Campus free expression takes hit in Supreme Court decision

The U.S. Supreme Court sided with a school administration of a Morgan Hill, California high school  in leaving in place a ruling that they acted correctly in asking students to remove shirts with images of American flags during Cinco de Mayo. The administration was concerned that given a history of tension and fighting between whites and Hispanics that the shirts might incite violence and a federal appeals court agreed with them. (Reuters, March 30, 2015, by Lawrence Hurley)

The lawyer for the students’ parents said it was a poor decision, “It essentially means that American public schools can silence patriotic expression whenever it offends anti-American students, or students who prefer to identify with their cultural or national origins. This is a tragic outcome.” (San Jose Mercury News, March 30, 2015, by Howard Mintz)

Eugene Volokh, who filed an amicus brief in the case on behalf of Mary Beth Tinker and her brother John, said the decision validated the “heckler’s veto” that whenever there was a reasonable threat of violence from student speech, school authorities could ban the speech. (The Volokh Conspiracy in The Washington Post, March 30, 2015, by Eugene Volokh)