Search results
The letter was an attack on the Board's handling of the 1961 bond proposals and its subsequent allocation of financial resources between the schools' educational and athletic programs. It also charged the superintendent of schools with trying to prevent teachers from speaking out against the proposed bond issue.
Appellant Marvin L. Pickering, a teacher in Township High School District 205, Will County, Illinois, was dismissed from his position by the appellee Board of Education for sending a letter to a local newspaper in connection with a recently proposed tax increase that was critical of the way in which the Board and the district superintendent of ...
26 lut 2019 · Pickering v. Board of Education Brief. Statement of the Facts: A teacher in Township High School District 205 wrote a letter to a local newspaper, complaining about the way in which the Board of Education handled past proposals to raise revenue.
Pickering sued in the Circuit Court of Will County alleging his letter was speech protected under the First Amendment. The court ruled in favor of the school board and the Supreme Court of Illinois affirmed.
The Board found all the statements false as charged, and concluded that publication of the letter was "detrimental to the efficient operation and administration of the schools of the district" and that "the interests of the school require[d] [appellant's dismissal]" under the applicable statute.
Justice Thurgood Marshall wrote the 8-1 majority opinion holding that Pickering’s dismissal violated his First Amendment right to free speech. The Supreme Court noted that similar speech is not protected if it contains false statements knowingly or recklessly made.
1 sty 2009 · The case began when school board officials in Will County, Illinois, terminated Lockport High science teacher Marvin Pickering for writing a letter to the Lockport Herald critical of the school board’s allocation of funds.
