Due Process and Student Rights: Syllabus of the Goss v. Lopez Decision

The Ninth Amendment guarantees that rights not enumerated in the Constitution are retained by the people. To identify these rights and give them legal status, statutes have been adopted, amendments added, Presidential proclamations issued, and court opinions written. Rights of citizens under the age of 18 have been secured in this piecemeal manner.

The legal rights of minors emerged in a series of Supreme Court interpretations. Beginning in 1899, juvenile courts were established as a reform measure to separate youthful offenders from older lawbreakers. The juvenile justice system balances justice with the doctrine of parens patriae, under which the court is supposed to act as a parent protecting the interests of the juvenile. In the case of 1 S-year-old Gerald Gault, the juvenile court judge sentenced him to state reform school until he reached the age of majority, a six-year sentence, for an obscene phone call. Gault’s parents appealed his case to the state supreme court on the grounds that Gault had been denied due process of law. Gault’s case was subsequently appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which reversed the lower court’s decisions (In Re Gault, 1967).

Justice Abe Fortas wrote the opinion that found the juvenile court had deprived Gault of due process in denying him basic legal rights, including notice of the charges, right to counsel, right to confrontation and cross-examination, privilege against self-incrimination, the right to a transcript of the proceedings, and the right to appellate review.

School systems, too, are required to accord students a minimum amount of due process as a result of Goss v Lopez, 1975. In 1971 public school officials responded to student unrest in Columbus, OH, by suspending for up to 10 days all students present at or participating in demonstrations on school grounds. Students were not given a hearing prior to suspension, although some students and parents were able to hold conferences with school principals at a later date. Parents of many of the suspended students decided to sue the board of education on the basis of due process since Ohio law guaranteed free public education to all children between the ages of 6 and 21.

The Supreme Court, in a five-to-four decision, ruled that students are entitled to due process protection of their right to an education and their reputations. The state of Ohio was obliged to provide students with a written or oral notice of charges against them. If the students denied the charges, a hearing had to be held informing them of the evidence against them and providing them an opportunity to present their defense. Other than in the event of an emergency, schools were required to schedule this hearing with students before suspending them from school for misconduct for up to 10 days. A broader range of rights may be granted to students by local school boards or state law, but the range of rights cannot be narrowed. The decision did not entitle students to a lawyer, to cross-examine hostile witnesses, or to call friendly witnesses. It also did not require that the hearing be held before an impartial judge.

The featured document is the syllabus issued by the Court’s Reporter of Decisions for the case ofGoss v Lopez, which is in the Records of the Supreme Court of the United States, Record Group 267.

TEACHING ACTIVITIES

Vocabulary

1. Many terms in this document and in the background reading need to be identified before students can read about the Goss case. Instruct students to refer to their textbooks and a dictionary to define the following legal terms: appellant, appellee, de minimis, dissenting opinion, due process of law, enjoin, injunction, statute, syllabus, and opinion.

Document Analysis

2. Duplicate and distribute copies of the document to pairs of students, and instruct each pair to answer the following questions:

a. What is the date of the document?

b. Who prepared this document? For what purpose was the document created?

c. Why are the students of Ohio seeking action against school officials?

d. On the basis of which amendment did the Supreme Court uphold the rights of the students?

e. What is the students’ property interest that qualifies for protection?

f. What is the students’ liberty interest that qualifies for protection?

g. According to the Goss decision, what does due process minimally provide for students?

h. According to the Goss decision, when do schools have the authority to suspend students without an immediate hearing?

i. How many of the justices decided for Goss? Who were they?

j. How many of the justices decided against Goss? Who were they?

Discuss the questions in class, clarifying any points that students find confusing.

Research

3. Ask students to select one of the following activities for further research and to share their findings in an oral report or project:

a. If your local school board or state department of education has a written list of student rights and responsibilities, try to discover how they were developed, when they were adopted, and what topics are covered. Are rights other than the due process ones mandated by Goss v Lopez addressed in the listing, for instance, rights of learners in instructional matters? Are the topics of the student rights and responsibilities still timely, or are revisions needed?

b. If your school does not have such a list, find out whether the student government has a student rights committee and why no such document has been compiled. Students may wish to work through the student government association with the faculty adviser and administration to adopt a statement of student rights and responsibilities and to inform the student body through the school newspaper or perhaps through a special assembly.

c. Contact the school librarian or counseling office about the possibility of preparing and displaying a small exhibit that illustrates the theme, The Constitution and Student Rights. Sources of materials for such an exhibit might include:

• The Bill of Rights: Evolution of Personal Liberties, a documentary teaching package produced by the National Archives and Records Administration

• American Bar Association materials

• Student Government Association materials

• School board regulations and handouts

• Articles from local and school newspapers

• Original student drawings, illustrations, and cartoons

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