Background
Summary and Questions
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In
May 1983, students in the Journalism II class at Hazelwood
East High School in St. Louis, Missouri, created the final
edition of the school paper, the Spectrum. Before publishing
the paper, they submitted it to their advisor, Howard Emerson,
so he could review it. Emerson was new to the job, so he followed
the procedures of the previous advisor. Those guidelines required
him to give Principal Robert Reynolds, the opportunity
to review the paper before it was published.
When Principal Reynolds reviewed the paper, he found two articles
that concerned him. The first dealt with the issue of teen
pregnancy. It included comments from pregnant students at
the school. To protect their privacy, names were not given.
However, when Reynolds read the article, he realized that
the details in the article would make it easy for other students
to identify the pregnant teens. The second article addressed
the issue of divorce. Like the first article, this one included
personal articles. One student, whose parents were divorced,
made negative comments about her father. She said that her
father was always out with the guys and that her father didn't
spend enough time with the family. Principal Reynolds was
troubled by the fact that the father had not been given a
chance to defend himself by responding to his daughter's comments.
He also noticed that the article mentioned sex and birth control.
He did not think that students in ninth grade should be reading
about sex and birth control.
Reynolds wanted the journalism students to modify the articles.
However, it was almost the end of the school year. If they
took the time to revise, they would miss the deadline for
publishing the newspaper. If that happened, the other students
might never get to read the paper. He felt like he had to
act quickly, so he told Emerson to delete the two pages with
the offending articles and publish the rest of the Spectrum.
He told his supervisors about this decision and they agreed
with him.
The students had worked hard on the paper and felt that they
had followed proper journalism procedures. If they had been
approached about the problems, they may have been able to
correct them. They were upset to find out instead that two
pages, which included a number of nonoffensive articles, had
been deleted. They felt that their First Amendment rights
had been violated. They took the case to the U.S. District
Court for the Eastern District of Missouri.
The Court did not agree with the students. In the ruling,
the judges said that school officials may impose limits on
students' speech in activities that are "an integral part
of the school's educational function" as long as their decision
"has a substantial and reasonable basis". In other words,
the Court felt that if the school has a good reason to do
so, it can place limits on curricular activities, such as
the publication of the school newspaper.
Unhappy with the outcome, the students appealed their case
to the Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit Court. This
court reversed the decision of the lower court, saying that
the students' First Amendment rights were violated. In the
opinion, the Court explained that the newspaper was part of
the school curriculum but was also a "public forum". As a
public forum, the newspaper was "intended to be and operated
as a conduit for student viewpoint". Because the paper was
a forum for student discussion, the principal or other officials
could censor it only when "necessary to avoid material and
substantial interference with school work or discipline .
. . or the rights of others".
The school appealed the decision of the Court of Appeals and
the Supreme Court of the United States agreed to hear the
case. In determining whether or not students' rights were
violated, it would consider whether or not the student newspaper
was a public forum and whether the First Amendment "requires
a school affirmatively to promote particular student speech".
Questions to Consider:
- Why
did the newspaper advisor give the paper to Principal
Reynolds for review? Was that standard procedure?
- What
concerns did Principal Reynolds have regarding the two
articles? Were these legitimate concerns? Were there other
ways that the principal could have handled the situation?
- Do
you think Principal Reynolds was justified in deleting
the two pages of the paper? Should a principal be able
to censor student newspapers? If so, under what conditions?
- What
rights did the students believe had been violated?
- Were
there any steps the students could have taken other than
filing a lawsuit?
- Should
a principal or other school authority be able to silence
other forms of student speech? If so, under what conditions?
How does speech by an individual student differ from speech
by the school newspaper?
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