Keyishian v. Board of Regents of the University of the State of New York
385 U.S. 589 (1967)
by
Leigh Arnold

Five faculty members from the privately owned and operated University of Buffalo found themselves becoming state employees when their employer merged with into the State University of New York that was operated by the State of New York. In order to continue their employment they had to comply with a New York plan that was designed to prevent “subversive” people from being state employees. Each one of four of the employees was asked to sign “a certificate that he was not a Communist, and that, if he had ever been a Communist, he had communicated that fact to the President of the State University of New York.” They refused to sign and were notified that failure to sign was grounds for dismissal. The four employees were dismissed. The fifth employee fell under another category so he was asked to answer the following question in writing

“Have you ever advised or taught or were you ever a member of any society or group of persons which taught or advocated the doctrine that the Government of the United States or of any political subdivisions thereof should be overthrown or overturned by force, violence or any unlawful means?”

The employee refused to sign and was also dismissed. The five employees felt that the state program violated the United Constitution. The state program was designed to enforce the Feinberg Law which was developed to enforce the 1917 Education Law that enforced the dismissal of an employee from the public school system for "the utterance of any treasonable or seditious word or words or the doing of any treasonable or seditious act" and the Civil Service which prohibited the civil service or employment in the education system of any person who supported the overthrow of the government.

Lower courts upheld the laws and the dismissal.  The Supreme Court reversed  those decisions and declared  the Education Law and the Civil Service Law were unconstitutional because of their vagueness in wording and their over breadth. An example of the vagueness was in the words “seditious acts.” It was unclear what was considered a seditious act. The issue of over breadth came when the Feinberg Law stated that membership in the Communist Party was grounds for dismissal.

According to the Court the vagueness and over breadth of the laws were a “hazard of loss or substantial impairment” of rights given by the First Amendment rights of the United States Constitution and thus the Supreme Court overturned the decisions of the lower courts.