Supreme Court schedules oral arguments in Tennessee Secondary School Athletic Association v. Brentwood Academy
The U.S. Supreme Court has scheduled oral arguments in Tennessee Secondary School Athletic Association v. Brentwood Academy, Docket No. 06-427 for April 18, 2007. The case concerns whether the Tennessee Secondary School Athletic Association (TSSAA) violated the free speech rights of a member private school by sanctioning the school for violating the association’s rules against recruiting athletes. Background on the case, other aspects of which already have been argued before the Supreme Court once, is available starting at the first link below.
NSBA has filed an amicus brief, also linked below, in support of TSSAA. NSBA argues that the Court should apply its traditionally deferential standard of First Amendment review to a government’s speech-restrictive condition on recipients of government subsidies that furthers a legitimate governmental purpose and does not lead the recipient to violate an independent constitutional provision. The brief argues that the non-recruiting rule in question furthers important educational interests, interests as to which education officials also are entitled to judicial deference. Lead authors on the brief were Pamela S. Karlan and Jeffrey L. Fisher of the Stanford Law School Supreme Court Litigation Clinic, with additional pro bono participation by Amy Howe and Kevin K. Russell of Howe & Russell P.C. of Washington, D.C., and Thomas C. Goldstein of Akin, Gump, Strauss, Hauer, and Feld, LLC, also in Washington, D.C.
[NSBA School Law pages on Tennessee Secondary Sch. Athletic Ass’n v. Brentwood Acad.]
[NSBA brief in Tennessee Secondary Sch. Athletic Ass’n v. Brentwood Acad.]