Private School Paper Asks Court to Restore Funding Editor Axes Sports
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Who Owns the News? Private School Paper Asks Court to Restore Funding Editor Axes Sports Page: Adviser Fired SPLC Report Staff Contents Richard Kaye High School. ....... ... ... ........ 3 George Washington University Law School • Papers burned to protect writers Richard Keshian • First Junior High battle Duke University • Book banning ain't just in Boston • Contraception article censored (again) James Presnell • Gay ad, abortion articles cause controversy Friendswood (Texas) High School Current Events . ... ... ... .... .. ..... 8 Copyright Update . .... ..... ... .. 10 Student Press Law Center Guest columnist Jeffrey L. Squires examines the wire services' fight for rights to the news they cover. Executive Committee Resources . .. 10 Jeanne Buckeye Robert Knight Recent Court Decisions .. .. .. ..... 12 National SCholastic. Press Assn Missouri College Newspaper Assn Associated Collegiate Press Missouri Interscholastic Press Assn A compendium of cases involving student rights and Carol Ann Hall Lillian Lodge Kopenhaver student journalism Journalism Assn of Ohio Schools National Council 01 College Obscenity Guide .. .......... .. ... .. 14 Richard Johns Publications Advisers Quill and Scroll Society Legal Intern Rick Kaye defines and discusses ob scenity and court definitions of it • Obscenity vs. profanity Legal Advisory Committee • The three-pronged test Leon Letwin, Esq Supreme .. ... ..... Alan Levine, Esq Court Brief . 21 Robert Trager Teachers: Beware the Censor . .. ... 22 College ...... ... ... .. .. ... ...... 23 Advisory Committee • b u exposure faces financial hardships • Community college paper censored by students Gloria Brown Anderson LouiS Ingelhart • Adviser fired for refusing to censor Women in Communicalions Jack Landau • Campus Blurbs makes its debut Abraham Bass Reporters Commilfee for Freedom of the Press Illinois Community College The Student Press Law Center JournaiJsm Assn Kay Lockridge Northern illinOIS School Press Assn Society 01 Professional JournalIsts The Student Press Law Center is the only national organiza John Butler Sigma Delta Chi tion devoted exclusively to protecting the FirSI Amendment Iowa Hign School Press ASSn C Marshall Matlock rights of high school and college journalists. The Center is a national legal aid agency providing legal assistance and infor James Crook Empire State Press Assn mation to student journalists and faculty advisers experi Tennessee High School Press Assn Jack Nelson encing censorship and other legal problems. James Davidson Los Angeles Times Nalional School Yearbook/ Charles O'Malley !!Jf!8PLC Report Newspaper ASSn Columbia Scholastic Press Assn S. Gale Denley Albert Scroggins SPLC Report, published three times each year by the Student Mississippi SCholaslic Press Assn Southern Interscholastic Press Assn Press Law center, summarizes current controversies involving student rights. SPLC Report is researched, written and pro Kenneth Devol Robert Skinner Assn for Education in Journatism The Newspaper Fund duced entirely by journalism and law student interns. The SPLC seeks student-produced drawings or photo William Fisher Stan Soffin graphs to illustrate the SPLC Report. Please send copies of Assn for Educallon in Journalism. Michigan Interscholastic Press Assn Law Division your materials to the SPLC office. Robert Tottingham ......._ __. ... _--- Nancy Green Wisconsin Journatism Student Press Law Center Report, number 7, spring 1978, is Kentucky High School Press Assn Teacher/Adviser Council published by the Student Press Law Center, Suite 1112, 1750 David Hackett Craig Trygstad Pennsylvania Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20005, (202) 347- Roberl F Kennedy Memorial Youth Communication 6888. Copyright © 1978, Student Press Law Center. All rights Mary Hartman Molly Wiseman reserved. Yearly subscriptions to the SPLC Report are $5.00 Oregon Schofastic Press Journalism Educalion Assn for student newspapers, $7.00 for individuals and organiza Ray Henry Robert Wylie tions. All other contributions are tax deductible. A subscrip Plus Publications Community College Journalism Assn tion order form appears on page 31. ------_... - -.--------.�-.-�-------.--�---- Barbara Hines Lesley Lee Zimic The Student Press Law Center is pleased to announce the ad Maryland Scholastic Press American Assn of dition of a new co-director. Michael D. Simpson, who started Advisers Assn University Professors in January, is a cum laude graduate of the University of Geor gia School of Law, and an honors graduate of Davidson Col lege. He served on the Senior Editorial Board of the Georgia Co-Directors Journal of International and Comparative Law. Before join Christopher Fager ing SPLC, Mike worked for legal services programs represent Michael Simpson ing indigent persons in Georgia and recently in Washington, D.C. He is a member of the federal bar as well as the Georgia and District of Columbia bar associations. -----._------ 2 SPLC Report Spring 1978 � �High School _� .----- -- - JUNIOR HIGH Middle School Fights Prior Review .. .. --_ _--------_.-.,_ . .... --_ .. _. - ........_, . __ . .. __ ... ...- -_ .. .. .. _ _ Guidelines Protested by 11- to 14-Year-Olds The Tenafly (New Jersey) School Action on the proposed guide- Board has "delayed indefinitely" lines was not as swift or resolute, plans to enact publication guide- however. Advisers and editors at lines proposed last October which Tenafly High School submitted a would h ave severely restricted stu- statement on December J 4 to the dent press rights at Tenafly High Board of Education express ng their i School and Tenafly Middle School. dismay at the new guidelines. Men- Immediately after the proposed lioned in this letter was legal re- guidelines were announced in Octo- search in progress at the Student ber Principal Robert Smith of the Press Law Center and the American Middle School notified Tiger Tales Civil Liberties Union regarding the guidelines. advisers Dione Danis and Catherine Miggins that aJl copy would be sub- A legaJ opinion leUer written by mitted to him prior to publication. SPLC attorney Mike Simpson which stated that many of the pro- The staff, who at II Tiger Tales posed guidelines were unconstitu- to 14 are one of the youngest staffs tional was circulated to school to decided face this dilemma, to officials. cease publication rather than sub- Since then the SPLC has been in mit the copy for approval. The staff contact with school board member did not publish a newspaper for Marjorie Osborn and has learned three months. that action on "Proposed Guide- With the help of a local attorney. lines for Student Publications" has the ACLU. the local teacher's asso- been removed entirely f o the r m eiation, and the Student Press Law board's agenda. Ms. Osborn says of Center. Miggins and Danis were fi- the guidelines , "I think (the issue) nally able to persuade Principal Pholo�y Londa Schwarn just may die a normal death." Smith to permit uncensored publi- Will Captive Voices have to be For the last three months the cation of the paper until the guide- rewritten when Junior High School Tiger Tales has been published . lines were approved or amended by students join the battle for First without prior approval by the Tenafly's school board. t h pr e g i I ..m ______A::_�n dm n ri ���� _________. _ __ __S_ C__O_O _ 1 _ :�� .�.��_O_ _____ . ___ Principal Censors to 'Protect' Students Last December one thousand cop said "Voice 0 f the St uden ts. " under the veil of " T h e Movement". ies of the Dunedin (Florida) High Principal Freeman feared that the Michael Szymanski, one of the School student news ape , The PIp articles might anger members of wrilers, was nearly hit by a truck p r at a er, were destroyed by Principal Fran " The Movement". "We've had some neighborhood shopping mall soon af cis Freeman because he feared two incidents, mostly off campus. that ter the articles were wriHen. He {old "guest editorials" would cause more have been kind of frightening. In my police that he believed the incident (0 problems with a student group that opinion, the (articles] just added fuel be directly related to threatening calls itself " The Movement. " to Ihe fire." nOles and vandalism directed at stu The paper had been printed and The articles in qu tion were dents on Ihe "showdown" list. es was ready for distribution when Free written by two of nine students whose Szymanski's article defended man ordered the copies deslroyed and names appear on a "showdown" Jist allowing several students to take {he paper reprinted with a blank issued by "The Movement". The pictures for the yearbook in costumes space where the editorials would ha e nine a e been targets of harassing v h v appeared, under a headline which phone calls and threatening notes see page 4 Spring 1978 SP LC Report 3 Principal Censors continued from page 3 from a homecoming skit called "The Coneheads". "The Movement" has indicated in its correspondence with various students that the actors in the skit were receiving too many special privileges. Szymanski said the articles should have been run because local newspa pers have carried accounts of "The Movement" while the school paper has not mentioned the incidents. Tim McBride. the other writer in volved, said. "Some people have told us that because we're underage we have no rights. It just seems wrong that he can censor something like that. .. Editors Mary Rosina and Liane Anderson said Freeman notified them that he was burning the paper. and they convinced him to have it reprinted. Freeman said the $108 printing cost would