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1st Amendment Wrangling

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1st Amendment Wrangling

There have been many supreme and district court cases that involve the first amendment. Your First Amendment rights are a heavily debated topic. Students, in particular, walk a very fine line regard to their free speech. Schools, students, and the federal government are still trying to figure out where they stand. Within this essay there are three main topics that I wish to cover; they are as follows Dress Code, Student Free Speech, and Internet Use. Every case within these topics is argued with the First Amendment in hand, though not all of them conclude the same. I hope you enjoy educating yourself on this tedious topic!

Dress Code

When you think of dress code in schools, the 1969 case “Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District” comes to mind. It is by far the most cited and discussed …show more content…

Marineau” in 2006. The case began in May 2004, a student of Williamstown Middle School named Zachary Guiles wore a shirt that talks down on President George Bush. You can see the shirt he wore to the right. The school suspended Zachary for wearing the shirt. Once he was allowed back in school, the school told him that he could wear the shirt if he wished but he would have to tape over certain pictures in including a martini glass, lines of cocaine, straws, and razor blades. These were all references to substance abuse problems President Bush is said to have had as a younger man. The images violated the school 's dress code policy, which prohibited all images of drugs, or anything related to drugs. Zachary felt this violated his first amendment rights by censoring his messages. Zachary took the issue to court; the case eventually moved to the Second Circuit Court. The court decided that even though the shirt demonstrated drugs and alcohol, the First and Fourteenth Amendments protected Zachary. This case only strengthens student free speech by bypassing the school 's dress

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