Mahanoy Area School District v B.L.

Material Facts:

• During the weekend, while at a local convenience store, B. L. posted two images on Snapchat ... expressed frustration with the school and the school’s cheerleading squad, and one contained vulgar language and gestures.
• The coaches decided that because the posts used profanity in connection with a school extracurricular activity, they violated team and school rules.
• As a result, the coaches suspended B. L. from the junior varsity cheerleading squad for the upcoming year.
• A full recounting of the facts is available below

Procedural History:

• In response, B. L., together with her parents, filed this lawsuit in Federal District Court alleging infringement of B. L. First Amendment rights.
• District Court granted an injunction ordering the school to reinstate B. L. to the cheerleading team.
• District Court granted summary judgment to B. L. on the basis of violations the First Amendment because her Snapchat posts had not caused substantial disruption at the school. (Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School Dist., 393 U. S. 503)
• Third Circuit affirmed the judgment noting that this Court had previously held in Tinker that a public high school could not constitutionally prohibit a peaceful student political demonstration consisting of “‘pure speech’” on school property during the school day. 393 U. S., at 505–506, 514.
• This case comes before the court via a writ of certiorari granted to the petitioners.

Petitioner's Claim(s):

Issues:

Holding(s) and Disposition:

Rationale

Breyer majority opinion (Roberts, Alito, Sotomayor, Kagan, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Barrett)

• Consider B. L.’s speech. [It is] ... criticism of the rules of a community of which B. L. forms a part.
• B. L.’s posts ... did not amount to fighting words. See Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, 315 U. S. 568 (1942).
• ... her speech was not obscene as this Court has understood that term. See Cohen v. California, 403 U. S. 15, 19–20 (1971)
• Her posts appeared outside of school hours from a location outside the school.
• She did not identify the school in her posts or target any member of the school community with vulgar or abusive language. [mitigating libel and defamation considerations ?]
• B. L. also transmitted her speech through a personal cellphone, to an audience consisting of her private circle of Snapchat friends. [private speech ? 1st concern at all then ?]
• A full description of the rationale is available below

Alito concurrance (Gorsuch)

• ... write separately to explain my understanding of the Court’s decision and the framework within which I think cases like this should be analyzed.
• This is the first case in which we have considered the constitutionality of a public school’s attempt to regulate true off-premises student speech ....
• ... the doctrine of in loco parentis “rarely” applies to off-premises speech;
• One category of off-premises student speech falls easily within the scope of the authority that parents implicitly or explicitly provide. ... includes ... e.g., online instruction at home, assigned essays or other homework, and transportation to and from school.
• At the other end of the spectrum, there is a category of speech that is almost always beyond the regulatory authority of a public school.
• ... [speech] not expressly and specifically directed at the school, school administrators, teachers, or fellow students and that addresses matters of public concern, including sensitive subjects like politics, religion, and social relations.
• Between these two extremes ... lie the categories of off-premises student speech that appear to have given rise to the most litigation.
• [This case] simply involves criticism (albeit in a crude manner) of the school and an extracurricular activity.
• The school did not claim that the messages caused any significant disruption of classes. Tinker.
• ... it is not reasonable to infer that they gave the school the authority to regulate her choice of language when she was off school premises and not engaged in any school activity.
• If today’s decision teaches any lesson, it must be that the regulation of many types of off-premises student speech raises serious First Amendment concerns, and school officials should proceed cautiously before venturing into this territory.
• A full description of the rationale is available below

Thomas dissent

• A more searching review reveals that schools historically could discipline students incircumstances like those presented here.
• ... it was well settled that they still could discipline students for off-campus speech or conduct that had a proximate tendency to harm the school environment. Lander v. Seaver, 32 Vt. 114, 120 (1859).
• discipline students for off-campus speech or conduct that had a proximate tendency to harm the school environment.
• In other words, they followed Lander: A school can regulate speech when it occurs off campus, so long as it has a proximate tendency to harm the school, its faculty or students, or its programs.
• The larger problem facing us today is that our student-speech cases are untethered from any textual or historical foundation.
• ... this case involves speech made in one location but capable of being received in countless others .... [culpability linked to location, perforce unknown to sender, of recipient !?]

Full Recounting of Facts

• B. L. tried out for a position on the the school’s varsity cheerleading squad.
• B. L. did not make the varsity cheerleading team, but she was offered a spot on the cheerleading squad’s junior varsity team.
• During the weekend, while at a local convenience store, B. L. posted two images on Snapchat ... expressed frustration with the school and the school’s cheerleading squad, and one contained vulgar language and gestures.
• The audience of B. L. social media postings, her "friends", included other Mahanoy Area High School students, some of whom also belonged to the cheerleading squad.
• That week, several cheerleaders and other students approached the cheerleading coaches “visibly upset” about B. L.’s posts.
• Questions about the posts persisted during an Algebra class taught by one of the two coaches of the cheerleading squad.
• The coaches decided that because the posts used profanity in connection with a school extracurricular activity, they violated team and school rules.
• As a result, the coaches suspended B. L. from the junior varsity cheerleading squad for the upcoming year.
• B. L.’s subsequent apologies did not move school officials.
• The school’s athletic director, principal, superintendent, and school board, all affirmed B. L.’s suspension from the team.
• In response, B. L., together with her parents, filed this lawsuit in Federal District Court.
• When school officials learned of the posts, they suspended B. L. from the junior va rsity cheerleading squad for the upcoming year.
• After unsuccessfully seeking to reverse that punishment, B. L. and her parents sought relief in federal court, arguing inter alia that punishing B. L. for her speech violated the First Amendment.
• A list of the material facts is available above

Majority Full Argument

• In reaching its conclusion in Tinker, this Court emphasized that there was no evidence the student protest would “substantially interfere with the work of the school or impinge upon the rights of other students.” Id., at 509.
• But the Court also said that: “[C]onduct by [a] student, in class or out of it, which for any reason--whether it stems from time, place, or type of behavior--materially disrupts classwork or involves substantial disorder or invasion of the rights of others is ... not immunized by the constitutional guarantee of freedom of speech.” Id., at 513.
• [Section II]
• We have made clear that students do not “shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression,” even “at the school house gate.” Tinker, 393 U. S., at 506; see also Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Assn., 564 U. S. 786, 794 (2011)
• But we have also made clear that courts must apply the First Amendment “in light of the special characteristics of the school environment.” Hazelwood School Dist. v. Kuhlmeier, 484 U. S. 260, 266 (1988)
• One such characteristic, which we have stressed, is the fact that schools at times stand in loco parentis, i.e., in the place of parents. See Bethel School Dist. No. 403 v. Fraser, 478 U. S. 675, 684 (1986).
• This Court has previously outlined three specific categories of student speech that schools may regulate in certain circumstances:
  1. “indecent,” “lewd,” or “vulgar” speech uttered during a school assembly on school grounds, see id., at 685;
  2. speech, uttered during a class trip, that promotes “illegal drug use,” see Morse v. Frederick, 551 U. S. 393, 409 (2007); and
  3. speech that others may reasonably perceive as “bear[ing] the imprimatur of the school,” such as that ap pearing in a school-sponsored newspaper, see Kuhlmeier, 484 U. S., at 271.
• Finally, in Tinker, we said schools have a special interest in regulating speech that “materially disrupts classwork or involves substantial disorder or invasion of the rights of others.” 393 U. S., at 513.
• Unlike the Third Circuit, we do not believe the special characteristics that give schools additional license to regulate student speech always disappear when a school regulates speech that takes place off campus.
• The school’s regulatory interests remain significant in some off-campus circumstances.
• The parties’ briefs, and those of amici, list several types of off-campus behavior that may call for school regulation. These include serious or severe bullying or harassment targeting particular individuals; threats aimed at teachers or other students; the failure to follow rules concerning lessons, the writing of papers, the use of computers, or participation in other online school activities; and breaches of school security devices, including material maintained within school computers.
• We are uncertain as to the length or content of any such list of appropriate exceptions or carveouts to the Third Circuit [on campus/off campus distinction in it's] majority’s rule.
• Thus, we do not now set forth a broad, highly general First Amendment rule stating just what counts as “off campus” speech and whether or how ordinary First Amendment standards must give way off campus to a school’s special need ....
• We can, however, mention three features of off-campus speech that often, even if not always, distinguish schools’ efforts to regulate that speech from their efforts to regulate on-campus speech [and thereby diminish the school's special need].
  1. [place] a school, in relation to off-campus speech, will rarely stand in loco parentis.
  2. [time] from the student speaker’s perspective, regulations of off-campus speech, when coupled with regulations of on-campus speech, include all the speech a student utters during the full 24-hour day courts must be more skeptical of a school’s efforts to regulate off-campus speech, for doing so may mean the student cannot engage in that kind of speech at all. [possible voluntary association objection]
  3. [??] the school itself has an interest in protecting a student’s unpopular expression, especially when the expression takes place off campus
• Taken together, these three features of much off-campus speech mean that the leeway the First Amendment grants to schools in light of their special characteristics is diminished.
• We leave for future cases to decide where, when, and how these features mean the speaker’s off-campus location will make the critical difference.
• This case can, however, provide one example.
• [Section III]
• Consider B. L.’s speech. ... the listener would hear criticism...criticism of the rules of a community of which B. L. forms a part.
• B. L.’s posts, while crude, did not amount to fighting words. See Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, 315 U. S. 568 (1942).
• ... her speech was not obscene as this Court has understood that term. See Cohen v. California, 403 U. S. 15, 19–20 (1971)
• Her posts appeared outside of school hours from a location outside the school.
• She did not identify the school in her posts or target any member of the school community with vulgar or abusive language.
• B. L. also transmitted her speech through a personal cellphone, to an audience consisting of her private circle of Snapchat friends.
• But what about the school’s interest
  1. ... the school’s interest in teaching good manners and consequently in punishing the use of vulgar language aimed at part of the school community. weakened considerably by the fact that B. L. spoke outside the school on her own time. See Morse, 551 U. S., at 40. B. L. spoke under circumstances where the school did not stand in loco parentis.
  2. ... the school argues that it was trying to prevent disruption, if not within the classroom, then within the bounds of a school-sponsored extracurricular activity. But we can find no evidence in the record of the sort of “substantial disruption” of a school activity or a threatened harm to the rights of others that might justify the school’s action. Tinker, 393 U. S., at 514
  3. ... the school presented some evidence that expresses (at least indirectly) a concern for team morale. ... simple “undifferentiated fear or apprehension ... is not enough to overcome the right to freedom of expression.” Tinker, 393 U. S., at 508.
• Therefore the lower court decision is affirmed.
• The core of the rationale is available above

Alito Concurrance Full Argument

• ... write separately to explain my understanding of the Court’s decision and the framework within which I think cases like this should be analyzed.
• This is the first case in which we have considered the constitutionality of a public school’s attempt to regulate true off-premises student speech ....
• ... the First Amendment permits public schools to regulate some student speech that does not occur on school premises during the regular school day;
• this authority is more limited than the authority that schools exercise with respect to on-premises speech;
• ... the doctrine of in loco parentis “rarely” applies to off-premises speech;
• public schools have the duty to teach students that freedom of speech, including unpopular speech, is essential to our form of self-government;
• Q. Why does the First Amendment ever allow the free-speech rights of public school students to be restricted to a greater extent than the rights of other juveniles who do not attend a public school?
• A. ... a public school regulates student speech, it acts as an arm of the State in which it is located.
• Q. Why should enrollment in a public school result in the diminution of a student’s free-speech rights?
• A. ... in loco parentis ... amounts to is simply a doctrine of inferred parental consent to a public school’s exercise of a degree of authority that is commensurate with the task that the parents ask the school to perform.
• Q. So how much authority to regulate speech do parents implicitly delegate when they enro ll a child at a public school?
• A. ... the measure of authority that the schools must be able to exercise in order to carry out their state-mandated educational mission
• A public school’s regulation of off-premises student speech is a different matter.
• One category of off-premises student speech falls easily within the scope of the authority that parents implicitly or explicitly provide. ... includes ... e.g., online instruction at home, assigned essays or other homework, and transportation to and from school.
• At the other end of the spectrum, there is a category of speech that is almost always beyond the regulatory authority of a public school.
• ... [speech] not expressly and specifically directed at the school, school administrators, teachers, or fellow students and that addresses matters of public concern, including sensitive subjects like politics, religion, and social relations.
• When a student engages in oral or written communication of this nature [off-premises speech on a matter of public concern], the student is subject to whatever restraints the student’s parents impose, but the student enjoys the same First Amendment protection against government regulation as all other members of the public.
• Between these two extremes ... lie the categories of off-premises student speech that appear to have given rise to the most litigation.
• A survey of lower court cases reveals several prominent categories.
• One group of cases involves perceived threats to school administrators, teachers, other staff members, or students. Laws that apply to everyone prohibit defined categories of threats ....
• Another common category involves speech that criticizes or derides school administrators, teachers, or other staff members.
• ... parents surely do not relinquish their children’s ability to complain in an appropriate manner about wrongdoing, dereliction, or even plain incompetence.
• Perhaps the most difficult category involves criticism or hurtful remarks about other students.
• Bullying and severe harassment are serious (and age-old) problems, but these concepts are not easy to define with the precision required for a regulation of speech.
• The present case does not fall into any of these categories.
• Instead, it simply involves criticism (albeit in a crude manner) of the school and an extracurricular activity.
• Unflattering speech about a school or one of its programs is different from speech that criticizes or derides particular individuals.
• ... the school’s justifications for punishing B. L.’s speech were weak.
  • She sent the messages and image in question on her own time
  • while at a local convenience store.
  • They were transmitted via a medium that preserved the communication for only 24 hours, and
  • she sent them to a select group of “friends.”
  • She did not send the messages to the school or to any administrator, teacher, or coach,
• The school did not claim that the messages caused any significant disruption of classes. Tinker.
• upset” some students (including members of the cheerleading squad), caused students to ask some questions about the matter during an algebra class taught by a cheerleading coach,25 and put out “negativity ... that could impact students in the school."
• Speech cannot be suppressed [for those reasons.]
• ... it is not reasonable to infer that they gave the school the authority to regulate her choice of language when she was off school premises and not engaged in any school activity.
• If today’s decision teaches any lesson, it must be that the regulation of many types of off-premises student speech raises serious First Amendment concerns, and school officials should proceed cautiously before venturing into this territory.
• A full description of the rationale is available above