Tinker v. Des Moines
· Case: Tinker v. Des Moines
· Year: 1969
· Result: 7-2, favor Tinker
· Related constitutional issue/amendment: Amendment 1: Speech
· Civil rights or Civil liberties: Civil Liberties
· Significance/Precedent: The Court held that by preventing the students to wear armbands in public school, as a form of symbolic protest, the school violated the First Amendment's freedom of speech protections. The wearing of the armbands was considered an act of symbolic speech and was protected by the 1stamendment. The school also failed to demonstrate how the armbands would have distracted the class.
· Quote from majority opinion: “1. In wearing armbands, the petitioners were quiet and passive. They were not disruptive, and did not impinge upon the rights of others. In these circumstances, their conduct was within the protection of the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment and the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth… A prohibition against expression of opinion, without any evidence that the rule is necessary to avoid substantial interference with school discipline or the rights of others, is not permissible under the First and Fourteenth Amendments… The court referred to, but expressly declined to follow, the Fifth Circuit's holding in a similar case that the wearing of symbols like the armbands cannot be prohibited unless it materially and substantially interfere[s] with the requirements of appropriate discipline in the operation of the school… The District Court recognized that the wearing of an armband for the purpose of expressing certain views is the type of symbolic act that is within the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment.”
· Illustration/image: See Below
· 6-word summary: Armbands were prohibited-protected speech form.
· Year: 1969
· Result: 7-2, favor Tinker
· Related constitutional issue/amendment: Amendment 1: Speech
· Civil rights or Civil liberties: Civil Liberties
· Significance/Precedent: The Court held that by preventing the students to wear armbands in public school, as a form of symbolic protest, the school violated the First Amendment's freedom of speech protections. The wearing of the armbands was considered an act of symbolic speech and was protected by the 1stamendment. The school also failed to demonstrate how the armbands would have distracted the class.
· Quote from majority opinion: “1. In wearing armbands, the petitioners were quiet and passive. They were not disruptive, and did not impinge upon the rights of others. In these circumstances, their conduct was within the protection of the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment and the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth… A prohibition against expression of opinion, without any evidence that the rule is necessary to avoid substantial interference with school discipline or the rights of others, is not permissible under the First and Fourteenth Amendments… The court referred to, but expressly declined to follow, the Fifth Circuit's holding in a similar case that the wearing of symbols like the armbands cannot be prohibited unless it materially and substantially interfere[s] with the requirements of appropriate discipline in the operation of the school… The District Court recognized that the wearing of an armband for the purpose of expressing certain views is the type of symbolic act that is within the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment.”
· Illustration/image: See Below
· 6-word summary: Armbands were prohibited-protected speech form.