Alabama Public University Professors Must Now Call Gulf of Mexico "Gulf of America" (Except When Speaking on "Historical" Questions)
From HB2, which was enacted last month:
Beginning October 1, 2026, all state and local entities and their employees shall be required to do all of the following:
(1) Refer to the body of water that borders the coast of Alabama as the "Gulf of America."
(2) Reflect the "Gulf of America" terminology in all newly created maps, documents, educational materials, websites, official communications, and other resources.
(3) a. Make reasonable efforts to update all pre-existing resources owned by state and local entities, including, but not limited to, official state maps, documents, educational materials, websites, and communications under their jurisdiction to reflect the name change, where practicable.
b. The requirements of paragraph a. shall not apply if compliance would impose an operational or financial burden on the state or local entity and their employees.
Nothing in this section shall prohibit a public K-12 school or public institution of higher education from using the term "Gulf of Mexico" within a larger course of academic instruction when reasonable for historical purposes.
A few thoughts:
[1.] If the statute is interpreted as applying to all speech by employees, or even all speech by employees while at work, including informal conversations with colleagues, it will likely be unconstitutional. Government employees have a First Amendment right to refer to geographical locations however they please in talking to colleagues, unless the reference damages the efficiency of the workplace. It's highly unlikely that a typical conversation in which someone says "Gulf of Mexico" will be viewed as sufficiently harmful to workplace efficiency.
[2.] When it comes to speech that is part of the job—writing text for a government web site, corresponding with the public, and so on—then the government is indeed generally entitled to dictate which words are used. That is also true as to K-12 education.
[3.] But when it comes to public university professor speech in the classroom, the Eleventh Circuit (the federal appellate court to which Alabama cases go) has held that professors have a broad First Amendment academic freedom right to choose how to teach their classes. That's the conclusion of Pernell v. Fla. Bd. of Governors (11th Cir. 2026), which struck down Florida's Stope WOKE Act as applied to university teaching.
And while Pernell involved a ban on teaching that endorses particular viewpoints, and HB2 just mandates a particular phrase, that mandate is itself viewpoint-based: It mandates the use of a particular term that expresses a particular perspective (that the Gulf of Mexico should be seen as specially American) and forbids the use of a term that expresses other perspectives (e.g., that the U.S. government can't unilaterally change the names of such geographical entities). By way of analogy, imagine a law that required university professors to use the term "Zionist Entity" instead of "Israel"; that too would mandate the expression of a particular viewpoint, and restrict the expression of other viewpoints.
Nor is the law saved by the "when reasonable for historical purposes" exception. Professors are entitled to use "Gulf of Mexico" to refer to that body of water when talking about the present, not just when talking about the past.
[4.] I appreciate the argument that public university professors, like other government employees, speak on behalf of their government employers, and the government can thus dictate what they say as part of their jobs. The Pernell majority disagreed with that argument, but Judge Barbara Lagoa's dissent endorsed it.
Yet even if Judge Lagoa is right, and the law doesn't violate the First Amendment rights of public university professors, I think it wrongly interferes with academic freedom (the professional concept even if not a First Amendment rule), and helps promote a stultifying environment in public universities.
University classrooms should be a place where professors are allowed to express their own viewpoints, viewpoints that disagree with colleagues and deans and legislators. Doubtless some restrictions on professor speech (e.g., personal insults of students, or off-topic rants) are permissible. But mandating the use of one ideologically laden label instead of another promotes orthodoxy rather than the diversity of thought that universities should promote.