The John Seigenthaler Chair of Excellence in First Amendment Studies provides programs to promote awareness and understanding of the First Amendment and to support quality journalism in the state through deepening the experiences of students and partnerships with the community.

The chair was instituted in 1986 to honor Mr. Seigenthaler, the longtime president, editor and publisher of The Tennessean in Nashville and the first chairman of the Freedom Forum First Amendment Center at Vanderbilt University. Mr. Seigenthaler remained a leading nationwide spokesman for First Amendment freedoms until his death at age 86 on July 11, 2014.

Some of the chair's programs

---

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. - The First Amendment