Mahanoy Area School District v. B.L.

141 S. Ct. 2038 (2021)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

B. L. was a student at Mahanoy. B. L. tried out for a position on the school’s varsity cheerleading squad and right fielder on a private softball team. She did not make the varsity cheerleading team or get her preferred softball position, but she was offered a spot on the cheerleading squad’s junior varsity team. That weekend, B. L. used her smartphone to post two photos on Snapchat. The first image showed B. L. and a friend with middle fingers raised; it bore the caption: “Fuck school fuck softball fuck cheer fuck everything.” The second image was blank but for a caption, which read: “Love how me and [another student] get told we need a year of jv before we make varsity but that doesn’t matter to anyone else?” The caption also contained an upside-down smiley-face emoji. B. L.’s Snapchat “friends” included other Mahanoy students, some of whom also belonged to the cheerleading squad. One using a separate cellphone, took pictures of B. L.’s posts and shared them with other members of the cheerleading squad. One showed them to her mother (who was a cheerleading squad coach), and the images spread. Several cheerleaders and other students approached the cheerleading coaches “visibly upset” about B. L.’s posts. The coaches decided that because the posts used profanity in connection with a school extracurricular activity, they violated team and school rules. They suspended B. L. from the junior varsity cheerleading squad for the upcoming year. B. L.’s subsequent apologies did not move school officials. The school’s athletic director, principal, superintendent, and school board, all affirmed the suspension. B. L., together with her parents, filed this lawsuit in Federal District Court. The District Court found that B. L.’s Snapchats had not caused substantial disruption at the school. It declared that B. L.’s punishment violated the First Amendment, awarded B. L. nominal damages and attorneys’ fees and ordered the school to expunge her disciplinary record. The Third Circuit affirmed. It held there was no evidence the student protest would “substantially interfere with the work of the school or impinge upon the rights of other students.” It also held that: “Conduct by [a] student, in class or out of it, which for any reason-whether it stems from time, place, or type of behavior-materially disrupts classwork or involves substantial disorder or invasion of the rights of others is . . . not immunized by the constitutional guarantee of freedom of speech.” Because B. L.’s speech took place off-campus, the panel concluded that the Tinker standard did not apply and the school consequently could not discipline B. L. for engaging in a form of pure speech. D appealed.