Interpreting the Bill of Rights

Des, Moines Iowa
(1965)
- Mary Beth Tinker
and Christopher
Eckhardt
- protesting the
Vietnam War
- wore black armbands to school

The Case
*Once school
officials learned
about the protest...
- school officials
forbade the
armbands
- students wore the
armbands anyway
and were suspended

Argument
- parents:
- students were being denied their rights
- did not disrupt classes
- did not interfere with other students’ rights
- school:
- ‘armband rule’ preserved discipline
- schools not places for political
demonstrations

Court’s Decision
-What was the court’s decision on the case?

Court’s Decision
- local and state court
- armband rule was necessary
- avoided disruption of classes
- Supreme Court
- form of ‘speech’- symbols representing ideas
- did not interfere with students’ right to
education

Background (19381945)
- 1930’s Adolf Hitler
Nazi Party
- attacked Jews
throughout
Germany


Skokie, Illinois (1977)
- town included 40,000 Jews
- many survived Nazi camps (and many relatives
did not)
-American Nazi Party wanted to march through
Skokie with large black swastika (symbol of Nazi
Party)
To prevent march…
- group would have to obtain $350,000 of insurance

Argument:
- people against ‘march’:
- “freedom of expression has no meaning
when it defends those who would end this
right for others”
- American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU):
- “the First Amendment has to be for
everyone- or it will be for no one”

Appealing the Case
- What was the court’s decision on the case?

June 14, 1977- Supreme Court
- Protecting 1st Amendment Rights
- Skokie law requiring insurance violated First
Amendment (limited freedoms of
speech/assembly)
- right to distribute materials expressing hatred
(First Amendment protects expression of all
ideas)
- Symbols as Speech
- swastika was not banned
- Market of Ideas
- amendment protects popular and
unpopular ideas

Judge Learned Hand
- defender of free
speech
- “by respecting one
another’s rights, we
help guarantee that
the Bill of Rights
survives”