Posted on 11/11/2008 2:15:28 PM PST by NormsRevenge
The American Civil Liberties Union has sued the Fallbrook Union High School District, charging that Fallbrook High's principal violated the free speech of students when he censored two articles, axed the newspaper's faculty advisor position, cut the journalism class and killed publication of the Tomahawk newspaper.
The ACLU filed the lawsuit in San Diego County Superior Court on Monday afternoon, the organization said Tuesday.
The lawsuit is demanding that the high school district restore the journalism class and reinstate its advisor, Dave Evans.
The ACLU is also asking for a court order prohibiting school or district officials from censoring future publication of the articles killed last school year.
One of the articles, scheduled for publication last November, suggested that former district Supt. Tom Anthony had hesitated to open Fallbrook High as an evacuation center during the October 2007 fires.
The second article, scheduled for publication last May, was a editorial that had criticized the Bush administration's support for teaching abstinence in the public schools.
The district's attorney, Dan Shinoff, has said that Fallbrook High principal Rod King was concerned that the first article contained factual inaccuracies.
As for the second piece on abstinence, King was concerned that its tone and language suggested that it was likely written by an adult and not a student as claimed, Shinoff said.
The student whose byline appeared on the unpublished editorial has insisted that she alone wrote the piece.
Shinoff has said further that the district's decision to cancel the journalism program predated much of the controversies over the Tomahawk and was due entirely to state budget cuts.
In a statement announcing the lawsuit, David Blair-Loy, legal director for ACLU of San Diego and Imperial Counties, said Fallbrook school officials should “move swiftly to restore the journalism program.”
“The principal had no right to censor the article or the editorial, and he unfairly penalized all students by canceling the journalism class in retaliation against Evans for blowing the whistle on his illegal conduct,” Blair-Loy said.
New protections for student journalists and their faculty advisors were signed into law in late September. Senate Bill 1370, authored by state Sen. Leland Yee, D-San Francisco, protects high school and college teachers and other employees from retaliation by administrators who are upset by student speech.
There have been several instances in California – including San Francisco, Los Angeles, Claremont, Fremont, Novato, Oxnard, Rialto, Garden Grove, Redding and Fallbrook – in which faculty advisors have been reassigned or dismissed because of the content of their student's journalism.
Those protections will only be enforced so long as the speech being protected conforms to the liberal agenda. A student editorial against gay marriage would likely bring a howl of protests and a demand for the advisor to be fired, because the only protected speech is the speech that liberals approve of.
The principal had no right to censor the article or the editorial...My wife is a principal, and I know that, at least in Texas, the principal is legally liable for the actions of faculty, students and parents on the campus (her district carries an insurance policy for each admin).
IMO, if a person is liable, they have a right to control.
Any censorship of an article from a Christian worldview would not have raised a single ACLU eyebrow.
The ACLU has lost this one before.
They are relitigating becuase the attorney fees are GURARNTEED by statute.
We need to change the attorney fee clause to make such not for profits NOT qualified for attorney fees.
Her phone would never stop ringing, and her folks would get tired of the line of horny young guys leading up to her front door.
I agree. One of my main peeves against the ACLU is its extremely biased approach. If the editorial had taken exactly the opposite view and advocated abstinence only, I'm sure the ACLU would have decided that the "freedom" of the school administrators to run the school as they see fit took precedence over the "freedom" of the student editorial writers.
I have become of a mind that high-school student newspapers, as a product of the academic process at a high-school;
1. Should be understood as the property of “the publisher” and the “publisher” in that setting is the school - not the students, not the “journalism” course, not the “journalism advisers”.
2. Should be restricted to “reporting” things of and about that school and that school alone. I deny the assumptions that:
a. students are mature enough and “educated enough” to delve into more important matters - if that were true, only in its possibility, they would have “matured” into adult age, not still be high-school students
b. they have a right to their opinions on more mature subjects - that, that “right” is not the question; the question is whether or not the publisher - the school - must give them the publishers megaphone to express it.
I sincerely believe that “journalism” in high school is the opening door to Marxist views, because already at that point they are being taught advocacy journalism - not “reporting”.
If “students” want a “greater” voice in writing about matters outside the school, they have tons of off-campus possibilities for that.
this is a school STUDENT newspaper and is not a true first amendment paper. It is an educational project.
Dear Mr ACLU Attorney,
Did the Congress of the United States do this; or did the principal of a high school?
Or is this a state constitutional issue?
Who runs our childrens schools? The parents or the Angry Communist Laywers Union.
I know, I know. Silly American Parent, Rights are not for you.......
The ACLU wants the inmates to run the asylums.
Exactamundo!
If the school pays for it (through student fees or taxes) the school has editorial control. This was as true 50 years ago as it is today. The ACLU is just drumming up business.
“The second article, scheduled for publication last May, was a editorial that had criticized the Bush administration’s support for teaching abstinence in the public schools. “
...was ‘a’ editorial?
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