In 1990, a group of gay rights
and pro-choice
activists (it is unclear how many,
if any, were students) were
denied the use of campus space
to plan a protest of an upcoming
visit to campus by the Bishop of
Boston. The University officials
may have believed that the protest
being planned would aim to be
aggressively disruptive of the
Bishop's visit. The group refused
to pay a $200 fee for police coverage
of an event open to the
public. Police blocked the meeting
room.
In 1998, an appellate court ruled
that the university had
violated the activists' civil rights
by arbitrarily applying its
facilities use policy, which gave
too much power to deny space on
the basis of the content of a requestor's
message.