New Hampshire

As UNH hosts rally against Gaza war, lawmakers weigh campus free speech protections • New Hampshire Bulletin

Published

2 years ago

April 26, 2024

As UNH hosts rally against Gaza war, lawmakers weigh campus free speech protections • New Hampshire Bulletin

As campus demonstrations protesting Israeli actions in Gaza continue across the country, New Hampshire lawmakers are seeking to regulate how public colleges and universities respond to questions of free speech.

House Bill 1305 would insert freedom of speech rights on college campuses into state statute. The bill would establish that outdoor areas of campuses “shall be deemed public forums for members of the campus community” and would limit how much colleges and universities could bar demonstrations there.

The bill would also prevent public colleges and universities from discriminating against any religious, political, or ideological student organizations, even if the organization requires members to adhere to its beliefs, standards of conduct, or mission.

Proposed by Rep. Daniel Popovici-Muller, a Windham Republican, the bill follows similar campus speech legislation passed in other states. It was introduced partly in response to instances where conservative or Christian organizations in New Hampshire say they have been held back from participation on campus.

But it also comes against a backdrop of student demonstrations over the Israel-Hamas war that have divided campuses outside of New Hampshire, and that have prompted police crackdowns and fierce debate over the last week.

On Thursday evening, the student organization Palestine Solidarity Coalition UNH held a rally at Thompson Hall Lawn at the University of New Hampshire in New Hampshire.

HB 1305 is not in effect; the bill passed the House in March and has yet to receive a vote in the Senate. Representatives of the University System of New Hampshire have argued that they already have free speech policies that adhere to much of what is in the bill.

Others have taken issue with the provisions of the bill that apply to student organizations, arguing that the bill would prevent universities from banning groups that are discriminatory or exclusionary of certain groups.

But supporters say if signed by Gov. Chris Sununu, the bill would provide clearer guidelines for how administrators could act during difficult campus speech situations.

“What we’re doing is putting this into state law, so that universities are fully on notice – they know exactly what’s expected of them,” said Tyler Coward, lead counsel for the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, which advocates for free speech on campus.

The current rules

To some free speech advocates, HB 1305 is merely putting into law practices that colleges and universities should already be following. The 1989 U.S. Supreme Court case Ward v Rock Against Racism set a standard that a government or public authority can impose restrictions on the time, place, and manner of an event as long as they are content-neutral and narrowly tailored.

HB 1305 would codify that doctrine, allowing a public higher education institution to “maintain and enforce reasonable time, place, and manner restrictions” on events, so long as they were both content and viewpoint neutral, meaning that they apply to all groups. That means that a college could set a time limit for a demonstration, or set limits on how close to other buildings protestors could stand.

By some metrics, UNH already has strong freedom of speech protections in its policies. The university received third place in the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression’s national rankings for free speech in 2024, the second time in three years. Those rankings rely on surveys to determine whether students on campus feel free to voice their opinions as well as the university policies themselves.

One of those, UNH’s Outdoor Events and Assemblies policy, states that organizers of any demonstration expected to draw more than 25 people must apply for a permit to do so. To get a permit they must obtain permission from the Durham Fire Department, the chief of UNH police, the relevant manager of grounds and roads, and other campus officials depending on location.

Demonstrations are not allowed everywhere; UNH’s policy states that they include areas open to the public “that do not serve a specific educational, administrative, research, health, residential, dining, athletic, or recreational purpose.”

A divide over student clubs

Despite UNH’s high rankings for free speech, supporters of HB 1305 argue the state should include protections in statute – and should add new protections for student groups. That argument was driven by incidents involving conservative students.

In 2022, a group of students at the University of New Hampshire Franklin Pierce School of Law attempted to create the “Free Exercise Coalition.

The campus club would bring together students who subscribe to a belief “that it is OK for law students to have traditional Christian values” and to share those values, Jeff Ozanne, a UNH law student and current president of the club, told lawmakers in testimony this year. But the students received tough scrutiny from the Student Board Association, whose members raised concerns that those beliefs could be discriminatory, Ozanne said.

That same year, a different organization, the Christian Legal Society, also struggled to obtain recognition from the SBA and faced similar concerns that their mission and required beliefs would discriminate against others, including LGBTQ+ students.

Facing resistance, the groups sought help from a national organization standing for freedom of religion, the First Liberty Institute, which lobbied for UNH administrators to override the Student Board Association and approve the groups anyway, Ozanne said.

HB 1305 is in part designed to prevent that resistance, supporters say.

But critics of the bill have pointed to the UNH law school disputes as examples of the potential for universities and colleges to be required to approve groups that could discriminate against other viewpoints.

“It would allow student organizations to exclude others from membership based on race, gender identity, sexual orientation, or any other discriminatory beliefs and receive the same benefits as other student organizations, including financial support paid for through tuition, fees, and state taxes,” argued Rep. David Luneau, a Hopkinton Democrat.

Student demonstrators occupy the pro-Palestinian “Gaza Solidarity Encampment” on the West Lawn of Columbia University on April 24, 2024, in New York City. (Michael M. Santiago | Getty Images)

Unclear applications to pro-Palestinian protests

HB 1305 is designed to require free speech protections on New Hampshire campuses. But amid arrests this week at campus protests at Columbia University in New York, Harvard University, University of Texas at Austin, and others, supporters of the bill say it wouldn’t necessarily prevent those same outcomes in New Hampshire.

While the bill would prohibit New Hampshire public colleges from creating “free speech zones” that would limit protest activity to certain areas, it would still allow for colleges to disband demonstrations if they “materially or substantially disrupt the functioning” of the institution.

That includes instances where one person or group “significantly hinders” another’s ability to express themselves in the same space, including through violent or unlawful behavior, or the use of threats. The bill also would prevent harassment, defined as “expression that is unwelcome, so severe, pervasive and subjectively and objectively offensive, that a student is effectively denied equal access to educational opportunities or benefits” on campus.

Sen. Tim Lang, a Sanbornton Republican, said that provision is designed in part to prevent activist groups from shutting down speaking events on campus by shouting down speakers or otherwise creating an unsafe environment. “The idea behind what’s called a heckler’s veto,” he said in an interview.

But the provisions could also be used to justify crackdowns on other forms of protest, too.

After pro-Palestinian student demonstrators set up encampments at Columbia University, President Minouche Shafik authorized the New York Police Department to enter campus last Thursday and make arrests, arguing that some demonstrators had used antisemitic language and threats against Jewish students, creating a threatening atmosphere.

In Texas, Gov. Greg Abbott directed State Police to make arrests at the University of Texas at Austin Wednesday. Both Shafik and Abbott have been criticized by free speech advocates for the enforcement actions.

Coward said that theoretically, New Hampshire’s proposed law could allow for similar action, depending on the type of speech and action taken by demonstrators. Addressing the protests outside New Hampshire, FIRE has called on universities to respect peaceful student protests but it has also advised students not to engage in violent behavior.

But Coward also noted that the New Hampshire bill includes a recourse for students to sue a public college or university if they feel that the statute was violated, and to receive up to $20,000 in damages plus attorney’s fees if successful.

“This bill just makes it easier (for students ) to get into state court and to vindicate their rights in state court,” he said. “I think that’s important.”

Lang argued that the bill was designed to protect most speech, but not all speech.

“That protest can’t be calling for the end of the Jewish state,” he said. “Because now you’re stepping into hate speech or discriminatory speech. But they can call for a ceasefire. Pro-Palestinian people can call for Israel to stop. And the same with … the Jewish League could get up and say we want them to stop.”

In a statement Thursday, UNH said it was “deeply committed to the safety of our campus community” and “similarly committed to its role as a public university in protecting free speech on campus.”

“We are responsible, however, for ensuring an individual’s speech is allowed to occur safely,” the statement read. “The bar for any public institution to restrict, or allow others to interrupt, an individual’s speech is, and should be, very high.”

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New Hampshire

Canterbury NH library saves big with insulation upgrade – Concord Monitor

Published

12 hours ago

November 23, 2025

Press Room

Canterbury NH library saves big with insulation upgrade – Concord Monitor

Rachel Baker is going to have to think of a new present for library staffers this holiday season.

“For Christmas I would always buy them sweaters… just to keep them warm,” said Baker, who has worked at Canterbury’s town library for 20 years, the last five as its director.

Holiday sweaters, ugly or otherwise, won’t be needed this year because the building, a converted cinderblock fire station, now has something that most buildings take for granted: insulation.

“When I say it had zero insulation, I mean zero. I have pictures!” said Baker. “You could see Mt. Kearsarge through my roof… There was no caulking around my windows, none.”

Library Director Rachel Baker discusses the formerly-leaky windows at Elkins Public Library in Canterbury, NH. Credit: UNITIL / Courtesy

That problem was solved during a five-day session in April, when crews from Northeast Air Sealing of Concord crawled through the roof and otherwise gained access to fill leaky air spaces and, in industry parlance, tighten the building envelope.

“They did the ceiling, all the walls, around the windows. They did it without us having to move the books out — they were brilliant,” Baker said.

Elkins Public Library at 9 Center Road moved into the former fire station in 2004 as part of a town-wide municipal building project, but initial plans for radiant heating were dropped, leaving just a propane furnace. Patrons and staffers have shivered through winters ever since.

The roughly $20,000 cost of the improvements was mostly covered by NH Saves, a program funded by New Hampshire utilities using ratepayer money that supports a variety of energy efficiency work, with the help of a $7,210 energy efficiency incentive from Unitil. Baker said town resident Tom Flaco did the heavy lifting on getting the assistance.

The improvements are expected to lower the library’s annual energy usage by approximately 1,515 gallons of propane, saving around $4,500 a year.

The arrival of cold weather means people will be able enjoy the library without having to put on fingerless gloves and break out the space heaters, but even during the heat of summer, Baker noticed an unexpected improvement.

“Acoustics was the biggest difference,” she said. The uninsulated cinderblock building had allowed outdoor noise to intrude even as it reflected indoor noise. “We didn’t notice that until it was gone — it was so much quieter.”

The director has an extra reason to enjoy the upgrade because she grew up in Canterbury where her father, Dale Caswell, was fire chief.

“I knew this building intimately. I spent my childhood in this firehouse,” she said. Seeing it take on a new life has been a treat: “It’s a gorgeous space. We have so much room here.”

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New Hampshire

Lawsuit challenges New Hampshire’s voter ID requirements – Valley News

Published

1 day ago

November 22, 2025

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Lawsuit challenges New Hampshire’s voter ID requirements – Valley News

Soon after Joshua Bogden attempted to register to vote on the day of Portsmouth’s municipal elections Nov. 11, he faced a tough decision.

Bogden had not brought along a passport or birth certificate to prove his citizenship. And though he had previously been registered and voted in Wilton, poll workers told Bogden he needed to leave and return with one of those physical documents.

Bogden could either drive to city hall and request a same-day copy of his birth certificate, or rush home and find his own copy. But he had only hours until the polls closed, and only minutes before Portsmouth stopped its birth certificate service at 4:30.

In the end, Bogden decided to drive home and chance that he could find the certificate, he said during a press conference Thursday. He did find it and was able to vote. But the hassle he faced is at the center of arguments by some that recent changes to New Hampshire’s voter registration laws are too strict and will result in frustrated voters choosing not to vote.

“Luckily, I lived nearby,” he said. “But if there had been any more sort of traffic or anything in my personal life — going home to pick up the kids, trying to do this after work — there’s no way I would have been able to come back and vote successfully.”

Since a new law took effect November 2024, New Hampshire voters are required to produce hard copies of citizenship documents the first time they register to vote in the state. The law eliminated the previous option for voters registering on Election Day to sign a “qualified voter affidavit” that allowed them to vote without proving citizenship by testifying on penalty of perjury that they were a U.S. citizen.

Republican supporters of the law, House Bill 1569, say the new requirements are reasonable and necessary to close loopholes that could allow non-citizens to vote, and that voters should prepare by obtaining their citizenship documents in advance

Lawmakers also passed a follow-up law in 2025, House Bill 464, that allows local election officials to access the Statewide Voter Registration System, New Hampshire Vital Records, and Division of Motor Vehicle databases in order to attempt to corroborate a resident’s citizenship.

But a number of voting rights groups are suing in federal court to block the law, arguing it creates an unconstitutional burden and that it will disenfranchise eligible voters, especially those for whom obtaining a passport or birth certificate could be difficult.

In the meantime, the October and November municipal elections have offered a fresh look into how the new law might affect voting in practice.

According to a tally by the New Hampshire Campaign for Voting Rights, 123 voters were turned away from the polls due to a lack of documents. Combined with the 121 residents the group reported were turned away for the same reason during town meetings in spring, at least 244 people were turned away in 2025, the group says.

Voting rights advocates and Democrats argue those tallies are a cautionary tale for the state ahead of the September 2026 state primaries and the November 2026 midterm federal election. Many more people are likely to vote in those elections, and many more who don’t bring along their citizenship documentation could be turned away, advocates warn.

They hope U.S. District Court Judge Samantha Elliott, who is presiding over the lawsuit, will issue an injunction ahead of the midterms. A full evidentiary trial in that case is expected in February.

At Thursday’s press conference, advocates attempted to show the difficulty posed by the new documentary requirements, which election law experts have called the strictest in the country.

In addition to Bogden, Brayden Rumsey, a Dover voter, said he had to drive home to retrieve his passport in order to vote Nov. 11. Rumsey was not aware of the new citizenship documentation requirements; he had assumed that showing a REAL ID driver’s license would suffice, since to obtain it he had been required to show his passport.

“I have my own car. I have my own way of getting there. I don’t have any kids to take care of. I have access to a passport and access to my birth certificate that I could easily get,” he said. “I know a lot of people don’t have that privilege like I do.”

And Michael Blanchette, who recently moved from Concord to Manchester, said he had called the city ahead of the Nov. 11 election to get confirmation of his citizenship using his previous registration and presence on the voter database. But despite that confirmation, Blanchette said he was still asked for citizenship documentation at the Manchester Ward 7 polls, and had to wait an hour for multiple election workers and city officials to clear him to vote.

“(I knew) if I went back home and took my pain meds, I was not coming back out,” he said. “And it was now or never. So I stuck through it. I didn’t realize it would just drag on.”

Linnea Hartsuyker, a supervisor of the checklist in Dover’s Ward 5, said she had seen at least one prospective voter leave and not return once learning of the requirements.

Hartsuyker said the 2025 law providing election workers access to the state voter file proved helpful, allowing her to verify at least those voters who had already registered. That remedy would not have worked for new voters who moved from out of state, she said.

“Last year at the general (election) I and my team registered 50 people per hour for 12 hours,” she said. “That’s almost one person per minute with the old system, and I am quite worried about being able to do that in the coming election, at the midterms.”

Access to those state databases might vary from polling place to polling place depending on internet availability and the amount of time and manpower available during a rush of voters, critics say. Rumsey and Blanchette said workers at their polling places did not appear to have direct access to those databases, necessitating calls to city hall officials.

It is not clear how the apparent tallies of voters turned away from voting might affect the trial in next year’s lawsuit.

In a July 29 ruling, Elliott ruled that some of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit, filed in 2024, lacked standing because their experiences did not directly demonstrate a potential unconstitutional barrier to voting. But she granted standing to other plaintiffs, such as the Coalition for Open Democracy, the League of Women Voters of New Hampshire, the Forward Foundation, and three plaintiffs who were minors but planned to register to vote when they turned 18 and said the need to procure documentation was a burden.

The Attorney General’s Office has defended the law and said the constitutional challenges are not substantiated. In a Nov. 7 memorandum asking Elliott to dismiss the case, Assistant Attorney General Michael DeGrandis argued that the law struck a balance between allowing every eligible person to vote and safeguarding the process from fraud.

“New Hampshire pairs that open access with commonsense eligibility checks so only the votes of eligible voters are counted,” DeGrandis wrote. “Striking this balance is essential to guarantee an election system that is both welcoming and vigilant in protecting the integrity of the ballot.”

And he wrote that the law does not impede the organizations suing, and that the individual plaintiffs “have not offered competent evidence of cognizable injuries.”

“It is Plaintiffs’ burden to come forward with definite, competent evidence of injury, causation, and redressability, but they have not,” DeGrandis wrote.

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