Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School Dist.

Decision Date01 September 1966
Docket NumberCiv. No. 7-1810-C-1.
Citation258 F. Supp. 971
PartiesJohn F. TINKER and Mary Beth Tinker, minors, by their father and next friend, Leonard Tinker and Christopher Eckhardt, minor, by his father and next friend, William Eckhardt, Plaintiffs, v. The DES MOINES INDEPENDENT COMMUNITY SCHOOL DISTRICT et al., Defendants.
CourtU.S. District Court — Southern District of Iowa

Dan Johnston, Des Moines, Ia., for plaintiffs.

Allan A. Herrick and Philip C. Lovrien, Des Moines, Ia., for defendants.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

STEPHENSON, Chief Judge.

The plaintiffs instituted this action against the Des Moines Independent Community School District, its Board of Directors and certain administrative officials and teachers thereof in an attempt to recover nominal damages and obtain an injunction pursuant to the provisions of 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Jurisdiction exists under 28 U.S.C. § 1343.

The events giving rise to this controversy took place in December 1965. During the second week of that month, it came to the attention of certain school officials that several students intended to wear black arm bands for the purpose of expressing their beliefs relating to the war in Viet Nam. A regulation was then promulgated by officials of the defendant school district prohibiting the wearing of arm bands on school facilities. After the regulation had been established, the plaintiffs, John Tinker, Mary Beth Tinker and Christopher Eckhardt, wore black arm bands to their respective schools.1 Each of the plaintiffs testified that their purpose in wearing the arm bands was to mourn those who had died in the Viet Nam war and to support Senator Robert F. Kennedy's proposal that the truce proposed for Christmas Day, 1965, be extended indefinitely. The plaintiffs herein were all aware of the regulation prohibiting the wearing of arm bands when they wore them to school. After being in their schools for varying lengths of time, each plaintiff was sent home by school officials for violating the regulation prohibiting the wearing of arm bands on school premises. Each plaintiff returned to school following the Christmas holidays. They did not wear arm bands at that time.

The question which now must be determined is whether the action of officials of the defendant school district forbidding the wearing of arm bands on school facilities deprived the plaintiffs of constitutional rights secured by the freedom of speech clause of the first amendment. An individual's right of free speech is protected against state infringement by the due process clause of the fourteenth amendment. Gitlow v. People of State of New York, 268 U.S. 652, 45 S.Ct. 625, 69 L.Ed. 1138 (1925). The wearing of an arm band for the purpose of expressing certain views is a symbolic act and falls within the protection of the first amendment's free speech clause. West Virginia State Bd. of Educ. v. Burnette, 319 U.S. 624, 63 S.Ct. 1178, 87 L.Ed. 1628 (1943); Stromberg v People of State of California, 283 U.S. 359, 51 S.Ct. 532, 75 L.Ed. 1117 (1931). However, the protections of that clause are not absolute. See, e. g., Dennis v. United States, 341 U.S. 494, 503, 71 S.Ct. 857, 95 L.Ed. 1137 (1951); Near v. State of Minnesota, 283 U.S. 697, 51 S.Ct. 625, 75 L.Ed. 1357 (1931); Pocket Books, Inc. v. Walsh, 204 F.Supp. 297 (D.Conn.1962). The abridgement of speech by a state regulation must always be considered in terms of the object the regulation is attempting to accomplish and the abridgement of speech that actually occurs. "In each case courts must ask whether the gravity of the `evil', discounted by its improbability, justifies such invasion of free speech as is necessary to avoid the danger." United States v. Dennis, 183 F.2d 201, 212 (2d Cir. 1950).

Officials of the defendant school district have the responsibility for maintaining a scholarly, disciplined atmosphere within the classroom. These officials not only have a right, they have an obligation to prevent anything which might be disruptive of such an atmosphere. Unless the actions of school officials in this connection are unreasonable, the Courts should not interfere.

The Viet Nam war and the involvement of the United States therein has been the subject of a major controversy for some time. When the arm band regulation involved herein was promulgated, debate over the Viet Nam war had become vehement in many localities. A protest march against the war had been recently held in Washington, D. C. A wave of draft card burning incidents protesting the war had swept the country. At that time two highly publicized draft card burning cases were pending in this Court. Both individuals supporting the war and those opposing it were quite vocal in expressing their views. This was demonstrated during the school board's hearing on the arm band regulation. At this hearing, the...

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  • Harkless v. Sweeny Independent Sch. Dist. of Sweeny, Tex., Civ. A. No. 66-G-34.
    • United States
    • U.S. District Court — Southern District of Texas
    • June 6, 1969
    ...Debates 568 (remarks of Rep. Poland). 27 393 U.S. 503, 89 S.Ct. 733, 21 L.Ed. 2d 731 (1969). 28 See Tinker v. Des Moines Indep. Community School Dist., 258 F.Supp. 971-972 (S.D.Iowa 1966), aff'd per curiam by an equally divided court, 383 F.2d 988 (8th Cir. 1967) (en banc), rev'd, 393 U.S. ......
  • Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District
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    • February 24, 1969
    ...of the school authorities' action on the ground that it was reasonable in order to prevent disturbance of school disipline. 258 F.Supp. 971 (1966). The court referred to but expressly declined to follow the Fifth Circuit's holding in a similar case that the wearing of symbols like the armba......
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    • March 8, 1968
    ...and Mechanical University, 233 F.Supp. 396 (N.D.Fla.1963) where adequate hearing was afforded; Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Comm. School District, 258 F.Supp. 971 (S.D.Iowa 1966), aff'd en banc, 383 F.2d 988 (8th Cir. 1967), certiorari granted by Supreme Court, 390 U.S. 942, 88 S.Ct. 10......
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    ...F.Supp. 596 (E.D.Va.1970); Shultz v. Crotty Brothers Texas, Inc., 310 F.Supp. 761 (E.D.Tex.1970); Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District, 258 F.Supp. 971 (S.D.Iowa 1966), aff'd, 383 F.2d 988 (Eighth Cir. 1967), rev'd on other grounds, 393 U.S. 503, 89 S.Ct. 733, 21 L.Ed.......
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