Supreme Court Declines to Hear Appeal of Ruling That Sharply Limited Student-Press Freedom

By SARA LIPKA

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The U.S. Supreme Court declined this morning to hear the appeal of student journalists whose dean had insisted on reviewing their newspaper before publication -- a move that defenders of press freedoms portrayed as a blow to student journalism.

The case, Hosty v. Carter, No. 05-377, involved three student reporters at Governors State University, in Illinois, who in 2000 wrote articles in The Innovator, the student newspaper, that harshly criticized the university's administration. A dean at the university, as the newspaper's publisher, then demanded to review, prior to printing, all future issues of the paper. The students refused that demand and sued the university.

In 2005 the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit ruled for the university, overturning decisions by both a district court and a three-judge panel of the appellate court. In their decision, the Seventh Circuit judges cited Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier, a 1988 Supreme Court ruling that gave high-school administrators the authority to censor publications by their students.

In a petition to the Supreme Court, the Governors State students wrote that a college newspaper's purpose is to offer "the university community the ability to receive news and information about the university uncensored by the institution itself." They and their supporters also noted that college students have historically been considered more mature than high-school students and therefore should be subjected to less restraint on their First Amendment freedoms by administrators.

For now, the Seventh Circuit's ruling is law only in the states covered by that circuit, which are Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin. But now that the Supreme Court has let stand that ruling, other courts may cite it as precedent and extend its holdings to student journalists in other states, if college officials choose to take advantage of the Hosty decision and seek greater control over their student publications.

The high court's decision not to hear the appeal "may be interpreted as a green light by some college administrators," said Mark Goodman, executive director of the Student Press Law Center, which supported the students' appeal. Thirty organizations, including press-freedom groups and university journalism departments, had joined in filing three briefs on behalf of the students.

The Student Press Law Center will "fight to ensure that censorship doesn't become a way of life on college and university campuses," said Mr. Goodman. "If nothing else we are going to be more vigilant in monitoring student-press freedom," he said.

• Like High Schools, Public Colleges Can Censor Student Newspapers, Federal Court Rules (7/1/2005)

• Case Compares Free-Speech Rights of College and High-School Newspapers (1/23/2004)

• Federal Appeals Court to Rehear Student-Newspaper Case (7/18/2003)

• Public-College Student Papers Have Broad First Amendment Rights, Court Rules (4/25/2003)

• Censorship or Quality Control? Lawsuit by Student-Newspaper Editors Tests How Much Oversight Administrators Can Assert (8/9/2002)