The school had decided the T-shirt would make it hard for other students to focus on their schoolwork. Two conservative justices would have taken the case.
Transgender references removed from Stonewall website
References to transgender people have been removed from a National Park Service website for the Stonewall National Monument.
Fox – 5 NY
WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court on May 27 allowed a middle school’s ban on a student’s controversial T-shirt to remain in place, declining to take a case related to the child’s “THERE ARE ONLY TWO GENDERS” message.
The court’s decision to not take the case preserves a ruling supporting the school’s decision that the shirt would make it hard for students to focus on their schoolwork.
Two of the court’s conservative justices − Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito − said they would have taken the student’s appeal.
The Supreme Court’s decision came as the debate over transgender rights has leaped to the forefront in the culture wars and after President Donald Trump declared that only two sexes, male and female, would be recognized by the federal government.
“These sexes are not changeable,” Trump stated in one of his first executive orders.
Middle schooler wore a shirt that shared Trump’s sentiment on transgender issues
Liam Morrison wanted to share a similar view in 2023 when, as a seventh-grader, he wore his “two genders” T-shirt to school.
When the principal told Liam he couldn’t return to class unless he changed his shirt, Liam opted to go home.
As the controversy over the shirt increased, Liam later wore a version of the shirt with the word “censored” taped over “two genders.”
He was also told to change that shirt.
School officials said they were acting out of concern for gender-nonconforming students, some of whom had previously experienced serious mental health struggles − including thoughts of suicide − because of how they were treated by other students.
Attorneys for Liam said the school violated his First Amendment rights to express a view different from the school’s.
Attorneys cite a ‘marketplace of ideas’ in school
Liam “sought to participate in his school’s marketplace of ideas and address sociopolitical matters in a passive, silent, and untargeted way,” lawyers with the Alliance Defending Freedom, told the Supreme Court.
The Boston-based 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sided with the school, noting federal courts have ruled schools can restrict messages that can be reasonably interpreted to demean a person’s identity and are reasonably expected to be disruptive.
And school officials, Judge David Barron wrote, must have “some margin to make high-stakes assessments in conditions of inevitable uncertainty.”
“The question here is not whether the t-shirts should have been barred,” Barron wrote. “The question is who should decide whether to bar them – educators or federal judges.”
Alito: Free speech at school should be the rule, not the exception
In his dissent, Alito said the appeals court had watered down the Supreme Court’s “demanding standard” for when schools can restrict a student’s free speech rights.
Free speech should be the rule, not the exception, he wrote.
But the appeals court, Alito said, deferred to school officials’ speculation about the effects of the T-shirt, even though there were no actual disruptions, and accepted the administrator’s conclusion that the shirt’s messaged demeaned others’ personal identity.
“Feeling upset, however, is an unavoidable part of living in our `often disputations’ society,” Alito wrote. And the desire to avoid discomfort or unpleasantness “is no reason to thwart a student’s speech.”