A Supreme Court Fight For Students' Free Speech Rights
A Supreme Court Milestone for Students’ Free Speech Rights: www.aclu.org/blog/free-speech...
In 1969, a group of public school students protesting the Vietnam War made First Amendment history that stands strong to this day.
Mary Beth Tinker and John Tinker grew up in Iowa, where their father was a Methodist minister.
When they were teenagers in 1965, they started to see horrific news about the escalating war in Vietnam, thanks to the brave journalists reporting there. Young people we knew in Des Moines started to be sent to war - and they were coming home in coffins.
They decided to wear black armbands to school to send a message of mourning for the dead in Vietnam on both sides and support for a Christmas truce. The school suspended them and three others for wearing the armbands.
The Iowa Civil Liberties Union said that was a violation of their First Amendment rights and told them to try to negotiate with the school board to change the policy. When the board voted to continue the ban on armbands, the national ACLU took the case to court on behalf of them and another student, Chris Eckhardt.
Dan Johnston, a young lawyer also from Des Moines and just out of law school, argued the case. After defeats at the lower courts, he won 7-2 at the Supreme Court on February 24, 1969. “It can hardly be argued that either students or teachers shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate,” the majority opinion said.
The court went on to affirm the freedom that young people have under the Constitution: In our system, state-operated schools may not be enclaves of totalitarianism. School officials do not possess absolute authority over their students. Students…are possessed of fundamental rights which the State must respect, just as they themselves must respect their obligations to the State.
There are still limits on what students can do in public schools. Under the ruling, students can’t violate rules that aren’t targeted at expression, like attendance policies, as long as their school is applying the rules equally, regardless of whether students have broken them to protest or for other reasons. And students can’t “materially disrupt” the functioning of their school, though what’s considered disruptive can depend on the situation.
Over the years, students have protested everything from apartheid in South Africa to a ban on dancing. And of course there were 2018’s massive student protests that followed the shooting massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.
Schools aren’t supposed to only teach things like math and science - they’re also supposed to prepare students to participate in society. The ability to speak out and make up your own mind through freedom of expression lies at the core of what it means to live in our society, and it wouldn’t make sense for public schools to try to stop students from learning to exercise their speech rights. A half century after the Supreme Court recognized that truth, it’s important now more than ever.
Пікірлер: 65
What a great story of standing up for what you believe!
Im doing this for homework for covid
@ruhathe6940
4 жыл бұрын
Me too
@DjVade9
3 жыл бұрын
@@ruhathe6940 same\
@HighQualityCarter
3 жыл бұрын
Same lol
A must see video for anyone that wants to understand their full rights as a resident of this country. Do not stand for censorship, ever!
@Cryptic_Keeper
4 жыл бұрын
Unless it's your rival that doesn't agree with you.
@jaydagoat1316
4 жыл бұрын
@@Cryptic_Keeper Lol for sure
@Godz_Girl
6 ай бұрын
Their opponents say the ACLU is a left-wing organization that uses the courts to subvert the Constitution, protect criminals, and attack religion. They contend that the ACLU advances an extremist agenda, and is a threat to the United States.
@Godz_Girl
6 ай бұрын
ACLU is bad for America
Thank you for standing up for what was right
I love the art here, who drew and animated this?
Did not wear armbands either. We were not in DC on January 5th.
Tinker v Desmoines (1969) Roosevelt High school suspended students that wore black armbands to protest against the Vietnam War - students suspended saught for help from the Iowa Civil Liberties Union Lawyer - the Lawyer suggested that students should sue the school board for violating student's 1st Amendment right Case was first taken to the federal district court in Des Moines, but lost there - then appealed to supreme court and won 7-2 Supreme Court Justice Abe Fortas declared that Neither schools or teachers "shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the school house gate." Thank you ACLU, and thanks to Ms. Tinker and Mr. Tinker for standing up for their constitutional rights.
Wonderful video! So proud of these fellow Iowans!
Happy Anniversary!
During the era depicted in this video, I enlisted in the US Army. I experienced many events that shaped my more than fifty years of life since. One of which was the bitterness and screams of the students attending the same college where only two summers back I had been the president of the most outrageous (and fun!) fraternity on campus. Returning to campus in uniform allowed me to feel and understand that hatred has no parent, loyalty, ethic, or honor. Hatred is an opportunist, and position is secondary to the addictive tang of anger. The efforts of my life since those days have centered about making reason--the seeking of answers to problems that are founded in some truth and unburdened by personal fears--the criteria for problem solving. And so I made documentary films with the Soviet Union and watched The Discovery Channel as this ex-Army captain rode on the Russian tanks he had been trained to fight many years before. Today I hold a new camera, and smile wondering if it will, as of old, produce the smoke and genie of another such project. America needs truth today, and every citizen has the opportunity to speak his and her truth--as loud and for as long as their courage will allow . Yet to be heard, a man or woman must be able to listen. I joined the ACLU decades ago, precisely because they voiced positions that were contrary to my own. I've tried to disallow opposition to direct my relationship with the ACLU, and to substitute instead appreciation. I've tried to remember that if I served my country for a valid purpose, it was in hope of assuring that the experiment this country represents does not lose its way--to assure that free speech be encouraged, welcomed, and receives the gratitude for the guarantee it represents. I, too, was once called a Commie, but because I listened to Communists, I allowed them to listen to me. I hope they are better Russians for this; I know I am a better American. Certainly my life has been richer and allowed me much to give away.
My kindergarten got the cops called on him for using bad words in school
U are really brave
What we’re seeing here is that Schools of today in America aren’t treating students as humans, but rather robots or scripted marionettes with extremely limited functions outside of the script. The working of a School is a computerized script. The principal is the Admin, or the (Worker of the Computer), the Teachers are the Programs (Microsoft word, Google Chrome etc), and the Students are the scripts inside of the Programs (Scripts being pieces of information that tell the Computer program what to do, how to do it, and when to do it.) Seems familiar doesn’t it? The principal controls the Programs to the extent of his/her will while also controlling the scripts (Like a file editing software), that can punish them, change them, work them, or push them beyond the threshold (stress). The reason why Students do NOT have any Rights in school is because if they did, the students would not be controllable. They would be able to say what they want to say, bear arms, keep quiet during trial, etc. That would mean disaster for the Barbaric system, because the students would be able expose the system, cause the Government grief, and it would cause chaos because no one would be in charge other than Greedy psychopaths who know squat about how the Mind works.
respect
this was for my computer class, i love it
wow that is amazing!!!!
even though im doing this for hw, this is a pretty epik legit video
sigh I have this for hw
@amiyahwashere
4 жыл бұрын
SO DO I!
@alexdoesrandomstuff
4 жыл бұрын
Same
@amiyahwashere
4 жыл бұрын
AlexDoesRandomStuff6000 that’s tough
corona time
469 Lake Road 34472
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pretty good video. im surprised that you made a 11 year old enjoy this video.
I was suspended from Twitter because of SJWs so I am voting for Trump as revenge. I live in OHIO btw!
@griffin1837
4 жыл бұрын
OK.....who asked? Also, Twitter is a private organization, they're allowed to project their own beliefs. If you don't like that, don't use the app.
this aint it chief
Are you guys supporting all free speech on campuses, or just liberal free speech?
@ALRIGHTYTHEN.
4 жыл бұрын
Rhetorical questions don't get many replies. I'll answer it for you since they won't. They support leftist speech only. That's why you don't see them representing conservative speakers that get shouted down when it's their turn to speak.
@user-dr8xp1uz1q
Жыл бұрын
@@ALRIGHTYTHEN. that honestly depends where you are. if you are in a more liberal area, most likely conservative opinions will be diminished. same as vice versa.
That is so ignorant. Children are in school to learn, not waste their time on protesting for anti-american indoctrinating liberal school teachers.
@maryos1
5 жыл бұрын
This was the early 60's and most people were against our involvement in Viet Nam. A simple black arm ban is just a "piece of cloth" as his comment went. We should all be taught history as it happened, good or bad. We need to learn about it so that we don't repeat it. It is the smart thing - nothing to do with left/right parties - but the real way to know history.
@maryos1
5 жыл бұрын
@Vlavitir glutginskiya What are you talking about ? Who is a communist? Certainly not 99% of Americans.
@countfloydschillerhorrorth2090
4 жыл бұрын
@@maryos1 You sound like the 1%
@juhanatuomola9580
3 жыл бұрын
I really thought that we are all Americans, mayber