COUNTY EDUCATORS SUPPORT 'BONG' RULING

Court Rules Banner Not Free Speech

WASHINGTON -- Some Ventura County school officials were pleased with
Monday's Supreme Court decision slapping down a high school student's
"Bong Hits 4 Jesus" banner, effectively restricting students'
free-speech rights when the message seems to advocate illegal drug use.

While critics were saying the case might chill speech on campuses,
Ventura County Board of Education member Mary Louise Peterson agreed
with the court.

"People reading that (banner) could legitimately interpret that as
promoting illegal drug use," she said.

Tim Baird, superintendent of the Ojai Unified School District, agreed.

"I believe this was a narrow decision that talks about a school being
able to control advocating for drug use on campus," he said. "I
believe the law does give us the right to not allow students to
harass other students, to disrupt the campus, to advocate drug use,
and this was simply a case where it seemed pretty clear-cut to me."

The court ruled 5-4 in the case of Joseph Frederick, who unfurled his
handiwork at a school-sanctioned event in 2002, triggering his
suspension and leading to a court battle.

"The message on Frederick's banner is cryptic," Chief Justice John
Roberts said. But the school principal who suspended him "thought the
banner would be interpreted by those viewing it as promoting illegal
drug use, and that interpretation is plainly a reasonable one,"
Roberts said in the majority opinion.

In a concurrence, Justices Samuel Alito and Anthony Kennedy said the
court's opinion "goes no further" than speech interpreted as dealing
with illegal drug use.

"It provides no support" for any restriction that goes to political
or social issues, Alito and Kennedy added.

Nonsensical Message

In dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens said the ruling "does serious
violence to the First Amendment."

Students in public schools don't have the same rights as adults, but
neither do they leave their constitutional protections at the
schoolhouse gate, the court said in a landmark free speech ruling
from the Vietnam era.

The court has limited what students can do in subsequent cases,
saying they may not be disruptive or lewd or interfere with a
school's basic educational mission.

Frederick said his banner was a nonsensical message that he first saw
on a snowboard. He intended it to proclaim his right to say anything
at all. He displayed it on a winter morning as the Olympic torch made
its way through Juneau, Alaska, en route to the Winter Olympics in
Salt Lake City.

School Principal Deborah Morse said the phrase was a pro-drug
message. Frederick denied he was advocating for drug use and brought
a federal civil rights lawsuit.

Pepperdine University School of Law Dean Ken Starr, whose law firm
represented the school principal, argued the case in the Supreme
Court. He called it a narrow ruling that "should not be read more broadly."

"I think the opinions all taken together are going to be quite
protective of free speech by students," Starr said.

In their concurrence, Alito and Kennedy said the ruling does not
address free speech on political or social issues such as the wisdom
of the war on drugs or of legalizing marijuana for medicinal use.

Stevens said the First Amendment protects student speech if the
message itself neither violates a permissible rule nor expressly
advocates conduct that is illegal and harmful to students.

"This nonsense banner does neither," Stevens said.

Kris Krane, executive director of Students for Sensible Drug Policy,
called it "sad" that the court thinks there should be a drug
exception to the First Amendment.

Lawsuit Cost Family

Frederick, now 23, said he later had to drop out of college after his
father lost his job. The elder Frederick, who worked for the company
that insures Juneau schools, was fired in connection with his son's
legal fight, the son said. A jury recently awarded the father
$200,000 in a lawsuit he filed over his firing.

The younger Frederick, who has been teaching and studying in China,
pleaded guilty in 2004 to a misdemeanor charge of selling marijuana
at Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Texas,
according to court records.

- -- Staff writer Stephanie Hoops contributed to this report.