements can establish unconstitutional motive, even where the policy is framed in neutral terms.

## Conclusion

The court held that the University’s shift to a refund-based funding system for the student newspaper was unconstitutional because it was substantially prompted by opposition to the newspaper’s offensive content, amounting to impermissible content-based retaliation through financial control.


Stanley v. Magrath, 719 F.2d 279 (8th Cir. 1983)