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| 22205 | Nov 20 2008, 10:36 PM |
Arlingtonian
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i just wanted to add a distinction: bettin's censure of the shirt in the yearbook is a seperate issue from his request of the photo company to black out the shirt in the pics they sent out. in other words, when you pay for student pictures, you are in a private money exchange for goods. so the boy should have received UNCENSORED copies of his picture. the photo company's compliance with the principal's request, is a civil issue. the boy's parents could sue at least for the cost they paid for the pictures, if not for some sort of punitive damages - though i doubt they would receive any. the issue of censoring his school pictures in the yearbook on the other hand, may fall under the 1st amendment. jim - i asked for a Minnesota courts' ruling on the subject, since thats the state thats in question in this specific instance. hazelwood is in missouri, so their ruling does not apply to minnesota. in the first link i posted, the aclu was clear that the supreme court has left it up to individual states (and their higher courts) to rule on the issue. i have tried to find a Minnesota ruling, but have so far come up empty. thats why i was hoping you could help find the specific ruling in minnesota as opposed to the other cases, such as these: http://tinyurl.com/5a239e http://tinyurl.com/5bpx5t disclaimer: i am not an attorney, though i have successfully defended myself without representation in 2 civil cases - once at the age of 16. but i have no misconceptions about my limited understanding of civil or constitutional law and am not pretending to be an expert. i frankly think that the case we are debating here is extremely complex and in a case by case basis, the rulings have differed on the issue. its all up to the lawyers and how well they did or didnt present their cases to the higher courts, so although we can try to be better informed on the issue, i doubt any of us will ever be qualified to PROVE wether or not the boy was within his official legal rights to wear a 911 truth tshirt on picture day. again however, i refer to the actions of principal Bettin for what i think is the most accurate insight of what the case was in this specific instance. his retraction probably did not come from a personal feeling on the issue. afterall, i have never known a teacher or principal who willingly backed down after they put their foot down, and believe me i have bumped heads with "educators" often in school. so for a principal to back down, especially after the case became so public, would be like him admitting defeat. i dont think he would do that willingly, so i suspect he had to have been informed (possibly as a result of the boy's legal representatives, but also the school district's own attonerys) that he was in no man's land legally, and that he had no choice but to back off. it would be informative to find a public statement made by either bitten or school superintendant about the retraction. i looked for that, but found none on their website, or in the local papers of that region: http://www.mpls.k12.mn.us/MPS_News3.html http://www.mpls.k12.mn.us/News_Releases http://www.startribune.com/ http://www.wahpetondailynews.com/ Edited by 22205, Nov 20 2008, 10:39 PM.
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| School Principal Censors 9/11 Truth Shirt · The Lounge | |
6:15 AM Dec 2
