Legal Question in Constitutional Law in Texas

Hi,

My Young Republican club tried to put up posters advertising our meetings and we included a famous Ronald Reagan quote that goes as follows "Republicans believe every day is the Fourth of July, but the democrats believe every day is April 15." We were told by our schools principal we could not put it up because the quote was not "succinct, tasteful or intelligent." I know that the Supreme Court has ruled that free speech in high schools is protected unless it is to lewd or vulgar for the learning environment or if it will cause a clear and predictable disruption in the school. This quote does neither of those things. Our school district and our school both do NOT have policies that restrict students from putting posters containing political speech, or anything else, in hallways. Has our principal has violated our first amendment right to free speech?


Asked on 9/07/16, 4:40 pm

1 Answer from Attorneys
John Mitchell Interaction Law

Although I personally believe Reagan was a terrible President who offered many shallow pithy statements that appealed to the masses while handing over power to corporate interests and making life more difficult for humans, and although I would hope that you learn enough in school to cease being a Republican, based on the facts you have laid out, it does appear that your school principal needs an education, too. The First Amendment is not intended to protect only "succinct, tasteful and intelligent" speech. You hardly need constitutional protection for that. The First Amendment protects offensive, objectionable speech as well. That's what it's for. If you contact your local ACLU, you may find lawyers who, despite disagreeing with your political views, value your freedom to express them enough to advocate for you.

If you want to see how this might play out in litigation (and it should not, hopefully, reach that point), here is a link to a very recent 9/7/16 oral argument in the Maryland Court of Appeals (Maryland's highest court) on the legality of the state censoring a vanity plate that reads "MIERDA," where you will see that, even for judges at that level, the answer may be unclear. http://www.courts.state.md.us/coappeals/media/2016/coa20160907caseno10.mp4

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Answered on 9/08/16, 12:05 am


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