WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Tuesday turned down appeals from two Pennsylvania school districts that were successfully sued by students who posted on the Internet malicious mockeries of their school principals.
The court’s action puts school officials on notice they may be violating the First Amendment if they try to discipline students for online posts made from their home computers.
Last year, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that school officials cannot police “off-campus speech” by students unless they can show it caused a major disruption at school. Based on that standard, the appeals court upheld free-speech lawsuits by the students over profiles of their principals that one judge called “lewd and vile.”
In one case, an eighth-grade girl posted a mock profile of her principal with his photo that called him a “sex addict” who enjoyed “hitting on students” on his office. In a second, a high school senior from western Pennsylvania profiled his principal on MySpace as a drug user and referred to the principal using slurs.
After the students were briefly suspended, they and their parents sued the school districts, citing the First Amendment.
A national coalition of school administrators and counselors had urged the high court to take up the issue. They said the “explosion” of social media had blurred the lines between on-campus and off-campus speech. And they argued that the Constitution “does not demand that school officials remain idle in the face of vulgar and malicious attacks.”
But without comment, the high court turned away appeals not only from the Pennsylvania schools but also from one in West Virginia. In the latter case, a student’s online attack was directed against another student.
The court also turned down an appeal that sought to allow a greater use of Christian prayers at county council meetings.
The justices let stand a ruling holding a North Carolina county board violated the First Amendment’s ban on an “establishment of religion” by opening its sessions with a Christian prayer. The judges agreed, however, the board could have a nondenominational prayer at each session.
Other court news
Texas redistricting: The state of Texas defended in court its election maps for congressional and state assembly districts as the U.S. sought to block the plan, alleging it discriminates against Hispanic voters. A lawyer for Texas urged a federal court in Washington on Tuesday to sign off on the state’s redistricting proposal, saying the boundaries drawn on the maps comply with the Voting Rights Act. Legal challenges over the maps are under consideration by three federal courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court.
Death-penalty protest: Fourteen people were arrested at the Supreme Court on Tuesday for protesting the resumption of the use of the death penalty in the United States. Such protests are banned on the court’s plaza. The protests are timed to mark the year of the 35th anniversary of the execution of Gary Gilmore, who protesters hold up as the first person executed under the Supreme Court’s upholding of the death penalty in 1976.
Denver post wire services
