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Page Number: 39.0

6 

MAHANOY AREA SCHOOL DIST. v. B. L. 

THOMAS, J., dissenting 

A 
Consider the Court’s longtime failure to grapple with the
historical doctrine of in loco parentis.  As I have previously
explained, the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified against 
the background legal principle that publicly funded schools 
operated not as ordinary state actors, but as delegated sub-
stitutes  of  parents.  Id.,  at  411–413.  This  principle  freed
schools  from  the  constraints  the  Fourteenth  Amendment 
placed on other government actors.  “[N]o one doubted the 
government’s ability to educate and discipline children as
private schools did,” including “through strict discipline . . . 
for behavior the school considered disrespectful or wrong.” 
Id., at 411–412.  “The doctrine of in loco parentis limited the 
ability of schools to set rules and control their classrooms in
almost no way.”  Id., at 416. 

Plausible arguments can be raised in favor of departing
from  that  historical  doctrine.    When  the  Fourteenth 
Amendment was ratified, just three jurisdictions had com-
pulsory-education laws.  M. Katz, A History of Compulsory 
Education Laws 17 (1976).  One might argue that the dele-
gation logic of in loco parentis applies only when delegation
is  voluntary.  But  cf.  id.,  at  11–13  (identifying  analogs  to
compulsory-education laws as early as the 1640s); Pierce v. 
Society of Sisters, 268 U. S. 510 (1925) (requiring States to
permit parents to send their children to nonpublic schools). 
The Court, however, did not make that (or any other) argu-
ment against this historical doctrine. 

Instead,  the  Court  simply  abandoned  the  foundational
rule without mentioning it.  See Tinker v. Des Moines Inde-
pendent Community School Dist., 393 U. S. 503 (1969).  Ra-
ther than wrestle with this history, the Court declared that
it  “ha[d]  been  the  unmistakable  holding  of  this  Court  for 
almost 50 years” that students have free-speech rights in-
side schools.  Id., at 506.  “But the cases the Court cited in 
favor of that bold proposition do not support it.”  Morse, 551 
U. S., at 420, n. 8 (THOMAS, J., concurring).  The cases on