Another Victory for Student Speech

Last week we received a call from a parent in Colorado Springs, Colorado, who contacted us because her daughter, Kaytlin, had been asked to step down from the high school newspaper if she continued to include Christian themes in her articles.  One of the articles that Kaytlin submitted had discussed the great work of Operation Christmas Child of Samaritans Purse. This program by Franklin Graham provides gift-filled shoe boxes and the Good News of Gods love to many children throughout the world.

I immediately had our lawyers go to work on this situation because Kaytlin was being unconstitutionally discriminated against because of her Christian faith.  The First Amendment protects Kaytlin in this situation.  In fact, three years ago, we were at the Supreme Court of the United States on behalf of students in the campaign finance case, McConnell v. FEC.   In that case, a unanimous Supreme Court recognized once again that minors have the right to freedom of speech under the Constitution.  The Court in the FEC case cited the famous Tinker decision which held that [i]t can hardly be argued that either students or teachers shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate. Kaytlins First Amendment rights were implicated by this attempt of censorship.

We gave Kaytlins mother materials available on the ACLJ website. Kaytlins mother had a meeting with the principal and the teacher who oversees the newspaper. After reviewing our materials, the principal instructed the teacher that Kaytlin must be allowed to incorporate her faith into the articles she writes for the newspaper. We are all pleased with the outcome of this case.