ABFFE Disappointed by Supreme Court’s Student Speech Decision

Free speech advocates were disappointed by the U.S. Supreme Court’s June 25 decision upholding the right of school officials to punish a student for speech that they believe advocates the use of illegal drugs. The American Booksellers Foundation for Free Speech (ABFFE), the bookseller’s voice in the fight against censorship, had joined the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) in filing an amicus brief that argued that it was wrong to punish the student for displaying a banner that read, “Bong Hits 4 Jesus.”

ABFFE and NCAC argued that students had been released from school to attend an Olympic parade, and the student, Joseph Frederick, was not standing on school property at the time. However, the Supreme Court held that it was a school-sponsored event and declared that the principal was justified in punishing the student for displaying words that violated the school’s anti-drug policy.

But the decision in Morse v. Frederick is not a cause for despair. It is very narrow because it applies only to advocacy of illegal drug use (and persumably other illegal activities) in school or at a school sponsored event. Justices Anthony Kennedy and and Samuel Alito, who joined the majority, filed a separate opinion indicating that they supported only the right to censor drug messages. They rejected the Bush administration’s view that school officials could suppress any speech that interfered with the school’s "educational mission." To read ABFFE President Chris Finan’s comments about the decision, click here to read his blog.

ABFFE Launches New “Book of the Month” Web Feature

On July 10, ABFFE announced today that it was launching a campaign to promote books about free speech by selecting a new title every month as the “ABFFE Book of the Month” on its Web site, www.abffe.com. The featured title will appear on a page that includes a list of other newly published works. “Free speech is a hot topic in our country, and publishers are producing a growing number of important books on the subject. We want to help them get the attention they deserve,” ABFFE President Chris Finan said.

The first ABFFE Book of the Month is Bruce Barry’s Speechless: The Erosion of Free Expression in the American Workplace (June, Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 978-1-57675-397-2). Barry, a professor of management and sociology at Vanderbilt University and president of the American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee, observes that contrary to what most Americans believe, they enjoy few protections for free speech on the job. The First Amendment bars censorship by government, not private parties, Barry notes. It is even legal for an employer to fire a person whose car sports a bumper sticker boosting the “wrong” candidate. Barry believes that efforts to control their employee speech are growing–both on and off the job.

An interview with Barry can be found here.


Appeals Court Reviews Miami School Board Ban

The Miami School Board’s fight to ban a children’s picture book, Vamos a Cuba, continues. On June 6, a school board attorney told the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals that the board was entitled to ban the book from school libraries because it contains “inaccuracies.” The board is appealing a lower court decision that ordered it to keep the book in the libraries. ABFFE has filed an amicus brief supporting the ACLU’s challenge to the ban.

The controversy began ase last summer when when a former Cuban political prisoner complained that Vamos a Cuba, which is intended for children between the ages of four and six, was “untruthful” because it “portray[ed] a life in Cuba that does not exist.” Two panels reviewed the book and upheld its use in school libraries by a combined vote of 22-2. But the book was banned. One school board member said the book should have included the fact that “[t]he people of Cuba survive without civil liberties and due process under the law and receive 10- to 20-year prison sentences for simply writing a document or voicing an opinion contrary to the party line.”

Another complaint was that the book didn’t make clear that “education is permeated by political control and indoctrination” or that “[h]igh pregnancy rates in adolescence are a bi-product” of adolescents being sent to the countryside to do unpaid agricultural work.