Major test for student newspapers
on Oct 31, 2005 at 5:13 pm
The Supreme Court is showing some interest in a case that tests the scope of First Amendment protection for college and university newspaper editors and reporters. On Oct. 27, the Court asked for a response to the appeal in Hosty, et al., v. Carter (docket 05-377). The petition had been scheduled for the Court’s consideration this week, but now will be put off awaiting the response.
The case has attracted filings by the Student Press Law Center, the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communications, and other rights and education organizations.
The case reaches back to the Supreme Court’s 1988 decision in Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier. The Court ruled there that school officials may regulate the content of a student newspaper that is a part of the curriculum, but that decision involved a student publication at the high school level. The Court, in footnote 7, said: “We need not now decide whether the same degree of deference is approopriate with respect to school-sponsored expressive activities at the college and university level.”
That comment lies behind the appeal in Hosty. The case involves two editors and a reporter of the Innovator, a student newspaper at Governors State University in University Park, Ill. After the newspaper published a series of articles that were critical of university policy and personnel decisions, the dean of student affairs, Patricia Carter, told the company that printed the newspaper not to print any editions without prior approval of a university administrator.
The students sued in federal court, claiming a violation of their First Amendment rights by what they deemed a “prior restraint” by Dean Carter. The District Court ruled that the dean could not take “adverse action against the newspaper because of its content.” That Court said that the Hazelwood decision did not apply to the college level. The Seventh Circuit, in a 7-4 en banc decision, ruled that applies to subsidized student newspapers at the college level, too. The decision concluded that Dean Carter had qualified immunity to damage claims.
After the students filed a petition in the Supreme Court on Sept. 16, Dean Carter waived her right to respond. The Court last week asked for a response, to be filed by Nov. 28. This does not assure review by the Justices, but it does indicate an interest in the question at stake.
(NOTE: The Student Press Law Center has a post on Supreme Court nominee Samuel A. Alito’s decision in July 2004 that “sided with students in at least one First Amendment case during his tenure as a federal appeals judge.” The post, with a link to that decision, can be found here.)
