Testing the Limits of Free Speech for Students

In this case, I was interested in the fact that Kenneth Starr refered to the Olympic Torch Relay as a "school sanctioned event." In fact, the Rally was sponsored by Coca-Cola and other private groups and drew a crowd of citizens. The high school did release their students for the event, and there were administrators and teachers among the students, but the student Frederick had not been in attendance at school that morning.

I feel that the case rests on whether this was an actual field trip in which students are expected to conform to a code of conduct, also whether the conduct itself was disruptive to the lessons, and whether or not the banner itself was "political" speech. Under the Tinker case, political speech is protected unless it's disruptive and that is the legal rule that the Supreme Court was asked to uphold.

I didn't think that the banner was political. I saw it as humerous, perhaps poking fun at the student clubs, or having a group of the high school student trying to get attention for themselves.

While the augument could be made that the students had to conform to the normal code of conduct, the Supreme Court was asked to make it's ruling based on the content of the banner. It was argued that the banner glorified drug use, in conflict with the district policies of education to prevent drug abuse. So, it wasn't that the banner itself was considered disruptive, it was the thoughts conveyed on the banner that the high school principal was disturbed by. The message "Bong Hits 4 Jesus" as Frederik told CNN, was "just a joke."

The student says that he was being deliberately provacative to test his free speech rights. In an telephone conference with reporters on March 2, 2007, just prior to the Supreme Court ruling, Joseph Frederick said “I conducted my free speech experiment in order to assert my rights at a time when I felt that free speech was being eroded in America. “The high school I attended advocated that the Constitution and the Bill of Rights did not apply to students. I was skeptical of my own free speech rights and I wanted to know more precisely the boundaries of my freedom. I guess we'll get to find that out soon.”

I did not see this public rally as a controlled field trip. Therefore, as a public event, this student was free to exercise his normal guarenteed rights of speech, political or otherwise. For instance, if he and his friends had worn a t-shirts that said "Bong Hits for Jesus," they would not have been suspended for ten days, or told to remove their clothes. In an earlier case, the Supreme Court has already given guidelines in which "Students, for example, cannot be punished merely for expressing their personal views on the school premises whether in the cafeteria, or on the playing field, or on the campus during the authorized hours unless the school shows that the speech would substantially interfere with the work of the school." Hazelwood, 484 U.S. at 266 (quoting Tinker, 393 U.S. at 512-13 .)

The School Board claimed that the banner was a reflection on the school administrators, and that if they didn't punish the student they would be accused of condoning the message of the banner. However, the public is understanding enough to know that this banner was the work of a student, on his own volition, and had nothing to do with what is being taught in school, other than the principle of free speech.The school felt that the banner had changed the message of the event and appeared to endorse or promote drug use, which was contradictory to the mission of the school. In a classroom, if a student were to stand up and take out a banner, that would disrupt the class and would be subject to punishment. But in the case of the public display of a humourous and nonsensical banner, nothing was disrupted. The rally continued and the school day continued.

In the Amicus Brief of the Student Press Law Center, they quoted a legal precedent "There is, of course, no constitutional exception for subject-altering speech. The government may not select which issues are worth discussing or debating in publicfacilities. Carey, 447 U.S. at 463."

Inside the classroom, I think that students should be allowed the freedom to state their opinions or their questions freely, even controversial ones. Where abusive languages comes into the picture, a treacher should also have the freedom to protect the rights of the victims of verbal abuse. The problem comes in when one person's right to free speech steps on another person's right to be protected from harassment or hatespeech.

I value the freedom of speech that we enjoy in the United States. I know that in many parts of the world, our freedoms are envied. The laws that protect my ability to state my opinions in a wide variety of public forums, and in the privacy of my own home as well are extremely important and worth defending, and testing, so that future generations will enjoy the same hard won freedoms we have.

Final Fantasy Congress Post

My team ended up #12. I was a little dissapointed by my "Change Agents," expecially Ruben Hinojosa who didn't score any points on legislation. Also, the Rookie Rahm Emanuel surprised me because I thought that as a leader in the Democratic Party, he would be more aggressive. But I now think that both these players are more of a backup team members and in order to get support on bills, you need a lot of those! I learned that there are people who are the "stars" in the Congress, people who are the front persons to lead major efforts to pass legislation. I also learned that many bills get introduced by one person but never gained much support. The legislators can then tell their constituants that they are busy introducing bills, even if those bills don't go anywere at all. That was very interesting to see.

I also learned that senority is a huge factor in who sponsors legislation. The Upper Senators were, far and away, the ones who introduced the most legislation. I imagine that many of their bills might come from a more collaborative process, but that these senior leaders are asked and expected to be the front person.I think that the game is very instructive but only if the student takes the time to get out of their game page and browse the site. One thing that could draw in more understanding is if there was a news crawl at the bottom of every page, like the stock ticker on TV, that would show the bill numbers that had some new activity that week. They already do show those on the "Research Legislation" page, but if it was spruced up into a real time crawl, that might grab more attention and encourage clickthroughs to learn more about those individual bills.