Writing for the majority, Justice Abe Fortas stated that it “can hardly be argued that either students or teachers shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.” He focused on the fact that school officials could point to no evidence that the armbands would disrupt school activities. The students then appealed to the Supreme Court and won in a 7-2 decision. The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals divided evenly, which allowed the lower court decision to stand. A federal district court judge dismissed the lawsuit in 1966, finding that the school rule was a reasonable way to prevent student disturbances. The students’ families challenged the suspensions on First Amendment grounds in federal court. The armbands caused no real disruption of school activities. Several students-including Christopher Eckhardt, John Tinker, and Mary Beth Tinker-wore the armbands to school and faced suspension. They continued, however, to allow students to wear political campaign buttons and Iron Crosses. School officials learned of the plan and quickly passed a policy prohibiting armbands.
One of the actions selected was for students to wear black armbands. In December 1965, a group of parents and students in Des Moines, Iowa, gathered to discuss ways to protest the Vietnam War and proclaim their support for a truce. Students suspended for protesting the Vietnam War through black armbands Tinker remains the seminal decision on student speech. The decision firmly established that public school students possess First Amendments rights. 503 (1969), the Supreme Court ruled that public school officials cannot censor student expression unless they can reasonably forecast that the speech will substantially disrupt school activities or invade the rights of others. Des Moines Independent Community School District, 393 U.S. "It's better for our whole society when kids have a voice," she says.
Her message: Students should take action on issues important to them.
When the school suspended her, she took her free speech case all the way to the U.S. Tinker was just 13 when she spoke out against the Vietnam War by wearing a black armband to her Iowa school in 1965. 27, 2013, Mary Beth Tinker, 61, holds up an old photograph of herself with her brother during an interview with the Associated Press in Washington.
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