Defoe And Spiva Case Summary

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In the Defoe and Spiva case, the plaintiffs, Tom Defoe, a minor by and through his parent and guardian Phil Defoe, and Phil Defoe, prosecuted the defendants Sid Spiva, Merl Krull, Greg Deal, V.L. Stonecipher, John Burrel, and the Anderson County. The fact was that the Plaintiff Tom Defoe was a high school student who attended Anderson County High School (ACHS), and Anderson County Career and Technical Center (ACCTC) until December, 2007. Both of the ACHS and ACCTC have a dress code that prohibited racial and ethnic symbols, gang affiliations, vulgar, subversive, or sexually suggestive language, and any items that promote alcohol, tobacco, and drugs, because there were several racially charged incidents happens in that district in the past sixty years. In 2006, the plaintiff Tom Defoe has worn the clothes with the Confederate flag for two times, even though the school officials asked him to remove it and gave him warnings that he has already violated the dress code. Therefore, school decided to suspend the plaintiff Tom Defoe. In November, 2006, the plaintiffs alleged the Anderson County School District of violating the First and Fourteenth Amendments, …show more content…

Instead of relying on the reasoning of Tinker, the concurring opinion deviated the main opinion from the case Morse v. Frederick. The concurrence has the opinion that the racial tension in the public school is caused by the problem of drug abuse. The concurrence stated two reasons to choose to follow Morse rather than Tinker. On the one hand, the evidence could not strongly show the threat of substantial disruption, so the concurrence did not believe the evidence could apply to the Tinker analysis. On the other hand, the concurrence viewed Tinker to be the exception to the rule, instead of the standard, because the mode of analysis for Tinker is not

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