25th Annual Bill of Rights
Art and Essay Contest, 2008-2009

TOPIC:  Should students' rights to free speech and
              expression be limited or denied at school?

3rd Prize, Middle School
by J.B. from Pacific Grove Middle School

When the Bill of Rights first became a legal document, some people wondered the limit of the First Amendment right to freedom of speech. Today, many still question the definition of free speech, and a major topic that has been brought before the Supreme Court is the question of whether students should have limited us of the First Amendment. A variety of people think students should be allowed to express what they please at school, or their rights are being violated. Yet, this concept can be debated. Teachers have a main goal of teaching students how to become better citizens, but how can they create good citizens if the school is in constant chaos? When does the right of one student invade the right to the education of another student? If students are under the age of eighteen, should they have limited rights to free speech? Judges have argued these issues in various court cases. Students' rights to free speech should be limited to protect the rights of other students.

Plenty of court cases have been difficult to judge, and Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier in 1988 was no different. This conflict was started when two girls wrote about pregnancy and divorce, two delicate topics, and the principal refused to publish their articles in the school newspaper. The girls claimed they had freedom of speech granted by the First Amendment of the Constitution, and the principal had no right to reject the articles. The principal's defense was that the articles invaded other people's right to privacy. The pregnancy paper had invaded the privacy of the girls who were pregnant in the school at that time, and the divorce article had stated the names of the writer's parents and what had happened between them. On this issue, the principal was correct in not publishing the articles, because the school had ownership of the newspaper and like any other public newspaper, they had a right to refuse the papers. A student has a right to free speech until it overlaps into another person's rights. The difficult, final decision of the court was that the school newspaper could deny the articles.

The right to freedom of speech for students may depend upon the age of the student. This was debated in 1973 in the case of Papish v. the Board of Curators of the University of Missouri. A student at the University was expressing how he felt his rights were violated by handing out a paper to students portraying the Statue of Liberty being raped, and he was expelled for this action. The University stated that the pamphlet was obscene and of a sexual nature, which was not allowed at the school. The student's standpoint was that he had the right to freedom of expression now that he was an adult, and that the school was not in charge of publishing the paper, although the picture was handed out at school. The first court judge decided that the student was simply expressing his feelings and that the expulsion violated the First Amendment, which I agree with in this situation. The final court overturned the First ruling saying that the University did have a right to punish the student, even though he was an adult acting within his First Amendment rights, because he was handing out the offensive pamphlet on school property and disrupted the others students' right to a harassment-free education.

The United States Constitution states that all citizens have a right to free expression and speech. However, to protect students from a chaotic and interrupted education, schools must have stricter rules. School may be a great place to learn the opinions of others and discover what type of person to be, but not to a point where these actions or words adversely affect the rights of another person. In addition, students have freedom of speech outside of class, so students can express themselves then, without crossing someone else's rights in school.

People all over the nation gather to save students' rights and to clarify the Constitution. Students and schools have repeatedly battled in court only to find the Constitution unclear in the area of the First Amendment. Students come to school ready to learn, but if constant disruption from another student's inappropriate behavior is happening at the school, then it distracts them from learning. Unknowing students may think that they can promote smoking, drug dealing, obscene and slanderous language, sexual gestures, and libelous expression. Before students attack schools with their words, thinking the school is crushing their constitutional rights, they should consider if what they are doing is disrespecting others. To protect all students, schools need to act now by limiting freedom of the First Amendment to save the rights of others from being denied.