A FAILURE FOR FREE SPEECH

The Supreme Court's recent ruling on a high school free speech
question seems legally correct but morally regrettable.

Legally correct because, confronted with the question over who has
final authority on school grounds for student behavior, the court is
duty bound to uphold the supremacy of elected school boards and top
administrators,

Morally regrettable because, in practice, the decision undermines
rather than expands student appreciation for free speech rights and
responsibilities and often places teachers and other classroom
advocates at odds with administrators and school board members.

The 5-4 ruling holds that students standing on a Juneau, Alaska public
street watching the Olympic torch pass through town en route to the
2002 Winter Olympics in Utah had no free-speech right to unfurl a
banner that read, "Bong Hits 4 Jesus."

School administrators read this as endorsement of, even advocacy for,
illegal marijuana use in violation of stated school policy and
educational mission. When the student refused to take the banner down,
he was suspended for 10 days.

One troubling consequence of the decision is that it seems to go
against the high court's 1969 decision that teenagers wearing arm
bands to school to protest the Vietnam War do not "shed their
constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the
schoolhouse gate."

Another even more troubling consequence is the disdain demonstrated by
Justice Clarence Thomas in his majority opinion, wherein he found
"farcical" the very notion that students hold First Amendment rights
beyond those liberties granted them by school authorities. The other
majority justices at least split hairs, ruling against the students'
advocating an illegal action.

To which a dissenting Justice John Paul Stevens wisely asked his
colleagues how they would rule when the next banner unfurled reads
"Wine Sips 4 Jesus."

This is just the kind of troubling web the court spins when it
constricts rather than expands basic rights.