William Rehnquist

“ The idea that such students have a right of access, in the school, to information other than that thought by their educators to be necessary is contrary to the very nature of an inculcative education. ”

“ Not every official act which denies access to an idea can be characterized as a suppression of the idea. Thus, unless the "right to receive information" and the prohibition against "suppression of ideas" are each a kind of Mother-Hubbard catch phrase for whatever First Amendment doctrines one wishes to cover, they would not appear to be interchangeable.
JUSTICE BRENNAN's reliance on the "suppression of ideas" to justify his distinction between acquisition and removal of books has additional logical pitfalls. ”

“ After all else is said, however, the most obvious reason that petitioners' removal of the books did not violate respondents' right to receive information is the ready availability of the books elsewhere. Students are not denied books by their removal from a school library. The books may be borrowed from a public library, read at a university library, purchased at a bookstore, or loaned by a friend. The government as educator does not seek to reach beyond the confines of the school. ”

“ In every one of these areas, the members of a school board will act on the basis of their own personal or moral values, will attempt to mirror those of the community, or will abdicate the making of such decisions to so-called "experts." ”

“ With respect to the education of children in elementary and secondary schools, the school board may properly determine in many cases that a particular book, a particular course, or even a particular area of knowledge is not educationally suitable for inclusion within the body of knowledge which the school seeks to impart. ”

“ Clearly, the prohibition of expression of one particular opinion, at least without evidence that it is necessary to avoid material and substantial interference with schoolwork or discipline, is not constitutionally permissible. ”

“ A school board which publicly adopts a policy forbidding the criticism of United States foreign policy by any student, any teacher, or any book on the library shelves is indulging in one kind of "suppression of ideas." ”

“ The problem, in any case, is to arrive at a balance between the interests of the teacher, as a citizen, in commenting upon matters of concern, and the interest of the State, as an employer, in promoting the efficiency of the public services it performs through its employees. ”

“ The effective acquisition of knowledge depends upon an orderly exposure to relevant information. Nowhere is this more true than in elementary and secondary schools, where, unlike the broad-ranging inquiry available to university students, the courses taught are those thought most relevant to the young students' individual development. Of necessity, elementary and secondary educators must separate the relevant from the irrelevant, the appropriate from the inappropriate. Determining what information not to present to the students is often as important as identifying relevant material. ”

“ We have held that students may not be prevented from symbolically expressing their political views by the wearing of black arm bands, Tinker v. Des Moines School District, supra, and that they may not be forced to participate in the symbolic expression of saluting the flag, West Virginia Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624 (1943) . But these decisions scarcely control the case before us. Neither the District Court nor the Court of Appeals found that petitioners' removal of books from the school libraries infringed respondents' right to speak or otherwise express themselves. ”