Opinion ID: 770682
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: To What Extent Can the Government Control Its Own Speech?

Text: 40 Now that we have concluded that this case involves government speech in a nonpublic forum, we must decide to what extent the First Amendment allows others to interfere with it. See Knights of the Ku Klux Klan v. Curators of the Univ. of Mo., 203 F.3d 1085, 1094 n.11 (8th Cir. 2000) (refusing to decide whether speech's status as government speech is enough to preclude forum analysis altogether), petition for cert. filed, 68 U.S.L.W. 3741 (U.S. May 17, 2000) (No. 991838). We conclude that when a public high school is the speaker, its control of its own speech is not subject to the constraints of constitutional safeguards and forum analysis, but instead is measured by practical considerations applicable to any individual's choice of how to convey oneself: among other things, content, timing, and purpose. Simply because the government opens its mouth to speak does not give every outside individual or group a First Amendment right to play ventriloquist. As applied here, the First Amendment allows LAUSD to decide that Downs may not speak as its representative. This power is certainly so if his message is one with which the district disagrees. 41 Although [i]t is axiomatic that the government may not regulate speech based on its substantive content or the message it conveys, Rosenberger, 515 U.S. at 828 (emphasis added), when the State is the speaker, it may make contentbased choices. Id. at 833; see also Rust v. Sullivan, 500 U.S. 173, 194-200 (1991) (upholding federal regulations prohibiting recipients of Title X grants from promoting or advocating abortion as a method of family planning); Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, 203 F.3d at 1094 & n.11 (in public broadcasting case dealing with outside organization's desire to donate funds to broadcaster and thereby mandate broadcaster's on-air recognition of such donation, stating that [a]s speaker, [the university-public broadcaster] exercises control not only over the decision to accept or reject the donations, but also over the form and content of the announcements themselves.); Steirer, 987 F.2d at 994, 997 (The mere fact that [a public high school's] course content itself reflects a particular ideology does not necessarily trench upon First Amendment protections.); Muir v. Alabama Educ. Television Comm'n, 688 F.2d 1033, 1044 (5th Cir. 1982) (en banc) (in the context of state-owned-and-operated public television stations, stating that the First Amendment does not prohibit the government, itself, from speaking, nor require the government to speak. Similarly, the First Amendment does not preclude the government from exercising editorial control over its own medium of expression.). Accord Forbes, 523 U.S. at 674, 676-78, 682 (after specifically indicating that public broadcaster's broadcast was by design a forum for political speech by the candidates, holding that broadcaster must make broadcasting decisions in viewpoint-neutral manner); Edwards v. California Univ. of Pa., 156 F.3d 488, 490-92 (3d Cir. 1998) (adhering to Rosenberger's content-based language in curriculum case, but doing so in a way that allowed public university to prevent professor from advancing [his] religious beliefs through his lectures and handouts), cert. denied, 525 U.S. 1143 (1999). Forbes, in fact, recognized this proposition: Much like a university selecting a commencement speaker, a public institution selecting speakers for a lecture series, or a public school prescribing its curriculum, a broadcaster by its nature will facilitate the expression of some viewpoints instead of others. 523 U.S. at 674. 42 When the government is formulating and conveying its message, it may take legitimate and appropriate steps to ensure that its message is neither garbled nor distorted by its individual messengers. Rosenberger, 515 U.S. at 833. For example, a government's administration will not just make a decision to talk about taxes. It will have a viewpoint on the utility of taxes, and there is no constitutional reason why it should not be able to convey that message with clarity. See National Endowment for the Arts v. Finley, 524 U.S. 569, 598 (1998) (Scalia, J., concurring) (It is the very business of government to favor and disfavor points of view on (in modern times, at least) innumerable subjects -which is the main reason we have decided to elect those who run the government, rather than save money by making their posts hereditary . . . . None of this has anything to do with abridging anyone's speech.). 43 An arm of local government such as a school board -may decide not only to talk about gay and lesbian awareness and tolerance in general, but also to advocate such tolerance if it so decides, and restrict the contrary speech of one of its representatives. Cf. Rust, 500 U.S. at 194 (To hold that the Government unconstitutionally discriminates on the basis of viewpoint when it chooses to fund a program dedicated to advance certain permissible goals, because the program in advancing those goals necessarily discourages alternative goals, would render numerous Government programs constitutionally suspect.). Rosenberger supports this notion. Shortly after the Court stated that the government may make content-based choices as speaker, the Court also declared, with reference to the facts of that case, that [a] holding that the University may not discriminate based on the viewpoint of private persons whose speech it facilitates does not restrict the University's own speech which is controlled by different principles. Rosenberger, 515 U.S. at 834 (citing, among others, Hazelwood); see also Board of Regents of the Univ. of Wis. Sys. v. Southworth, 120 S. Ct. 1346, 1357 (2000) (Where the University speaks, either in its own name through its regents or officers, or in myriad other ways through its diverse faculties, the analysis likely would be all together different [from traditional viewpoint neutrality analysis].). 44 At oral argument, Downs asserted that his case is indistinguishable from Rosenberger because, he alleges, LAUSD invited a variety of viewpoints on gay and lesbian issues. Downs, of course, is correct in his argument that his postings focused on gay and lesbian issues, as contemplated by Memorandum No. 111. If we myopically limited Memorandum No. 111's message to that phrase, we might agree with Downs that this case would be indistinguishable from Rosenberger as inviting a myriad of viewpoints on a single topic of discussion, and thus requiring forum analysis. See 515 U.S. at 824, 837 (striking down university's decision not to subsidize publications with religious editorial viewpoints in light of a university mandate making such subsidies available to all student organizations related to the educational purpose of the University). However, that Downs's postings did indeed focus on gay and lesbian issues does not mean that they satisfied all aspects of LAUSD's policy as announced in Memorandum No. 111. 45 In addition to inviting a focus on gay and lesbian issues, Memorandum No. 111 made clear that it was the District's multicultural and human relations education policy to Educat[e] for Diversity, and that this included the expectation that all students would be given equal access to a quality education and the academic and social activities of the school. The policy also made clear a focus on foster[ing] a climate that reduces fears related to difference and deters name-calling and acts of violence or threats motivated by hate and bigotry. In LAUSD's view, Downs's contributions to the bulletin boards harmed, rather than helped, the promotion of tolerance for and appreciation of diversity. 46 Moreover, Downs had notice that he was not dealing with a situation in which the government had opened up a forum inviting private speech and debate. In fact, Downs had continuous notice that he was violating district policy, even if he could successfully argue that Memorandum No. 111 was ambiguous regarding what it allowed him to contribute to Gay and Lesbian Awareness month in the school. Olmsted and Marino, as representatives of the elected school board, informed him that he was not conveying the government's chosen message, and that as long as he was employed by LAUSD, he was expected to adhere to the district's policy. Estrada-Melendez, LAUSD's legal counsel, informed Downs that the bulletin boards were not free speech zones. 47 Were we to invoke the Constitution to protect Downs's ability to make his voice a part of the voice of the government entity he served, Downs would be able to do to the government what the government could not do to Downs: compel it to embrace a viewpoint. See Hurley v. Irish-American Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Group of Boston, 515 U.S. 557, 573-74 (1995) ([T]he fundamental rule of protection under the First Amendment [is] that a speaker has the autonomy to choose the content of his own message.); Wooley v. Maynard, 430 U.S. 705, 714 (1977) (striking down state criminal law forbidding New Hampshire citizens from covering up state motto Live Free or Die on license plates as violative of right to refrain from speaking); West Virginia Bd. of Educ. v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624 (1943) (invalidating school board resolution requiring teachers and students to participate in flag salute). Indeed, not only would the government be compelled to speak, but Downs's citation to passages from the Bible might present Establishment Clause problems. 48 Our narrow decision does not conflict with the Supreme Court's plurality decision in Board of Educ., Island Trees Union Free Sch. Dist. No. 26 v. Pico, 457 U.S. 853 (1982). Pico dealt with a school district's decision to remove several books from a school library. Id. at 856-58; see also Monteiro v. Tempe Union High Sch. Dist., 158 F.3d 1022, 1028-31 & n.13 (9th Cir. 1998) (student's First Amendment rights violated by removal -because of threats of damages, lawsuits, and other forms of retaliation -from mandatory reading list of books determined by the school district to have legitimate educational value); Pratt v. Independent Sch. Dist. No. 831, Forest Lake, Minn., 670 F.2d 771, 773 (8th Cir. 1982) (school board's removal of material from classroom curriculum based solely on material's message is unconstitutional). In Pico, the court made clear at the outset that the respondents in that case did not seek 49 to impose limitations upon their school Board's discretion to prescribe the curricula of the Island Trees schools. On the contrary, the only books at issue in this case are library books, books that by their nature are optional rather than required reading. Our adjudication of the present case thus does not intrude into the classroom, or into the compulsory courses taught there. 50 Pico, 457 U.S. at 862. Thus, when the Court held that local school boards could not remove books from school library shelves simply because they disliked the ideas contained in the books, id. at 872, the Court was not faced with a case of school board speech or government speech. Instead, the Court declared, the school board's duty to inculcate community values was misplaced as a defense in that case where the board attempt[ed] to extend [its] claim of absolute discretion beyond the compulsory environment of the classroom, into the school library and the regime of voluntary inquiry that there holds sway. Id. at 869. 51 Whether or not the bulletin boards by themselves may be characterized as part of the school district's curriculum is unimportant, because curriculum is only one outlet of a school district's expression of its policy. Nevertheless, our decision is consistent with cases holding that school teachers have no First Amendment right to influence curriculum as they so choose. See, e.g., Edwards, 156 F.3d at 491-92 (holding that professor has no First Amendment right to compel university to allow him to teach class from religious perspective); Boring v. Buncombe County Bd. of Educ., 136 F.3d 364, 370-71 (4th Cir. 1998) (en banc) (teacher's choice of play not constitutionally-protected speech); Bradley v. Pittsburgh Bd. of Educ., 910 F.2d 1172, 1176 (3d Cir. 1990) (holding that teacher has no First Amendment right to employ classroom teaching methodology of choice); Kirkland v. Northside Indep. Sch. Dist., 890 F.2d 794, 795 (5th Cir. 1989) (teacher's choice of supplemental reading list not constitutionallyprotected speech); see also Monteiro, 158 F.3d at 1030 n.13 (Although the complaint does not refer to the involvement of teachers in the teaching of the literary works at issue or in the formation of the curriculum, it is likely that claims such as these, and their outcomes, could have significant effect on the First Amendment rights of teachers.). 52 In order for the speaker to have the opportunity to speak as the government, the speaker must gain favor with the populace and survive the electoral process. See Southworth, 120 S. Ct. at 1357 (When the government speaks, for instance to promote its own policies or to advance a particular idea, it is, in the end, accountable to the electorate and the political process for its advocacy. If the citizenry objects, newly elected officials later could espouse some different or contrary position.). The LAUSD school board is elected by the public, and until its current members are voted out of office, they speak for the school district through the policies they adopt. Furthermore, in the case of the typical school board, influence from the community does not end at the ballot box, but continues through publicly-held school board meetings at which parents and other interested parties may express satisfaction or dissatisfaction with the school board's policies or speech. This is reflected in this case by Memorandum No. 111's acknowledgment that community groups had participated in a review of the posters and materials LAUSD sent to each of the schools for Gay and Lesbian Awareness month. 53 The district court in this case noted that [j]ust as a school could prohibit a teacher from posting racist material on a bulletin board designated for Black History Month,[LAUSD] may prohibit [Downs] from posting intolerant materials during `Gay and Lesbian Awareness Month.'  The Supreme Court has recognized a similar principle in the context of the government's ability to regulate its employees' speech and discipline those employees for that speech. In Pickering v. Board of Education, 391 U.S. 563 (1968), the Court noted that the State has interests as an employer in regulating the speech of its employees that differ significantly from those it possesses in connection with regulation of the speech of the citizenry in general. Id. at 568 (1968). 54 Our holding, however, does not prevent Downs from propounding his own opinion on the morality of homosexuality. Subject to any applicable forum analysis, he may do so on the sidewalks, in the parks, through the chat-rooms, at his dinner table, and in countless other locations. Cf. Rust, 500 U.S. at 198 (Individuals who are voluntarily employed for a Title X project must perform their duties in accordance with the regulation's restrictions on abortion counseling and referral. The employees remain free, however, to pursue abortion-related activities when they are not acting under the auspices of the Title X project.); Edwards, 156 F.3d at 491 ([A]lthough Edwards has a right to advocate outside of the classroom for the use of certain curriculum materials, he does not have a right to use those materials in the classroom.). He may not do so, however, when he is speaking as the government, unless the government allows him to be its voice.