COMMON SENSE - AND GOOD LAW - PREVAILS IN STUDENT-SPEECH DISPUTE

School administrators can gain from a recent court decision some
much-needed guidance on how to react to student voices they dislike.

The good news for students -- and for all Americans -- is that this
newest legal lesson supports more speech instead of placing more
limits on student expression.

A landmark 1969 U.S. Supreme Court decision -- Tinker v. Des Moines
Independent Community School District, involving students and Vietnam
War protest armbands -- put forth the idea that young citizens don't
automatically surrender their First Amendment rights at the schoolhouse door.

But since then, courts at various levels have set about defining when
and how officials legally could shut down student expression. A
number of those legal limits have been driven by security, education
or drug-related concerns.

No principal, no superintendent -- and no judge, for that matter --
wants to be the person whose inattention, inactivity or decision
results in another Columbine-style massacre. Judges have recognized
that teachers cannot teach and students cannot learn amid chaos or
fear. And the dangers of drug use are painfully obvious.

Still, in various cases in just the past five years, students have
been silenced because the message was politically incorrect or
offended administrator sensibilities or community views. After
voicing or writing sharp political views about the war in Iraq or
illegal immigrants or gay rights or after penning provocative
illustrations involving Old Glory, students have been told to sit
down, shut up and wait their turn as citizens until they leave school
- -- or face suspension or worse.

Many disputes are settled out of court, more often than not with an
apology to the student and reinstatement. But the 8th U.S. Circuit
Court of Appeals weighed in on Sept. 2 with a common-sense decision
supporting the rights of students to object to -- of all things -- a
school policy.

A three-judge panel agreed that school officials in Watson Chapel,
Ark., violated the constitutional rights of three students in 2006
who were disciplined for wearing black armbands or wristbands to
school to protest a new policy enforcing school uniforms, and for
handing out a flier objecting to the policy.

The administrators agreed in court that the student protest did not
disrupt classes or order at the school.

The 8th Circuit panel said that despite restrictive decisions since
it was handed down, including the 2007 Supreme Court decision in the
so-called "Bong Hits for Jesus" case, "Tinker remains good law."
Students in both Tinker and the Watson Chapel case were exercising a
right of protest against a government policy -- something officials
in every school ought to celebrate by example, not denigrate.

Advocates for student expression have feared that school officials
and lower courts would expand legal controls into other areas of
student free expression based on the ruling in that "Bong Hits" case.
In that case -- officially called Morse v. Frederick -- the high
court said officials may clamp down on student speech regarded as
encouraging drug use.

School officials in Arkansas even argued that the subject matter was
too mundane to get constitutional protection. The decision in the
Watson Chapel case, however, squarely affirms that nondisruptive
student speech, be it on issues of international interest or on local
policies such as school uniforms, is protected by the First Amendment.

In an era in which educators struggle to motivate students to think
critically, and to instill basic American values of good citizenship,
arbitrarily denying basic rights to speak out, to write in protest,
to assemble and to peaceably "seek redress" seems wrongheaded.

Students should learn about First Amendment freedoms in the classroom
rather than the courtroom.