Pennsylvania student editors tussle with administration over ban of ‘Redskins’

Pennsylvania high school editors are bucking the school’s administration in claiming the First Amendment right to ban the word “Redskins” in publishing their school’s newspaper. Redskins is the name of their athletic teams.  The administration claims that advertisers and the newspaper staff have a free speech right to see the word, which the newspaper editors say is racist and “a term of hate,” published in the Nashaminy Playwickian . (Student Press Law Center, November 22, 2013, by Sara Gregory)

The administration ordered the editors to accept ads with the word pending a hearing over the issue. The Washington Redskins professional football team is enduring ongoing criticism for holding onto the name. A rebranding the owner says would be expensive as team paraphernalia, contracts and logos would all have to be changed. (The New York Times, November 15, 2013, by Francis X. Clines)

Writing in The Philadelphia Inquirer, November 5, 2013, Steve Young praises the students for their open-minded and carefully considered decision to strike the Redskins name and castigates the Washington Redskins owner for his narrow focus.