HOUSTON — The University of Houston and a student anti-abortion group settled a lawsuit this week filed two years ago by the organization’s leader, who accused the school of violating the Constitution by not allowing a proposed campus anti-abortion display.

Benjamin Bull, the lead attorney for former University of Houston student and Pro-Life Cougar president Jeanne Tullos, said the settlement was presented to U.S. District Judge Ewing Werlein in Houston yesterday.

“We’re thrilled,” Bull said of the settlement, which was reached June 9. Under the settlement, the university agrees to pay $93,000 in attorney’s fees and to rewrite its policy — which regulates potential disruptions of school operations, such as protests, demonstrations and cell phone use — by June 30.

As part of the agreement, the rewritten policy will allow student demonstrations in Butler Plaza, where they previously were prohibited, said university spokesman Mike Cinelli.

“UH always has and always will support free speech and the free exchange of ideas,” he said. “The question has always been where on campus would this display be allowed. It has never been a question of what the display contained, simply where it would be put up.”

Cinelli said the university limits where displays and protests can take place on campus in an effort to avoid disruptions, which could interrupt classes or university business.

Bull said Tullos and the student group sued because the university was censoring certain groups based on the content of their message. In its lawsuit, the group claimed the school refused to allow its members to display pictures of dead fetuses in high-trafficked areas of campus.

The new policy proposed as part of the settlement will eliminate “any sort of discrimination of student speech based on content,” Bull said. “It broadens basically the entire university to speech instead of funneling it to the fringes of campus.”

Cinelli said the university has designated areas for protests and demonstrations since the mid-1970s. He said universities across the country carefully consider the “time, place and manner of the displays so they have the least disruption.”

The new policy will make it clear that free speech “cannot be prohibited when administrators or faculty disagree with it,” Bull said.

“The university is a marketplace of ideas,” he said. “It exists in order to foster unorthodox and sometimes challenging expression, which threatens conventional thinking. Popular speech does not need the First Amendment. Unpopular speech is what needs to be protected.

“That is the lesson, ironically, the University of Houston needed to learn from this lawsuit.”

In its new policy, the university says it is committed to an environment where “free inquiry and expression are encouraged.”

“The university expects that persons engaging in organized expressive activities will demonstrate civility, concern for the safety of persons and property, respect for university activities, respect for those who disagree with their message, and compliance with university policies and applicable local, state and federal laws,” the proposed policy reads.