Students, Speech & Politics, 2008 Edition
Justin Bathon on Tuesday, September 23, 2008 at 5:10PM 
Well, its official, another political season is upon us and with it comes another round of student speech cases. Here is the first one I have seen this season. An 11 year old in Aurora, Colorado wore a shirt that said "Obama is a terrorist's best friend." Here is a picture and here is a video of the student defending himself. The student is claiming the school violated his First Amendment rights when they told him to remove it.
So, inflammatory? Disruptive? Seventy-nine percent of the 20,500 votes in the news story's poll of the issue thought it was not appropriate for the school to punish the student. Anyway, I guess we will find out. The father has promised to file a lawsuit (but I like the school's chances).
h/t Scott McLeod
Update: Eugene Volokh disagrees with me on liking the school's chances.
Reader Comments (2)
Why do you like the school's chances? Is there any evidence of actual and substantial disruption? Absent that, since it's pure political speech, it's going to be awfully hard for the school to make the "reasonable fear of substantial disruption" argument...
I actually like their chances on inflammatory (or plainly offensive, or vulgar, whatever they choose). I don't think this gets to the Tinker test - I think Fraser will do the job here, even the somewhat reduced Fraser after Morse. Even if it does somehow get to Tinker, I am sure the district will be able to come up with something disruptive that happened in the minutes or hours that the student was wearing the shirt in school - a big assumption without knowing more facts, but it is hard for me to see how this does not disrupt the school in some way. Alternatively, the school could cite to instances where such political statements disrupted other schools or cite to previous disruptions in the district. After watching the video, I think it is reasonably likely this particular student has been disruptive in this way in the past. Plus, this is Colorado and the 10th Circuit, which seem more apt to find a reason to back the school here. That is just my feeling, though. I see the good arguments on the other side and certainly the Bush International Terrorist case would cut the other direction. But, that was a high school case and this is an elementary school. Anyway, I just like the school's chances here. This seems like one of those cases where the judge is going to be looking for a reason to find for the school.
Thanks for the tip on the case, though, Scott.