JOLT Digest

Second Circuit Holds First Amendment Claim Against School Regulation of Off-Campus Speech Unlikely to Succeed on the Merits
By Jay Gill — Edited by Nicola Carah

Doninger v. Niehoff
Second Circuit, May 29, 2008, No. 07-3885
Slip Opinion

The Second Circuit unanimously affirmed the Connecticut District Court’s decision to deny a motion for preliminary injunction in a case involving a high school’s alleged violation a student’s First Amendment rights. Ms. Doninger filed suit after the high school prohibited her daughter from running for senior-class secretary, a move prompted by the school’s discovery of a blog in which the daughter had posted a “vulgar and misleading message” about administrators and an upcoming school event. The court found that the lower court had not abused its discretion in denying the preliminary injunction on the grounds that the case was unlikely to succeed on the merits.

Scott H. Greenfield of Simple Justice is troubled by the broad application of a “potential for disruption” standard. Greenfield claims that the Second Circuit ruling flies in the face of the Supreme Court’s holding in Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District, 393 U.S. 503 (1969), that students do not “shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gates.” Instead of protecting the rights of students in the schoolyard, Greenfield says, the Second Circuit is restricting those rights even once the students have left school.

Professor Jonathan Turley views the decision as part of a “steady eradication of student rights” and thinks the decision teaches a “foul lesson to these future citizens.” While he thinks that punishment is warranted when students use vulgar language or behave inappropriately, he thinks this punishment should come from parents and not school authorities.

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Second Circuit Holds Copyright Class Action Claims Must Be Based on Registered Copyright

By Andrew Ungberg — Edited by Wen Bu

In Re Literary Works in Electronic Databases Copyright Litigation
Second Circuit, November 29, 2007, No. 05-5943-cv(L)
Slip Opinion

On November 29, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit vacated and remanded a decision of the District Court for the Southern District of New York to certify a class of freelance authors and accept a settlement of their copyright infringement claims. The claims arose from unauthorized reproduction of the authors’ works on internet sites and web databases.

The Second Circuit vacated the district court’s ruling on jurisdictional grounds. Citing Section 411(a) of the Copyright Act, which provides that claims will not be instituted until preregistration or registration of the copyright claim has been made, the court held that the district court lacked jurisdiction over the claims raised by the majority of the class members, who had not registered their works. The court held that because § 411(a) requires each class member’s claims to be based on a registered copyright, the district court lacked the authority to both certify the class and accept any settlement.

Richard Pérez-Peña of the New York Times reports on the decision.
Google’s William Patry sharply disagrees with the court’s reading of § 411(a).
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