More thoughts on Morse v Frederick

I thought the student speech cases were the most compelling readings this week, and it seems like most people agreed. The Morse v. Frederick case was very interesting for a number of reasons. First of all, Frederick was technically an adult. He was a senior in high school and 18 years old when this incident occurred. I think it’s important in this discussion that under the law, Frederick was both a student and a legal adult because I think it’s easy to assume that being a student equates the individual with being a minor. Does this change anything in the ruling? It’s unclear to me.
Another aspect of the case that was quickly discarded in the opinion was Frederick’s argument that this was not a school speech case. He was standing on the sidewalk across from the school when he held up his “Bong Hits 4 Jesus” sign, and while I understand that this was part of a clearly designated school-sponsored social event for the Olympic torch relay (so the same rules apply), I wonder how far the physical boundaries extend. If Frederick had played hooky that day and set up his banner on the other side of Juneau, would the same rules apply? If he was another block away from the school and it was pointed in the opposite direction, would that result in a different ruling? The physical boundaries of how far the limits of student speech in public schools extend is pretty ambiguous.
My second comment on the Frederick case has to do with student speech at universities. I wonder what would have happened had Frederick pulled this stunt at the University of Alaska or another public university. I see that Monica touched on this in her post, but I’ll try to elaborate. The environment in which someone expresses themselves seems to be crucial to the regulation of speech, just as crucial as the content of that expression. The promoting of illegal drugs near a high school seems worthy of Morse’s imposing of limitations on Frederick’s free speech. Monica suggested looking at this case as if it occurred at Yale—of course, the situation is not comparable as Yale is a private institution—but the idea of looking at the case through the lens of student speech at public universities is definitely valuable. In my mind, the difference is the audience. There are not impressionable 14 year old freshmen running around in college. The limiting of speech cannot be justified by an argument of protecting young minds from dangerous influences. Thus, I agree with the spirit of the ruling in Morse v. Frederick, though I think the judges left a lot of issues undecided, which as we have seen in other cases last week, may have been purposeful.