The president and the president-elect of the American Association of University Professors congratulate themselves on getting arrested for blocking traffic in Manhattan.

Never before in its 91-year history have the officers of the American Association of University Professors heard the call to be arrested in the line of duty. But there we were — Cary Nelson and Jane Buck, incoming and outgoing AAUP presidents and close friends — on a New York street on April 27 waiting to be handcuffed and taken to a police station and booked. The AAUP, adding a professional to a basic human right, long ago joined the United Nations in recognizing that all employee groups have the right to choose for themselves whether to be represented collectively.

The whole thing is quite a tale of heroic civil disobedience, conveniently recounted by . . . the heroes themselves.

Putting that aside, has anyone noticed how many new “basic human rights” keep cropping up on campuses? I suppose it’s a useful rhetorical device if you’re trying to extend emergency-contraception subsidies, or defend racial preferences, or climb the next rung of the perpetually escalating “living wage” . . . or browbeat a school into recognizing a union for graduate students.