Crossen v. Fatsi

• Decision Date: 16 February 1970
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. 13678.
• Citation: 309 F. Supp. 114
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Connecticut
• Parties: Ellen CROSSEN, on behalf of her son and next friend, Raymond Crossen, Plaintiff, v. Theodore FATSI, Principal of Tourtellotte Memorial High School, at al., Defendants.

309 F. Supp. 114

Ellen CROSSEN, on behalf of her son and next friend, Raymond Crossen, Plaintiff, v. Theodore FATSI, Principal of Tourtellotte Memorial High School, at al., Defendants.

Civ. A. No. 13678.

United States District Court, D. Connecticut.

February 16, 1970.

Bruce N. Berwald, Willimantic, Conn., for plaintiff.

Raymond T. Wheaton, Putnam, Conn., for defendants.

RULING ON MOTION FOR PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION

CLARIE, District Judge.

The plaintiff, a minor aged fifteen years, brings this action by his mother and next friend asking that a court of equity grant injunctive relief, ordering the defendants to immediately reinstate him as a pupil in the public high school. Jurisdiction is alleged under 28 U.S.C. §§ 2201-2202, and relief is sought pursuant to the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1983.

The Court finds that the high school dress code policy¹ relied upon by the defendants to establish general grooming standards for the student body is unduly vague, uncertain and ambiguous. Public school rules and regulations which are intended to limit the personalized freedom of privacy and self-expression in one's personal appearance, implemented by such drastic enforcement procedures, as a suspension from classes for a three week period, a potential renewal of such suspension, or even permanent expulsion, are required to be stated with sufficient clarity and specificity, that students will be adequately informed as to what conduct will invite administrative discipline. The school grooming code in this instance is unconstitutionally vague and unenforceable; therefore, the plaintiff's prayer for relief is granted.

The boy is a first year classman at the Tourtellotte Memorial (Public) High School in Thompson, Connecticut. When school opened in September 1969, he resided in that town with his parents. However, he desired to pursue a course in Vocational Agriculture, which was not taught in the local high school. This required that he enroll at a neighboring community high school, in which the state provides a regional center to teach this subject; and he also signed up for the pre-college curriculum. He did very poorly scholastically in his pre-college course subjects and ceased attending school altogether about Thanksgiving time, because of personal illness.

On December 16, 1969, he requested a transfer back to his home town high school in Thompson, but the necessary papers were not completed until December 22, 1969, when he was admitted to class three days prior to the Christmas vacation. He was orally advised then of the existing dress code, as it applied to him and he immediately complied by shaving. When he returned to classes on January 5, 1970, however, he had permitted the sideburns to grow into a full beard and had also grown a mustache. The school principal again discussed with him, in the presence of the superintendent, the grooming code in effect at the school. They advised him that he would have until the following Monday, January 12, 1970, to decide whether or not he would voluntarily comply. When he refused, he was ordered suspended from classes until he did conform.² This action by the school administrators was unanimously approved by the nine members of the Town Board of Education, which met that evening and a follow-up letter dated January 14, 1970, noticing the suspension action was mailed to the boy's parents by the principal.

It was testified that the boy's father did not approve of his son's decision, but the mother took a contrary position. The school principal explained that board policy requires that any administrative suspension is limited to a maximum of three weeks; and in this instance the plaintiff had been notified to return to classes on February 5, 1970, the day following the court hearing. This would not preclude however, a renewal of the original suspension order, should he still insist on non-compliance or taking formal action to expel him.³ On January 30, 1970, government counsel for the office of the Tolland-Windham Legal Assistance Program, Inc., filed this action in behalf of the plaintiff and requested that the Court order his reinstatement.

The dress code regulation, which is the subject of this controversy, reads as follows:

"Students are to be neatly dressed and groomed, maintaining standards of modesty and good taste conducive to an educational atmosphere. It is expected that clothing and grooming not be of an extreme style and fashion."

The school principal disclosed that this code had been effective for approximately two years and had worked very satisfactorily. It had been drawn up originally by a student-faculty advisory committee. Thereafter it was reviewed and approved by the Student Council, endorsed by the faculty and administration and formally approved by the Town Board of Education.

The school administration's involvement of all segments of the school in this policy making code was a commendable educational effort to achieve an experience in self-government by those affected by it. The first draft of the regulation was very specific, but a thorough discussion and appraisal of its objectives caused the committee to redraft the code, so that it could afford elasticity in its application and not be straight-jacketed by specifics. Beards and sideburns two or three inches below the ears and long hair below the shirt collar were considered by the principal to have been prohibited by the simple statement, "It is expected that clothing and grooming not be of an extreme style and fashion." The plaintiff-pupil contends that his beard and mustache were not prohibited under the present code, because he does not consider it to be an extreme style or fashion; and if it is so construed, it violates among other things, his constitutional right to privacy and freedom of expression; furthermore, he claims that the proceedings relating to his suspension were generally lacking in due process, because final action was taken without a full hearing.

The jurisdiction of this Court is invoked pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §§ 1343(3) and 1343(4).⁴ The complaint alleges that the plaintiff is being deprived of a right involving his personal liberty and bases his action on the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1983.⁵ The local Board of Education not only had approved the original form of the challenged regulation, but it had also ratified its application to this plaintiff by approving the school administrator's punitive suspension action. No adequate administrative remedies remained, which might afford prompt and effective relief. It is a recognized precept that whenever the right or immunity invaded affects personal liberty and is not dependent for its existence upon the infringement of property rights, a federal statutory remedy under § 1983 is available, without the plaintiff first being required to exhaust state remedies. Damico v. California, 389 U.S. 416, 88 S.Ct. 526, 19 L.Ed.2d 647 (1967); McNeese v. Board of Education, etc., 373 U.S. 668, 83 S.Ct. 1433, 10 L.Ed.2d 622 (1963); Monroe v. Pape, 365 U.S. 167, 81 S.Ct. 473, 5 L.Ed.2d 492 (1961); Hague v. CIO, 307 U.S. 496, 529, 59 S.Ct. 954, 83 L.Ed. 1423 (1939); McCall v. Shapiro, 416 F.2d 246, 249-250 (2d Cir. 1969); Eisen v. Eastman, 421 F.2d 560 (2d Cir. Nov. 28, 1969).

Secondary school regulations, which discourage extremes in personal grooming have been challenged with conflicting results in several states and federal courts in various parts of the Country. The five-member Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court unanimously sustained a demurrer to a complaint which challenged a local school regulation barring a student from classes, because of the length and appearance of his hair. The court apparently took judicial cognizance of the fact, that since the student's unusual hair style could result in the distraction of other pupils and thus disrupt and impede the maintenance of a proper classroom atomosphere, its validity was founded on a rational basis and would be sustained and enforced. Leonard v. School Committee of Attleboro, 349 Mass. 704, 212 N.E.2d 468, 14 A.L. R.3d 1192 (1965). However, a recent case in the federal district court in that same state held to the contrary in the absence of a factual showing of reasonable disciplinary demands. Richards v. Thurston, 304 F.Supp. 449, 452-453 (1969). It concluded:

"* * * (T)he state * * * has no such rational ground for dictating hair style to a pupil in a general high school as to support an official order interfering with his liberty to express in his own way his preference as to whatever hair style comports with his personality and his search for his own identity."

A recent landmark case in the Supreme Court involving the enforcement of administrative disciplinary codes in secondary schools concerned the suspension of pupils from high school for wearing arm bands, which protested the Viet Nam War, in violation of a local school regulation. Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School Dist., 393 U.S. 503, 89 S.Ct. 733, 21 L.Ed.2d 731 (1968). The court reversed the district court (whose decision had been affirmed by a divided appellate court (4-4) ) on the grounds that this school regulation proscribed freedom of expression in violation of the first and fourteenth amendments. Those federal courts who have considered this issue on constitutional grounds adhere to the basic criterion that where there is no finding or showing that engaging in the forbidden conduct would materially and substantially interfere with the requirements of appropriate discipline in the operation of the school, the prohibition cannot be sustained. Griffin v. Tatum, 300 F.Supp. 60, 62 (M.D. Ala.1969); Crews v. Cloncs, 303 F.Supp. 1370, 1375-1376 (S.D. Ind.1969); Richards v. Thurston, 304 F.Supp. 449 (D.Mass. 1969); Soglin v. Kauffman, 295 F.Supp. 978 (W.D.Wis.1968); Breen v. Kahl, 419 F.2d 1034 (7th Cir. Dec. 3, 1969); Westley v. Rossi, 305 F.Supp. 706 (D. Minn. Oct. 9, 1969); Sims v. Colfax County...