the denoument for Bong Hits 4 Jesus
From Wikipedia.
In January 2002, students were released from Juneau-Douglas High School to watch the Olympic torch pass by. Frederick, who had not attended school that day, joined some friends on the sidewalk across from the high school, off of school grounds. Frederick and his friends waited for the television cameras so they could unfurl a banner reading “Bong Hits 4 Jesus.” (Frederick was quoted as saying he’d first seen the phrase on a snowboard sticker.[2]) When they displayed the banner, then-principal Deborah Morse ran across the street and seized it.
Morse initially suspended Joseph Frederick for five days for violating the school district’s anti-drug policy, but increased the suspension to 10 days after he refused to give the names of his fellow participants and quoted Thomas Jefferson on free speech.[3] Frederick administratively appealed his suspension to the Superintendent, who denied his appeal but limited it to the time Frederick had already spent out of school prior to his appeal to the Superintendent (eight days). Frederick then appealed to the Juneau School Board, which upheld the suspension on March 19, 2002. On April 25, 2002, Frederick filed a §1983 lawsuit against Morse and the school board in the United States District Court for the District of Alaska claiming they violated his federal and state constitutional rights to free speech.[citation needed]
The United States District Court for the District of Alaska ruled in favor of the School Board and Deborah Morse.[4]9th US Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the federal district court’s decision. Regarding the circuit court’s decision, Juneau school district superintendent Peggy Cowan expressed, “My concern is that [the court’s ruling] could compromise our ability to send a consistent message against the use of illegal drugs.”
And today the Supreme Court reached it’s decision. 5 to 4, the 5 you would expect to go with the School Board going for the School Board, and the 4 you would expect to go with the “Bong Hits for Jesus” group went with the “Bong Hits for Jesus” group.
And so it goes. Score one for the Prison Complex of Modern Schooling, as often or not conceivable simple warehousing of the youth so that they don’t spend their days smashing in your cars. In propelling my way through some of those opinion-sters approving of the Holy 5 of the Supreme Court, I see comments to the effect of they’re not debating on the criminalization of drugs, they’re just doofuses looking to get on tv. So much the better, really. I remember high school stoners talking about drug legalization, and it was never a pretty site.
From the Ruling of the Holy 5:
At the outset, we reject Frederick’s argument that this is not a school speech case—as has every other authority to address the question. See App. 22–23 (PrincipalMorse); App. to Pet. for Cert. 63a (superintendent); id., at 69a (school board); id., at 34a–35a (District Court); 439F. 3d, at 1117 (Ninth Circuit). The event occurred during normal school hours. It was sanctioned by Principal Morse “as an approved social event or class trip,” App. 22–23, and the school district’s rules expressly provide that pupils in “approved social events and class trips are subject to district rules for student conduct.” App. to Pet. forCert. 58a. Teachers and administrators were interspersed among the students and charged with supervising them.The high school band and cheerleaders performed. Frederick, standing among other JDHS students across thestreet from the school, directed his banner toward the school, making it plainly visible to most students. Under these circumstances, we agree with the superintendentthat Frederick cannot “stand in the midst of his fellow students, during school hours, at a school-sanctioned activity and claim he is not at school.” Id., at 63a.
Hm. The “in the direction of the school” does not follow, but the rest is of some use. So, what, was this a field trip across the street? Those wacky students thought they were cutting class, but nope — here they are — dropping back into class!
In one sense the case is tedious, the Truant juvenile antic, the principal, and the Holy 5 Majority of the Supreme Court. In another sense, say, this rant that careens into “Fire in a Crowded Theater” is even more tedious, and it does not follow. Seriously? There’s a parallel between yelling “fire” in a crowded theater — the creation of an emergency where there is none — and waving a thought-de-voking banner? No. There is not. Resume that part of the spiel for when something is provoked. Beyond that, they didn’t do this because of lack of love from Mother — but go down the list a bit further of cliched adolescent reactive causes and you’ll eventually find their motivation… beyond raging hormones, of course.
I can’t say I was ever where these kids are, except perhaps in the narrowest of terms. I suppose, by the terms of the Supreme Court ruling, and in terms of their desired effect of bemusing themselves, they would have been better served flying their banner — a little bigger, I suppose — from the roof-top of a house located across the street — still in the direction of the school. Then we’d have to see what develops from there.