The Freedom of Professor’s Lecturing: Focusing on Study on the Decision 2014Do3923 of the Supreme Court of Korea

This paper attempted to identify the possibilities and limits of restrictions on the freedom of professor’s lecturing, which is a constitutional right under the Korean Constitution, through a commentary on the Supreme Court's 2014Do3923 decision. The core issue of the 2014Do3923 decision commented in this paper is whether the professor's conduct of lecturing by distributing press articles unfavorable to a presidential election candidate as part of the lecture content and method can be considered a violation of the Public Official Election Act, in relation to academic freedom, especially the freedom of professor’s lecturing. Among academic freedoms, which are constitutional rights guaranteed under the Korean Constitution, there is little in-depth prior research on the scope or degree of protection, restrictions, and limits on the freedom of professor’s lecturing. The significance of the Supreme Court's 2014Do3923 decision is summarized as follows. First, this decision is significant as the first Supreme Court’s ruling regarding restrictions on the freedom of professor’s lecturing and its limits. In particular, there were almost no court rulings or decisions of the Constitutional Court that directly address the relationship between the freedom of professor’s lecturing and positive law or deal in depth with the content, possibility of restrictions, and limits of the freedom of professor’s lecturing. In this respect, the Supreme Court's 2014Do3923 decision directly addresses the relationship between the freedom of professor’s lecturing and the Public Official Election Act, and argues in depth the content of the freedom of professor’s lecturing, the possibility of restrictions, and its limits. It can be positioned as the ‘first’ Supreme Court ruling that ‘directly’ addresses the possibility of restrictions, and its limits. Second, the legal principles regarding the restrictions on the freedom of professor’s lecturing and their limits presented in this ruling can present theoretically and practically meaningful judicial judgment standards in actual cases related to the freedom of professor’s lecturing in the future.