The appeal on Deborah Mayer v. Monroe County Community School Corporation was decided on January 24 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. The judgment once again brought into focus the free speech rights of teachers. An issue, which has deep implications on the society.

In short, Deborah Mayer worked for one year as a probationary elementary school teacher in Monroe County, Indiana. During her tenure in a current-events class, a pupil asked her whether she participated in political demonstrations. Deborah answered that when she passed a demonstration against this nation’s military operations in Iraq and saw a placard saying, “Honk for Peace,” she honked her car’s horn to show support for the demonstrators. Apparently, this exchange infuriated some parents who complained, and the school’s principal warned all teachers from taking sides in any political controversy. Mayer’s contract was not renewed.

Deborah filed a suit in the district court maintaining that the school authorities had refused to renew her contract because of the incident and have thus violated her rights under the first amendment. The district court held that though Mayer had a right to express her views on an issue of public importance, her right was qualified in the workplace by the requirement that her expression not unduly disrupt her employer’s business. However, the defendants contended that interest balancing did not have a role in this case since the speech in question was part of the employee’s official duties. The stance of the defense was that public employees, while making statements pursuant to their official duties, do not speak as citizens for First Amendment purposes, and the Constitution does not insulate their communications from employer discipline. The district court found in favor of the defendants and Deborah appealed to the Court of Appeals.

The Court of Appeals ruled against Deborah finding that the school system does not regulate the speech of teachers for it hires that speech. The court treated expression as a teacher’s stock in trade, the commodity she sells to her employer in exchange for a salary. The court also found that beyond the fact that teachers hire out their own speech and must provide the service for which employers are willing to pay, was the fact that the pupils are a captive audience. The court commented that the Constitution does not entitle teachers to present personal views to captive audiences against the instructions of elected officials. And in this case Mayer had been told by the elected board that she could teach the controversy about the policy toward Iraq, drawing out arguments from all perspectives, as long as she kept her opinions to herself.

If that is true, then Mayer should have desisted from expressing her personal stand even after being questioned in class about it.  She could have as easily avoided the truth by saying that she was not permitted to reveal her personal stand on the issue. But she digressed and the court declared that the first amendment does not entitle primary and secondary teachers, when conducting the education of captive audiences, to cover topics, or advocate viewpoints that depart from the curriculum adopted by the school system. While this ruling may be welcome from the standpoint of parents, still questions remain about its use in the hands of partisan school boards who may use it to carry out their own agenda of indoctrination.