Federal Court Upholds First Amendment Protections For Student's Off-Campus Social Media Post (eff.org) 105
"Students should not have to fear expulsion for expressing themselves on social media after school and off-campus, but that is just what happened to the plaintiff in C1.G v. Siegfried," writes Mukund Rathi via the Electronic Frontier Foundation (DFF). "Last month, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the student's expulsion violated his First Amendment rights. The court's opinion affirms what we argued in an amicus brief last year." From the report: We strongly support the Tenth Circuit's holding that schools cannot regulate how students use social media off campus, even to spread "offensive, controversial speech," unless they target members of the school community with "vulgar or abusive language."
The case arose when the student and his friends visited a thrift shop on a Friday night. There, they posted a picture on Snapchat with an offensive joke about violence against Jews. He deleted the post and shared an apology just a few hours later, but the school suspended and eventually expelled him. [...] The Tenth Circuit held the First Amendment protected the student's speech because "it does not constitute a true threat, fighting words, or obscenity." The "post did not include weapons, specific threats, or speech directed toward the school or its students." While the post spread widely and the school principal received emails about it, the court correctly held that this did not amount to "a reasonable forecast of substantial disruption" that would allow regulation of protected speech.
The case arose when the student and his friends visited a thrift shop on a Friday night. There, they posted a picture on Snapchat with an offensive joke about violence against Jews. He deleted the post and shared an apology just a few hours later, but the school suspended and eventually expelled him. [...] The Tenth Circuit held the First Amendment protected the student's speech because "it does not constitute a true threat, fighting words, or obscenity." The "post did not include weapons, specific threats, or speech directed toward the school or its students." While the post spread widely and the school principal received emails about it, the court correctly held that this did not amount to "a reasonable forecast of substantial disruption" that would allow regulation of protected speech.
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Looks like they fixed the problem
Re:Ok but (Score:5, Insightful)
Was that meant as a joke?
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Re:Ok but (Score:5, Insightful)
Its a public high school. Its an organ of local gov't, not a "legal" person. All individuals free speech rights are protected from the government . The high school does not have a US Constitutional right to "protect its reputation".
Its understood that public schools have limited powers to discipline minors beyond what what is extended to individuals under law. But apparently, it does not include expulsion for speech made outside of school grounds, and the student does not have any form of endorsement contract with the high school, or represent the school in an official capacity. If the school district was an employer, it could fire the underaged employee, provided its not a state with laws that prevent arbitrary firing of workers.
So, the original poster was not "trolling" when they questioned the school's non-existent right to expel the student to "protect its reputation" as a joke.
Re: Ok but (Score:2)
Re: Ok but (Score:5, Informative)
expulsion is unhelpful if you really want to correct a behavior.
My guess is that they are more worried about exclusion than anything else, to show all the other students that if they have a verboten opinion, they will be cast out.
The proper response is for a person who posts an offensive joke is to be called out on it. The guy pulled the post, apologized, and that should have been it.
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Just realize, its not an effective punishment when the person committing the fraud is a psychopath/sociopath.
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Just realize, its not an effective punishment when the person committing the fraud is a psychopath/sociopath.
Yeah, if they are real. Today we like to attach that to anyone we disagree with.
But if you've been paying any attention to the Amber Heard Johnny Depp defamation trial, after she was found guilty, she's been doing a deep protracted meltdown over it. She is diagnosed as Borderline personality disorder. One small step away from Psychopathy on the Cluster B group.
While she probably will never take accountability for her actions, she is definitely feeling persecuted despite bringing it on herself.
Re:Ok but (Score:5, Insightful)
The same could be claimed for defending the human rights of Palestinian Arabs (as potential threats to Israel). Threats are in the eye of the beholder.
"The Tenth Circuit held the First Amendment protected the student’s speech because “it does not constitute a true threat, fighting words, or obscenity.” The “post did not include weapons, specific threats, or speech directed toward the school or its students.”
You can't expel a kid from a public school for having antisemitic opinions; potentially only for expressing them on school grounds, or in a manner that presents a tangible threat for kids at a high school.
Re: Ok but (Score:4, Insightful)
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That's not how stand your ground laws work.
Actually, it wouldn't be the first time some kid with a poor understanding of the law got a hold of a gun, went looking for trouble and used deadly force against a "threat".
Re: Ok but (Score:1)
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Is "he's coming right for me" good enough?
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Yeah, no that's not true at all. I am amazed this is sitting at +4 insightful. My God this is "pi is exactly 3" levels of stupid, and me without mod points. Plus there's no "-5 never go full retard" moderation option.
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Re: Ok but (Score:1)
https://revealnews.org/podcast... [revealnews.org]
Re: Ok but (Score:5, Informative)
https://revealnews.org/podcast... [revealnews.org]
I try not to repost but some gun nut modded my initial post down. The truth is that stand-your-ground laws pretty much allow a "I killed someone because I was scared" defense. No actual threat required.
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When I took Criminal Law, my professor described the landscape of states as, "Must retreat", "May retreat", "Stand your ground", and "Florida".
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Re:Ok but (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Ok but (Score:4, Informative)
You are saying that if a cheerleader uses social media to threaten to kill her coach, but does it after school hours, the only recourse is to notify the parents? Kicking her off the team would be an overrreach?
That's a threat of violence, and all applicable terroristic threat concepts are in place to handle that.
Schools have become indoctrination camps, but fortunately they are limited in what they can do under the law. You might have to have whatever opinion they tell you is your opinion inside the camp, but outside of their campus, they don't have as much control as they would like to have. Good.
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Replace the words 'have become' {indoctrination camps} with 'are by definition' and your statement makes more sense. That is, the word indoctrinate is a synonym of the word teach. It is simply used in a pejorative manner.
If you are indoctrinated in the principles of quantum physics or democracy, you think it is a good idea. If people are indoctrinated in the principles of (not my political party) you think it is a horrible thing.
The problem is not with the 'indoctrination' perse, but instead with them t
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Replace the words 'have become' {indoctrination camps} with 'are by definition' and your statement makes more sense. That is, the word indoctrinate is a synonym of the word teach. It is simply used in a pejorative manner.
If you are indoctrinated in the principles of quantum physics or democracy, you think it is a good idea. If people are indoctrinated in the principles of (not my political party) you think it is a horrible thing.
I uh, didn't mention any political party. Yes it was written exactly as a pejorative. One might be able to derive that it is a pejorative by the word following "indoctrination" - which of course is "camp".
Most of us wouldn't use the term Quantum physics camp or Democracy camp.
The problem is not with the 'indoctrination' perse, but instead with them teaching something you dislike.
Ah - but you see, it isn't merely teaching. It's what they do. The wholesale drugging of young males in order to make them more tractable is in my estimation a crime. I'm not certain what political party that is. But here's the Nat
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You are saying that if a cheerleader uses social media to threaten to kill her coach, but does it after school hours, the only recourse is to notify the parents?
Did you not read the entire paragraph? The second to last sentence says: "If it's a direct threat to someone or something, they should report it to the parents and the police." Report it to the police, and let them handle it from there. The school teams also have codes of conduct they're required to follow, and I believe threatening to kill the coach would be against those codes and warrant removal from the cheer squad. Also, every member of the cheer team who received that text and didn't report it to t
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While I agree with the ruling, I think your conclusion goes a bit too far. If the student is doing something publicly that would make other students feel unsafe going to school with him, I think the school has a right to intervene. Having said that, I think it should be a pretty high bar and this does not cross it.
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Social media posts about violence could be construed to be a threat against the other students, in this case the Jewish ones in particular. So I'd say the school has some standing in kicking his antisemitic ass the hell out.
The judge considered this and stated that the speech did not constitute a threat. It's in the summary.
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Schools should not be allowed to protect their reputations? Are you trolling?
I hope you are.
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what about the school's 1st amendment right to protect its reputation?
That is not a thing.
"First Amendment: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
There is an effective right to freedom of association. But with a semi-governmental entity (a publicly funded school managed under the direction of elected officials) that is severely limited.
Re:Ok but (Score:4, Interesting)
The government speech doctrine [wikipedia.org] suggests that the First Amendment rights of governments are not so limited.
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Expulsion not passing a Law (Score:1)
Re:Expulsion not passing a Law (Score:5, Informative)
Executive not Legislative (Score:2)
All power arising from acts of Congress or, following the 14th Amendment, state governments, is given the effect of 'making a law' for these purposes.
I stand by my original comment that I don't see how this is a reasonable interpretation given what is written. Indeed, I thought the US was big on the separation of the legislative, executive and judicial branches of government. Surely the decision to expel someone is an executive function of government and so not a legislative issue and hence doe not flow from congress? While there is no law to specifically allow it there is also technically no law to prevent it given a reasonable interpretation of the la
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You still do not understand how America works.The Constitution sets the rules about what any government body - Legislative, Executive OR Judicial branch can do. All three branches are bound by it, not just one.
Within those rules, the Legislative branch can delegate more power to the Executive or Judicial branch. The Executive branch can exercise those powers given to it by either the Constitution or the Legislative. The Executive branch can refuse to do something it thinks is Unconstitutional, or it can i
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The Constitution sets the rules about what any government body - Legislative, Executive OR Judicial branch can do. All three branches are bound by it, not just one.
I think there are two things here. I do understand how America works in practice. What amazes me is that for all the claims that everything is based on the constitution it is clear that really things are only loosely based on the constitution as written and that there have been some pretty amazing reinterpretations of what is written - largely for the better but definitely not entirely consistent with the language of the constitution itself.
Don't get me wrong - I'm a strong supporter for freedom of spee
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I do understand how America works in practice.
I'm pretty sure you don't. The Executive enforces laws written by Congress. The Judiciary interprets laws written by Congress. So this question doesn't really mean anything:
Had the intent been to restrict the entire US government then why not write that into the constitution by restricting all three branches from abridging anyone's right to free speech?
Prohibiting Congress from making a law very much restricts the Executive, because without an infringing law to enforce, the Executive doesn't have a means to infringe. There's not really any room for it in the handful of powers enumerated in Article II. [congress.gov]
The Judiciary in this context, without any further authority delegated to it b
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I think every one of you would be well served to actually read, then attempt to understand, what is frankly a rather short document, before commenting on it.
Actually, I think it would be you who would be best advised to read the document with an open mind because what you are saying is how the US operates but what I'm pointing out is that this is not consistent with your constitution as written. That may be how your judges choose to interpret it but, even though that's what matters as far as the law is concerned, that does not mean that their interpretation is consistent with the written word. As you said before the judiciary gets to decide what the constituti
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Actually, I think it would be you who would be best advised to read the document with an open mind because what you are saying is how the US operates but what I'm pointing out is that this is not consistent with your constitution as written. That may be how your judges choose to interpret it but, even though that's what matters as far as the law is concerned, that does not mean that their interpretation is consistent with the written word.
You're certainly saying that. A lot. You have yet to actually come up with a meaningful explanation of how, save for those based on your own clear mistaken beliefs of either what is written in the Constitution or how things actually operate.
As you said before the judiciary gets to decide what the constitution says and that applies regardless of what is actually written in it.
That's actually the opposite of what I said, but then again I am definitely picking up on a theme with your reading comprehension.
I'm merely pointing out that, as written the US constitution does not confer any right to freedom of speech it merely prohibits congress from passing a law to restrict it which, from a purely "meaning of English" point of view is much weaker since it means that individuals and companies are free to act to restrict the freedom of speech of others. In countries that do have a specific freedom of speech right, this is binding on everyone: governments, people and companies alike.
First, that is far from the only thing you have tried to 'point out', and is not the thing I was correcting you about in the last post.
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First, on the Federal level, the only functions of the Executive branch are those specifically assigned to it, and setting up school boards isn't one of them. So even where the District of Columbia is concerned, a school board there would be a product of an act of Congress, not the Executive branch.
Second, the 14th amendment reads, in relevant part:
No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
The fourteenth amendment doesn't particularly care whether it is an executive or legislativ
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And a "Troll", evidently...
Re: Ok but (Score:4, Insightful)
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I don't see how expelling someone is protected under the first amendment. Maybe you can explain it to me.
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That's fine.
The school can point to what he specifically violated in their codes of conduct, refund his tuition and possibly damages for opportunity costs.
And if they are selective in enforcement (including their faculty... that tenure is going to be a bitch), they can deal with the lawsuit and the loss of reputation from that.
The degree which right of association has been twisted and formalized is a joke. It's basically an ideological ethnostate.
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refund his tuition
It is a public school. There is no tuition.
right of association
Government entities have no "right of association."
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Fair enough. I am a dumbass for not reading through.
That said, government entities do in fact try to establish right of association through codes of conduct.
Police officer posting racist or whatever stuff on their personal media space can pretty much be assured they will be dismissed.
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That's fine.
The school can point to what he specifically violated in their codes of conduct, refund his tuition and possibly damages for opportunity costs.
And if they are selective in enforcement (including their faculty... that tenure is going to be a bitch), they can deal with the lawsuit and the loss of reputation from that.
The degree which right of association has been twisted and formalized is a joke. It's basically an ideological ethnostate.
I don't want to slippery slope this, but if a school has domain and control over student's opinions, it starts to get a little 1984'ish.
In today's world, what of a male who posts that he is MGTOW or disagrees with a female? What if a young lady posts that she hates men?
Go watch TikTok - it's all there, documented for the world to see.
The point isn't that either stance is correct or not, but that if a school has the right to control it's student's opinions when they are off-campus, offensive jokes
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Protecting one's reputation is listed in the Constitution right after that famous verse about the right to an abortion, yes...
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Of course! And to an abortion too.
I was just mocking the claim, that these rights are enshrined anywhere in the Constitution in general — and the Bill of Rights in particular.
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1) Public school. Minors are legally entitled to an education. This entitlement is inalienable, even to minors incarcerated for serious crimes, let alone ones whose only offense is being stupid in public.
2) Institutions don't have rights. At least none separate from their mission. They can claim that they can't do their job for other students if they allow the offending student to remain, but that is obviously not cred
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Why would The People ever give their government a right to protect its reputation? There's no reason to do that, and it especially wasn't on any Americans' minds in the late 1700s. That's probably why I don't see anything in the 1st Amendment which mentions anything related to that.
But I do suppose one could make a case that government reputation is another item in the infinite, inexhaustible list of things which affect "interstate commerce."
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what about the school's 1st amendment right to protect its reputation?
It's fictional and exists exclusively inside your head.
He should have gone to Columbia University (Score:1)
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They would have given him a scholarship for talking about violence against Jews.
Don't be silly. To be a professor at Columbia, you need to join a terrorist organization and actually murder some people.
Kathy Boudin [wikipedia.org]
The Butlerian Jihad (Score:2)
... can't come soon enough.
(Terrible book written after Herbert had passed away, but generally a good idea.)
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[wrt. social media]
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... can't come soon enough.
(Terrible book written after Herbert had passed away, but generally a good idea.)
It certainly wasn't Dune et all, but I didn't think it was too bad. Most I know had trouble associating the good guy/bad guy switch between Atreides and Harkonnen.
But the real question is (Score:1, Offtopic)
But the real question is: Will they repel this decision in 49 years ?
And this is why we have neo-nazis (Score:3, Insightful)
Instead of doing a better job educating kids in the first place, we just suspend 'em when they go off flaunting their ignorance. While the court's decision was clearly a correct interpretation of the 1A, the whole situation itself is still a sad statement on the state of the country. Just because you have the right to be anti-semitic, doesn't mean you should.
Re: And this is why we have neo-nazis (Score:2)
This is a widespread problem? I could visit a random school, expecting to find more of this?
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Unfortunately, yes.
People don't travel enough and get outside their comfort zone. Teens tend to be sheltered and not aware of the real world outside the bubble they live in. At the same time the growing Teen brain is exploring all kinds of things while being easily influenced and prone to making bad decisions - this is how humans develop. When you put this together with modern internet (not the real world but a self-selected one or a social media curated one) the results are not good overall. Of course the
Re: And this is why we have neo-nazis (Score:2)
I'm surprised this isn't more widely reported on, particularly given how large segments of the media would seem eager to publish such news. Is the problem here that too many of the culprits are black? That's the only reason I could see for the media to ignore this.
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https://www.washingtonpost.com... [washingtonpost.com]
Re: And this is why we have neo-nazis (Score:2)
Thanks. Would you have a few thousand more from the past two years? That should be sufficient to prove the issue is systemic and as prevalent as you said. Absent this, people might get the impression such incidents are vanishingly rare, that we're simply engaged in a left wing moral panic.
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Most of the incidents do not rise to the level of media attention. School records of student issues are not public information. But it does happen and does get reported. Talk with your local high school administrators, see what they tell you.
I'm not having a moral panic, I'm advocating for education. Kids do dumb things without thinking them through, its part of growing up. I think a moral panic that wants to exclude kids that do dumb things is wrong.
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Systemic issues aren't news.
Re: And this is why we have neo-nazis (Score:2)
It must be an incredible conspiracy to prevent such a widespread issue appearing in the largely left-leaning media, keep the police away, and to ensure overwhelmingly left-leaning social scientists are blocked from researching such incidents.
Or could it be yet another case of the supply of far right extremism being nowhere near meeting your demand for it?
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Which leads to the idea that no civilised society
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The act of pursuing this through the courts not only legitimises & emboldens their son's behaviour but also sends a strong & clear signal to society as a whole that the state defends it.
As they should. The function of government is to defend the rights of its citizens.
Which leads to the idea that no civilised society should be tolerant of intolerance (Karl Popper's paradox or tolerance: "The paradox of tolerance states that if a society is tolerant without limit, its ability to be tolerant is eventually seized or destroyed by the intolerant. Karl Popper described it as the seemingly self-contradictory idea that in order to maintain a tolerant society, the society must retain the right to be intolerant of intolerance."
Paradoxes are not real, they are merely reflections of ignorance. KP's "paradox" sound bite is often cited precisely because it is trivially pervertable to suite everyone's perspectives. See some dead dude said don't tolerant intolerance so now I have a license to not tolerate your dislike of my rock collection. Jefferson's formulation is infinitely better than the paradox bullshit.
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Instead of doing a better job educating kids in the first place, we just suspend 'em when they go off flaunting their ignorance. While the court's decision was clearly a correct interpretation of the 1A, the whole situation itself is still a sad statement on the state of the country. Just because you have the right to be anti-semitic, doesn't mean you should.
But was he being anti-semitic? There is a whole genre of "tasteless jokes", and a number of people who enjoy them. His political views are not exactly known, and telling tasteless jokes is not an endorsement of the person telling them.
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Instead of doing a better job educating kids in the first place, we just suspend 'em when they go off flaunting their ignorance. While the court's decision was clearly a correct interpretation of the 1A, the whole situation itself is still a sad statement on the state of the country. Just because you have the right to be anti-semitic, doesn't mean you should.
This isn't why we have neo Nazis... We have neo Nazis because people keep supporting racist and fascist causes, ironically many of them hiding their hate speech behind your vaunted 1st amendment. Mainly this is because parents support hate and racism, then pass that down onto their kids who's peer groups are also supportive of racism and hate. But most of all, the biggest enabler of neo Nazism is the fact that we, as a society tolerate it.
When I were a lad, making jokes like that wouldn't have just gott
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I WANT to see the occasional pro-Nazi, because that lets us see how broadly awful that ideology is. Keep it hidden and it can take on a mystique that it doesn't deserve. Not only were the Nazis awful, they also LOST, lets not turn them into their own mythical uber-men.
Universities have free speech too (Score:2)
They express their free speech by sending termination letters to students.
Had to really dig.... (Score:2)
I had to dig to find out what school was involved. It's Mahanoy Area School District which is in eastern Pennsylvania. Not sure why the school isn't mentioned in most of the news articles about this story.
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I had to dig to find out what school was involved. It's Mahanoy Area School District which is in eastern Pennsylvania. Not sure why the school isn't mentioned in most of the news articles about this story.
Actually, that is not correct. The present case involves the Cherry Creek School District in Colorado. The Mahanoy Area School District was the subject of a recent Supreme Court Decision [wikipedia.org] which is cited in the decision of the present case [amazonaws.com].
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Huh, that just reinforces my point. I followed the links and googled the case and never saw the name of that school.