September 2009 Archives - Askthejudges

Even though 44 states ban school bullying, enforcement and data collection is deficient. Most states require school districts to have policies that prohibit harassment and bullying. But only a few require data gathering or regular reporting of results. Consequently, bullying continues unchecked and under-investigated. State …

The First Amendment grants all Americans freedom of speech, whether oral, written, posted online or through other means of electronic communication.  You may be argumentative, rude, insulting or even vile.  But our right to free speech is not absolute or unlimited. Several recent cases provide examples of …

In what may be the country’s first high school graduation behind bars, six teenagers in Arizona received their diplomas in September, 2009. Wearing graduation gowns over their prison-issue striped uniforms, the teens enjoyed “Pomp and Circumstance” from a boombox in a small room at the jail. …

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has filed a lawsuit against a Mississippi department in federal court asking the court to end the government funding of Mississippi’s abstinence-only-until-marriage program. The Mississippi Department of Human Services (MDHS) holds an annual teen abstinence summit every May.  After …

Since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, baseball parks across the country have played “God Bless America” during the seventh inning-stretch. Many spectators stand, some with their hands over their hearts. The question is, do you have to do either? At a game in …

In June, 2009, the Supreme Court said that a search of a student at school requires a “reasonable suspicion of danger” before a search can make “the quantum leap from outer clothes and backpacks to exposure of intimate parts.”  The “danger” referred to means danger to …