"Bong Hits for Jesus" Case at Supreme Court Today

Teh case of an Alaskan teenager who displayed a "Bong Hits 4 Jesus" sign at a school sanctioned event to watch the passage of the Olympic Torch prior to the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake City. From the Chicago Tribune story:

Joseph Frederick was a high school senior in Juneau, Alaska, when he decided to display the banner at a school-sanctioned event to watch the Olympic torch pass through the city on its way to the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake City.

Principal Deborah Morse believed his "Bong Hits 4 Jesus" banner was a pro-drug message that schools should not tolerate. She suspended Frederick for 10 days. Frederick sued Morse, and that case now is before the court.

Frederick acknowledged he was trying to provoke a reaction from school administrators with whom he had feuded, but he denied that he was speaking out in favor of drugs or anything other than free speech. A bong is a water pipe that is used to smoke marijuana.

The American Bar Association has the briefing materialsSCOTUSBlog has a preview here. The worry among some court watchers is that this case, invovling not only a dispute over legal rulings but also a base dispute over the facts, could result in a bad case/bad law scenario.

If the Supreme Court on Monday finds itself interested in the facts in a case coming up for argument, it might never get to the law. That is because both sides in the case of Morse v. Frederick (06-278) are as divided on the facts and especially on the meaning the facts convey as they are on the serious constitutional issues at stake.

A focus on the facts may determine whether the Court sees this as a case about student free speech rights, raising major, unresolved First Amendment questions, or a case about speech on a public sidewalk, making it routine, perhaps even unremarkable. If it is only the latter, the Court has been advised, why bother? It has been suggested seriously that the case should simply be dismissed, and an alternative found to pose the issues more clearly.

When transcripts/audio becomes available, I will post a link.