Opinion
Student Well-Being Opinion

Black Armbands for Constitution Day

By Jamin B. Raskin & Mary Beth Tinker — September 07, 2005 4 min read
  • Save to favorites
  • Print

Forty years ago, one of us, Mary Beth Tinker, was among a group of students in Des Moines, Iowa, who wore black armbands to school to mourn the dead in Vietnam and show support for a Christmas truce. Then a student in the 8th grade at Warren Harding Junior High School, Mary Beth was promptly suspended by her principal.

Because the public school is our most pervasive public institution, it is possible to teach a whole semester or yearlong class about the Constitution through school cases.

The Des Moines students, however, stood their ground. Even as Mary Beth’s family received death threats and people threw red paint on her front door, she insisted that she had a right to make a political statement at school.

Four years later, in Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed, holding that students (and teachers) have First Amendment rights at school. Student speech is protected unless it threatens to “substantially” disrupt the educational process. In his majority opinion, Justice Abe Fortas made clear that, far from being disruptive, Mary Beth’s kind of expression—political, respectful, nonviolent—enriched the educational environment.

Americans who go abroad recognize how extraordinary the Tinker decision is. Even in France, a nation that cherishes freedom of expression, public school students are forbidden to make religious or political statements at school through their dress. Although the Supreme Court has cut back on the rights of students somewhat in the intervening years, the Tinker decision still stands as a towering constitutional landmark. It affirms that under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, students have a right to speak truth to power, to express controversial opinions, to tell the community that the emperor has no clothes.

The right of students to speak can make grown-ups nervous. But there is no going back on Tinker, which defines the American approach to education, and even to childhood. Under our Constitution, young people may not be treated as objects of government indoctrination, the way they are treated in authoritarian societies. Instead, they are encouraged to become active and questioning participants in their own education. Their thoughts, feelings, and ideas count.

This month, we have the chance as a society to celebrate the value of student expression. Because of the leadership of Sen. Robert C. Byrd of West Virginia, who keeps a copy of the Constitution in his pocket, a new federal law requires public and private schools and universities that receive federal funding to observe Constitution Day, this year on Friday, Sept. 16. Importantly, the law leaves it up to schools and students to decide how to participate in its observance.

Teaching the Constitution does not have to be boring and abstract. On the contrary, Sen. Byrd’s law school alma mater at American University has taken a lead in showing that the promotion of constitutional understanding can be thrilling to students, and not just once a year. Through the Marshall-Brennan Constitutional Literacy Project, the school sends gifted law students into public schools to teach the Constitution and lead discussions of real cases and controversies that resonate in the lives of young people.

The trick is to teach students the Constitution through cases that affect them directly. American University’s Washington College of Law has designed an entire curriculum around decisions about censorship of student newspapers and yearbooks, locker searches, drug testing of student-athletes, prayer at high school football games, the posting of the Ten Commandments in the classroom, compulsory flag salutes, the inclusion of “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance, desegregation and affirmative action, neighborhood inequities in school financing, the rights of students with disabilities, sexual harassment at school, girls’ participation on boys’ baseball teams, and more. Because the public school is our most pervasive public institution, it is possible to teach a whole semester or yearlong class about the Constitution through school cases.

To become thoughtful citizens, young people need to distinguish between the shrill position-taking that dominates public discourse today and serious constitutional analysis that transcends party lines. This is why Marshall-Brennan classroom volunteers have included not only liberal public-interest lawyers but conservative luminaries such as Judge Kenneth W. Starr, who loyally taught once a week at Anacostia High School in Washington.

The black armband has become a national symbol of respect for student rights. On Constitution Day this year, the Marshall-Brennan project, which has spread to law schools at Rutgers, Howard, Arizona State, and the University of Pennsylvania, will be distributing black armbands to schools, teachers, and students. We will encourage lively conversations about the state of student rights and civil liberties across America.

We will be wearing our Tinker armbands on Sept. 16, and hope that other educators will join us. (Those who don’t wish to make their own armbands can get one by going to www.band-of-rights.org.)

Events

Jobs Virtual Career Fair for Teachers and K-12 Staff
Find teaching jobs and other jobs in K-12 education at the EdWeek Top School Jobs virtual career fair.

EdWeek Top School Jobs

Teacher Jobs
Search over ten thousand teaching jobs nationwide — elementary, middle, high school and more.
View Jobs
Principal Jobs
Find hundreds of jobs for principals, assistant principals, and other school leadership roles.
View Jobs
Administrator Jobs
Over a thousand district-level jobs: superintendents, directors, more.
View Jobs
Support Staff Jobs
Search thousands of jobs, from paraprofessionals to counselors and more.
View Jobs

Read Next

Student Well-Being Opinion How Teachers Can Do Better by Jewish Students This Chanukah
An instructional specialist shares three pervasive mistakes that educators should avoid.
Miriam Plotinsky
4 min read
3d rendering Low key image of menorah Jewish holiday Hanukkah background with candle lights
iStock/Getty + Education Week
Student Well-Being Opinion Is There a Secret to Faster Learning? Here’s What the Latest Research Says
Some students seem to learn quicker than others. But new research reveals that’s largely a myth.
Paulo Carvalho
1 min read
Images shows a stylized artistic landscape with soothing colors.
Getty
Student Well-Being Teen Girls Are Being Victimized by AI-Generated Nude Images
AI-generated deepfake nude images of teens were circulated at a schools in New Jersey and Washington.
5 min read
Dorota Mani sits for an interview in her office in Jersey City, N.J., on Nov. 8, 2023. Mani is the parent of a 14-year-old New Jersey student victimized by an AI-generated deepfake image.
Dorota Mani sits for an interview in her office in Jersey City, N.J., on Nov. 8, 2023. Mani is the parent of a 14-year-old New Jersey student victimized by an AI-generated deepfake image.
Peter K. Afriyie/AP
Student Well-Being How Districts Can Keep After-School and Summer Learning Alive After ESSER Dries Up
Roughly 8 in 10 school districts spent some of their federal COVID relief funds on after-school or summer learning.
4 min read
Multi-ethnic preschool boys playing with blocks.
E+ / Getty