Law & Courts

District’s Discipline Over Drug Banner Violated Student’s Rights, Court Says

By Andrew Trotter — April 18, 2006 2 min read
  • Save to favorites
  • Print

A banner that a Juneau, Alaska, student raised across the street from his high school may have had a pro-drug slogan, as school officials contend, but the principal violated the student’s right to free speech when she snatched the banner away and later suspended him for 10 days, a federal appeals court has ruled.

Joseph Frederick was 18 in 2002, when he stood on the sidewalk opposite Juneau-Douglas High School and held up the “Bong Hits 4 Jesus” banner. He stood among other, sometimes boisterous students as runners carrying the Olympic torch passed by as part of a community event.

Mr. Frederick said afterward that he thought the banner’s message was meaningless and humorous, and that he wanted to attract the attention of television cameras.

Principal Deborah Morse said she grabbed the banner because it contradicted the school’s anti-drug messages, according to court papers in Mr. Frederick’s lawsuit against Ms. Morse and the 5,300-student Juneau school district.

But on March 10, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, in San Francisco, ruled unanimously for Mr. Frederick.

U.S. Circuit Judge Andrew J. Kleinfeld said that the case falls squarely under the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1969 decision in Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District, which upheld students’ right to wear black armbands to protest the Vietnam War as long as school was not substantially disrupted.

The judge distinguished Mr. Frederick’s case from Bethel School District No. 403 v. Fraser, a 1986 Supreme Court decision that backed school officials’ authority to punish a student’s speech at a school assembly that was laced with sexual innuendo, because the speech, in the Supreme Court’s words, “would undermine the school’s basic educational mission.”

Mr. Frederick’s speech was not “vulgar, lewd, and obscene” and did not cause the crowd’s disruptive behavior, Judge Kleinfeld said.

“There has to be some limit on the school’s authority to define its mission in order to keep Fraser consistent with the bedrock principle of Tinker that students do not shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate,” the judge wrote.

The court also held that the principal could be held personally liable in the lawsuit.

In a notice on its Web site, the Juneau district said the decision would make it “much more difficult” to enforce its policies restricting student speech that advocates illegal drug and alcohol use. The district has petitioned the 9th Circuit court to rehear the case before a larger panel of judges.

Related Tags:

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.
Ed-Tech Policy Webinar Artificial Intelligence in Practice: Building a Roadmap for AI Use in Schools
AI in education: game-changer or classroom chaos? Join our webinar & learn how to navigate this evolving tech responsibly.
Education Webinar Developing and Executing Impactful Research Campaigns to Fuel Your Ed Marketing Strategy 
Develop impactful research campaigns to fuel your marketing. Join the EdWeek Research Center for a webinar with actionable take-aways for companies who sell to K-12 districts.

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

Law & Courts Oklahoma Nonbinary Student's Death Shines a Light on Families' Legal Recourse for Bullying
Students facing bullying and harassment from their peers face legal roadblocks in suing districts, but settlements appear to be on the rise
11 min read
A photograph of Nex Benedict, a nonbinary teenager who died a day after a fight in a high school bathroom, is projected during a candlelight service at Point A Gallery, on Feb. 24, 2024, in Oklahoma City. Federal officials will investigate the Oklahoma school district where Benedict died, according to a letter sent by the U.S. Department of Education on March 1, 2024.
A photograph of Nex Benedict, a nonbinary teenager who died a day after a fight in a high school restroom, is projected during a candlelight service at Point A Gallery, on Feb. 24, 2024, in Oklahoma City. Federal officials will investigate the Oklahoma school district where Benedict died, according to a letter sent by the U.S. Department of Education on March 1, 2024.
Nate Billings/The Oklahoman via AP
Law & Courts Supreme Court Declines Case on Selective High School Aiming to Boost Racial Diversity
Some advocates saw the K-12 case as the logical next step after last year's decision against affirmative action in college admissions
7 min read
Rising seniors at the Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology gather on the campus in Alexandria, Va., Aug. 10, 2020. From left in front are, Dinan Elsyad, Sean Nguyen, and Tiffany Ji. From left at rear are Jordan Lee and Shibli Nomani. A federal appeals court’s ruling in May 2023 about the admissions policy at the elite public high school in Virginia may provide a vehicle for the U.S. Supreme Court to flesh out the intended scope of its ruling Thursday, June 29, 2023, banning affirmative action in college admissions.
A group of rising seniors at the Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology gather on the campus in Alexandria, Va., in August 2020. From left in front are, Dinan Elsyad, Sean Nguyen, and Tiffany Ji. From left at rear are Jordan Lee and Shibli Nomani. The U.S. Supreme Court on Feb. 20 declined to hear a challenge to an admissions plan for the selective high school that was facially race neutral but designed to boost the enrollment of Black and Hispanic students.
J. Scott Applewhite/AP
Law & Courts School District Lawsuits Against Social Media Companies Are Piling Up
More than 200 school districts are now suing the major social media companies over the youth mental health crisis.
7 min read
A close up of a statue of the blindfolded lady justice against a light blue background with a ghosted image of a hands holding a cellphone with Facebook "Like" and "Love" icons hovering above it.
iStock/Getty
Law & Courts In 1974, the Supreme Court Recognized English Learners' Rights. The Story Behind That Case
The Lau v. Nichols ruling said students have a right to a "meaningful opportunity" to participate in school, but its legacy is complex.
12 min read
Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court William O. Douglas is shown in an undated photo.
U.S. Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas, shown in an undated photo, wrote the opinion in <i>Lau</i> v. <i>Nichols</i>, the 1974 decision holding that the San Francisco school system had denied Chinese-speaking schoolchildren a meaningful opportunity to participate in their education.
AP