Last week, a three-judge panel said it was peachy-keen for a school to forbid students to wear shirts with the image.....ready?........
...of the American flag.
When I read that, I shook my head so rapidly, you could blend paint colors in my mouth .
Legal expert Jonathan Turley explores the issue:
1. "An Inconvenient Symbol: Why The Flag Decision Flies In The Face Of Our Core Values
2. ... the ruling out of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit over a ban at a California high school of students wearing tee-shirts....
......students who came to Live Oak High School outside San Jose were rounded up by teachers for engaging in offensive speech.
The speech? They had American flags on their T-shirts, something the school viewed as insulting to Hispanics. Administrators insisted that only the Mexican flag could be shown on campus that day.....not shirts with American flags during the Mexican heritage celebration Cinco de Mayo.
3. .... a ruling that would allow flags and other patriotic symbols to be banned like profanity or hate speech.
4 ... the ruling is not a sign of contempt for the flag but a sign of contempt for the rights of students. The fact that this speech concerns the flag itself (the very symbol of civil liberties) captures how far the courts have gone in abandoning core First Amendment rights for students.
5.. .... Live Oak High was concerned about prior disruptions and saw the American flag as incendiary and disrespectful. Accordingly, Assistant Principal Miguel Rodriguez ordered students to change their shirts or turn them inside out to hide the flag.
6. Judge M. Margaret McKeown of the Ninth Circuit ruled, Our role is not to second-guess the decision to have a Cinco de Mayo celebration or the precautions put in place to avoid violence. What they did is second-guess the First Amendment and the precautions put in place to protect it.
7.... the Ninth Circuit decision was handed down days from the anniversary of the 1969 decision in Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District. In Tinker, the court supported the free speech rights of students who were wearing black armbands in protest of the Vietnam War, a highly divisive issue that had resulted in violent clashes around the country. Then, the court insisted that students did not shed their constitutional rights at the schoolhouse gate.
a. Since Tinker, however, the federal courts have not only stripped students of their free speech rights at the schoolhouse gate, they also have done so at their bedroom doors. Federal courts have upheld a series of cases where school officials have punished students for statements that they make outside school on social media. The current members of the Supreme Court have fueled this rollback in their own controversial decisions.
8.... the court entirely misses the distinction between speech and conduct.
When presented with threats of violence, the school should punish those who engage in harassing or violent acts. .... One would have thought that those who made threats would face action from the school administration.
Removing any display of the flag in the face of violence is akin to removing gay students to avoid harassment or girls to avoid sexual assaults.
9. Live Oak High is teaching students that it is the speech, not those who threaten the speakers, that is the problem. Citizens shaped in such an environment are likely to view speech as a discretionary privilege allowed by our government rather than an individual right guaranteed in our Constitution.
10. ... the flag is the very symbol of a nation of differing faiths, cultures and races bound by liberty. Perhaps the school was right: If you are going to deny free speech, it is the last thing you want to see."
An Inconvenient Symbol: Why The Flag Decision Flies In The Face Of Our Core Values | JONATHAN TURLEY
Make no mistake: any who voted for the current administration voted to empower them to curtail free speech.
Imagine.....there are actually adults who bought the lie that this President is some sort of 'constitutional scholar.'
Quite the opposite.
...of the American flag.
When I read that, I shook my head so rapidly, you could blend paint colors in my mouth .
Legal expert Jonathan Turley explores the issue:
1. "An Inconvenient Symbol: Why The Flag Decision Flies In The Face Of Our Core Values
2. ... the ruling out of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit over a ban at a California high school of students wearing tee-shirts....
......students who came to Live Oak High School outside San Jose were rounded up by teachers for engaging in offensive speech.
The speech? They had American flags on their T-shirts, something the school viewed as insulting to Hispanics. Administrators insisted that only the Mexican flag could be shown on campus that day.....not shirts with American flags during the Mexican heritage celebration Cinco de Mayo.
3. .... a ruling that would allow flags and other patriotic symbols to be banned like profanity or hate speech.
4 ... the ruling is not a sign of contempt for the flag but a sign of contempt for the rights of students. The fact that this speech concerns the flag itself (the very symbol of civil liberties) captures how far the courts have gone in abandoning core First Amendment rights for students.
5.. .... Live Oak High was concerned about prior disruptions and saw the American flag as incendiary and disrespectful. Accordingly, Assistant Principal Miguel Rodriguez ordered students to change their shirts or turn them inside out to hide the flag.
6. Judge M. Margaret McKeown of the Ninth Circuit ruled, Our role is not to second-guess the decision to have a Cinco de Mayo celebration or the precautions put in place to avoid violence. What they did is second-guess the First Amendment and the precautions put in place to protect it.
7.... the Ninth Circuit decision was handed down days from the anniversary of the 1969 decision in Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District. In Tinker, the court supported the free speech rights of students who were wearing black armbands in protest of the Vietnam War, a highly divisive issue that had resulted in violent clashes around the country. Then, the court insisted that students did not shed their constitutional rights at the schoolhouse gate.
a. Since Tinker, however, the federal courts have not only stripped students of their free speech rights at the schoolhouse gate, they also have done so at their bedroom doors. Federal courts have upheld a series of cases where school officials have punished students for statements that they make outside school on social media. The current members of the Supreme Court have fueled this rollback in their own controversial decisions.
8.... the court entirely misses the distinction between speech and conduct.
When presented with threats of violence, the school should punish those who engage in harassing or violent acts. .... One would have thought that those who made threats would face action from the school administration.
Removing any display of the flag in the face of violence is akin to removing gay students to avoid harassment or girls to avoid sexual assaults.
9. Live Oak High is teaching students that it is the speech, not those who threaten the speakers, that is the problem. Citizens shaped in such an environment are likely to view speech as a discretionary privilege allowed by our government rather than an individual right guaranteed in our Constitution.
10. ... the flag is the very symbol of a nation of differing faiths, cultures and races bound by liberty. Perhaps the school was right: If you are going to deny free speech, it is the last thing you want to see."
An Inconvenient Symbol: Why The Flag Decision Flies In The Face Of Our Core Values | JONATHAN TURLEY
Make no mistake: any who voted for the current administration voted to empower them to curtail free speech.
Imagine.....there are actually adults who bought the lie that this President is some sort of 'constitutional scholar.'
Quite the opposite.