The Supreme Court has lauded cross-examination as “the greatest legal engine ever invented for the discovery of truth.”  Suzanne Goldberg overlooks the Supreme Court’s praise for cross-examination, attributing this praise instead to a “1904 legal treatise” (“Keep Cross-Examination Out of College Sexual-Assault Cases,” The Chronicle, January 10).

But it is not just long-dead legal writers who view cross-examination this way. The Supreme Court still does, as it declared in its 1999 ruling in Lilly v. Virginia.

Goldberg wants to keep cross-examination out of campus sexual-assault and harassment cases. But doing that can violate state and federal law.

Some state courts have ruled that their state’s Administrative Procedures Act gives accused students the right to cross-examine their accuser. Federal law often confers this right as well. In Doe v. Baum (2018), a federal appeals court ruled that an accused student had a due-process right to cross-examination of his accuser in a college discipline hearing. That court ruling, just like the Supreme Court’s Lilly decision, touted cross-examination as ”the greatest legal engine ever invented” for uncovering the truth.

Colleges cannot ignore these court rulings in favor of accused students’ statutory and constitutional rights, even if Goldberg disagrees with them.

Hans Bader
Former Education Department Lawyer
Arlington, Va.