A student who was reprimanded by a Mississippi college for having an inflatable “free speech ball” on campus returned later without the prop, only to find out that his speech also had been banned.
And now a lawsuit has been filed by the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education against Jones County Community College in Ellisville.
The complaint on behalf of student Mike Brown notes that the campus police chief, Stan Livingston, told him he was “smarter” than to engage in “expressive activity” on campus without first getting permission.
Further, Livingston accused Brown of trying to make him “look like a fool.”
FIRE said Brown had been trying to poll his fellow students about legalizing marijuana, hoping to “spark a dialogue about civil liberties.”
The case developed after the college twice stopped Brown when he tried to recruit fellow students for a campus chapter of Young Americans for Liberty.
In April, Brown and a couple of other students held up a sign intended to poll students on marijuana.
College officials, however, quickly called police and had them enforce a rule that requires administrative approval for “gathering” for any purposes on campus.
“Brown and another student were taken to the police chief’s office while their friend, a non-student, was escorted to his car and told to leave immediately and not return, or he’d face arrest,” FIRE said.
The college did not respond to WND’s request for comment.
“Some people get in trouble for smoking weed, but at Jones College, I got in trouble just for trying to talk about it,” said Brown. “College is for cultivating thought and learning and encouraging civil discourse with your peers. That’s not what’s happening at Jones College.”
Brown first got into trouble for having a “free speech ball” on which students could write messages of their choice while YAL representatives talked with them.
“Students shouldn’t have to seek permission – then wait three or more days – before they can exercise their First Amendment rights,” said Marieke Tuthill Beck-Coon, FIRE’s director of litigation. “If a ball threatens the administration so much that they call campus police, no speech is safe at Jones College.”
FIRE wrote to the president, Jesse Smith, several months ago, offering help with bringing the college’s policies into compliance with the First Amendment, but they never got a response.
“Jones College had a chance to do the right thing,” said Tuthill Beck-Coon. “Instead, its leaders ignored their responsibility to uphold the First Amendment. Now the college has to answer for its censorship in federal court.”
Public colleges have the right to place some restrictions on student expression, but they “cannot maintain blanket restrictions on all student speech,” FIRE argued.
The action is part of FIRE’s Million Voices Campaign, which “aims to free the voices of one million students by striking down unconstitutional speech codes nationwide.”
The organization said it has helped more than 350,000 students.
Brown has transferred from Jones College to the University of Southern Mississippi, which holds FIRE’s “green light” rating for student speech.
The case seeks a judgment that the college’s policies are unconstitutional, violating the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
Also it seeks to have struck down the handbook provisions establishing prior restraint on speech of students and student groups.
The complaint states the college “failed to supervise or discipline its administrators and employees for unlawfully interfering with the First Amendment rights of plaintiffs as well as other JCJC students and student organizations to engage in expressive activities in the public areas of a public college campus.”
“This failure is systemic and pervades the restrictive policies maintained in the student handbook as well as the clear custom practiced by JCJC administrators and police officers to force students and student organizations into an undefined process of gaining administrative approval prior to engaging in any speech anywhere on campus,” the complaint says.
