## Facts

- The Dartmouth Review, an off-campus nonprofit student newspaper, and three white student staff members sued Dartmouth College, its Committee on Standards, and college officials.
- The Review published articles strongly critical of two professors, including a Black professor, William Cole.
- The student plaintiffs approached Cole after class to request a response, carrying a camera and tape recorder; they alleged Cole yelled profanities, broke camera equipment, and physically threatened one student.
- Cole contacted the Committee on Standards, which brought disciplinary charges against the students for harassment and disorderly conduct.
- Plaintiffs alleged Dartmouth administrators publicly accused the students of racism, supported protests by Black students, conducted an unfair disciplinary process, and imposed harsher discipline on the white Review staffers than on Black students involved in related campus events.
- Plaintiffs filed federal claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1981 and Title VI, alleging Dartmouth discriminated against them because they were white.

## Issues

1. Whether the complaint stated a plausible claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1981 that Dartmouth intentionally discriminated against the plaintiffs on the basis of race in a manner affecting protected rights, including the right to make and enforce contracts.
2. Whether the complaint stated a plausible claim under Title VI that Dartmouth, as a recipient of federal financial assistance, intentionally discriminated against the plaintiffs “on the ground of race” in administering its disciplinary process.

## Decision

- The First Circuit affirmed the district court’s Rule 12(b)(6) dismissal for failure to state a claim.
- The court treated well-pleaded factual allegations as true but disregarded legal conclusions and characterizations presented as facts.
- The court held the complaint’s core assertions of anti-white discrimination were largely conclusory and did not plead facts supporting the required elements of either § 1981 or Title VI.
- The court concluded the pleading described a contentious campus dispute and disciplinary grievance, not actionable federal race discrimination.

## Legal Principles

- On a Rule 12(b)(6) motion, courts accept well-pleaded factual allegations as true but need not accept conclusory assertions, rhetoric, or labels as substitutes for facts.
- A § 1981 claim requires nonconclusory factual allegations of intentional racial discrimination within the statute’s substantive scope, including interference with protected contractual rights.
- A Title VI claim requires nonconclusory factual allegations that the defendant acted with discriminatory intent and that the challenged conduct occurred in a federally funded program or activity “on the ground of race.”
- Assertions that a disciplinary process was unfair or that officials were hostile, without specific facts plausibly tying adverse action to race-based intent within the statute, do not state a federal civil rights claim.

## Conclusion

The First Circuit affirmed dismissal because the complaint relied heavily on rhetoric and generalized accusations and did not plead specific, nonconclusory facts showing that Dartmouth intentionally disciplined the plaintiffs because of race in a way that violates § 1981 or Title VI.


The Dartmouth Review v. Dartmouth Coll., 889 F.2d 13 (1st Cir. 1989)