A Conversation with John Tinker | BRI’s #TenthPeriod Webinar Series
0:06 hello and welcome everyone sit 10 theory equivalent license to taste by weekly webinars my name is Kirk Higgins I’m the senior manager for curriculum period for a license to I think here for five years and it’s my privilege to be able to develop that content and curriculum help build license to fellows and my name is Rachel Davis and countries I’m the director of outreach here at the Institute and prior to that I was in the classroom for about eight years working the students around the country on many of the ideas that we present here at 10th period and today we are honored to welcome with us John Titor joining us remotely and our were excited to have you cow thanks thank you very much for inviting me I’m happy to be with you John is a man who needs little introduction but I just to set the stage for what we’re hoping to cover today our goals discuss the landmark Supreme Court case of teacher Peter Borik we really want to do it that is worried about John’s experience and what it was like to be a part of that momentous case it also discussed the long arm of that decision and how its impacted conversations about free speech and continues to do so today and really to also prep with the idea of how we can talk about free speech in the classroom it’s important and how to really encourage students to to use their voice if you use the police speech rights that they have to do good in their schools and their communities I’d like to remind everyone that throughout the conversation today there’s a Q&A box
1:38 we’d encourage you to submit any questions that you have for John or for us and we will answer those at the end of the webinar series will save about 15 to 20 minutes or just your question so please throughout the conversation ask any questions that you had with that John but if you are familiar with your case but for those who are less familiar could you provide a summary for us sure in in late 1965 some of us students were very concerned about the war in Vietnam the the death and destruction that was and we were deeply moved by that and so we decided to wear black armbands to indicate our our feelings about the war and the the school administration prohibited the armbands when they found out that we were going to wear them they prohibited it and so we reward them anyway and got kicked out of school and so we sued the school board in the federal court for violating our First Amendment rights and we lost at the district court we appealed to the circuit court in st. Louis and they split four to four and so we appealed it to the Supreme Court and at the Supreme Court we won seven to two so it was a pretty strong decision in our favor at the Supreme Court and the court the Abe
3:09 Fortas the Justice who wrote the majority opinion declared that neither students nor teachers shed their First Amendment rights at the schoolhouse gate [Music] become the John tinker tinker B Des Moines habit how did you get to that moment when you and I guess it was a group of friends can you speak more about that about the origins of your story well I grew up in a family of activists in a sense my parents were both strong civil rights activists and my father was a Methodist minister I he he believed in a position that they sometimes called the social gospel concern for other people mostly and my parents had witnessed World War two as young adults they were very much anti-war and when the Vietnam War started to develop us children in the family also picked up that concern and so that was really the basis of how myself and my sister Mary Beth and actually our younger siblings too became involved in the wearing of the armbands sure my father was a Methodist minister
4:42 as I said in a small town in Iowa when I was a young child then there was one family in town the children of which were not a black family the kids were not permitted to swim at the public swimming pool and when my father found out about that he he took it up with with the town council and the church where he was serving as pastor was upset by that they didn’t want to have that type of controversy in the town and so they didn’t renew our father’s contract and so he had an appointment in the church in Des Moines Iowa and we also we invited our black friends as kids and the family invited our black friends to come to that church and that church also didn’t want to have black people in the church and so they also didn’t renew his contract at that point our Father had became employed by a Quaker organization called the American Friends Service Committee and his job title was peace education secretary and his job was to bring speakers about world affairs into into Iowa and and the surrounding states and so we kids had access to quite a bit of information about the war that that was
6:13 not coming from the network news or the AP or the UPI and and so it was natural in our family to be opposed to the war and it was also natural to do something about it when we we felt the the prick of conscience about it great story John it’s so incredible that you were able to feel that quick and take a step forward because it can be such a thing to do can we yeah in looking back now and how momentous this case is for Tom did you have an idea when you were putting on that armband and going off to school that it would develop into the case that it is or that it would garner the attention that it has not the faintest idea no idea at all our concern was about the war and the First Amendment I grew up in the public school system in Iowa and we were taught to believe in the First Amendment and I grew up assuming that the First Amendment applied and that I had a right to say what I thought I understood that I didn’t have the right to disrupt the school but I did feel that I had the right as an American to speak my mind and to let people know what I thought but no we we had no idea at all first that it would turn into a First Amendment case and second that that case
7:45 would grow to be what it has become in the following 50 years this month is actually the 50th anniversary of the decision in the case yeah that’s right and the rice Institute is actually going to be having a contest that we would like to encourage everyone in at hashtag honored 1050 on February 25th any teachers who are out there who are teaching about the Tinker case on the anniversary we encourage you to to tweet at us the platforms you’re interpreting these ideas and that can be long are their importance in into your classrooms with your students today so again that’s hashtag teacher on our teeth or 55 0 that’s wonderful so how is to tell us what happened since how has that early experience on the national stage impacted your life what what what’s been what’s the needs your your life experience since that well it’s been quite quite an experience for me it’s hard for me to compare a against B because I only experienced the life I’ve led in a sense I I felt like I’d already made my mark at a young age but at the same time I felt like I’d better do
9:16 something else or this will be the only thing that I’ve done so I I was very much an anti-war activist a peace activist and and the war of course continued for some time after we wore the armbands I attended the University of Iowa but to be honest I couldn’t really keep my mind on my studies I was I was part of the large demonstrations against the war in Iowa City I dropped out of school out of the University I actually dropped out twice I I tried to get back into it and I just could not keep my mind on that the world situation seemed too dire to me not just the war but also the pollution issue and particularly the nuclear pollution was a big concern for me I moved into a 1941 Ford delivery van and I lived in in a wood so and advice some friends of my parents actually north of Iowa City and I kind of had my henry david thoreau experience there which I loved it I honestly loved it and it gave me quite a view on what is necessary and what is kind of extra in life and in our pursuits I remember our lawyer came out to visit
10:47 me one day and in the truck and I was living in the truck I had a beard and long hair I was kind of a hippie and he was coming out of Dan Johnson was coming out to talk to the law school in Iowa City and he drove out to see me and his car got stuck out in the woods and this dirt track and so it just kind of summed up there he was in his tie and his suit and and so on and coming to visit me a hermit basically in the woods anyway anyway that that one thing led to another I lived in the old stone barn in Stone City Iowa that was owned by the inventor of the trampoline and so I I had a personal relationship with him I was his caretaker and he’d come out on the weekends and that was an interesting part of my life I moved into an old storefront in a very small town in Iowa I studied programming I became a database programmer I wrote a state database on on industrial byproducts for the state of Iowa I I got into a programming team at a telecommunications company a large company and got on that team and did database programming for them and finally they moved me up to be a database architect for them and and this was an no I had no formal schooling
12:20 at all and and they moved me into that high position so that was that was quite an experience they flew me around the country gave me an expense paid living situation I flew back and forth to San Jose California but let’s see before that actually I went to Nicaragua I had a I had a project in Nicaragua to take sewing machines and bicycles and medical equipment I shipped it through a Quaker organization in Florida so I spent parts of four years in Nicaragua and since then I I lived in a small town in Iowa in a in a 3,000 dollar building and you wouldn’t believe it was worth every penny and with the roof leak the I burned wood for heat it was pretty rough but then I got that job doing the database programming I was I became instantly middle I had a good income and and then I bought I bought this building that I’m in right now which is the old the old school building and Fayette Missouri it’s a beautiful three-story brick school building I love it very much my wife and I have built a local radio station here so I’m I’m also I forgot to tell you I was I was a chief engineer at a radio station in Iowa City for a
13:51 couple of years so right now I’m the engineer of our community radio station the roof is on the the antennas on the roof and and so we we have an interesting life here took your principles about justice and about what is what is right and and made a life around that even today with where they’re working the radio can you talk a little bit about that impulse what I well as I said our Father was a Methodist minister so I grew up with the Christian message and then to see our father be basically kicked out of two churches for living what he considered to be Christian principles it gave me a feeling that I it was okay to be independent in my own evaluation of what’s going on and what I should do about it and then when I when I dropped out of school in the early 1970s I decided that when I dropped out at the University and I I decided that if I’m going to drop out of school and not get a degree I’d better get an education and so at that point I did start educating myself and I read very widely but I I
15:24 decided that I would try to shoot for the center line of Civilizations values and so I was interested in the ancient values truth beauty justice and those sorts of things and so with that as my compass I read actually I kind of I read quite a few like Bartlett’s quotations Roe Dale’s dictionary of thoughts collections of wisdom and I tried to find what the center line was and and so I’ve tried to I thought it was a better winning decision to pick the center line I guess so I’ve done that but it’s put me on the edge of various social issues as they come by I’m still consider myself very much to be a peace activist anti-militarism not anti-military people I want to make that clear I have quite a bit of feeling of sympathy for people in the military but militarism as a mode of our society I’m very much opposed to anyway that’s that’s my worldview basically and I’ve just been trying to pursue it so I think that transitions nicely the free speech angle because you still are very much involved in social movements so what do you see as being
16:55 the long arm of your of this social of your viewer of your case oh don’t you seen a play out in your in the past 50 years well in our case justice Abe Fortas it’s you said for the first time that that public school students are persons under the law with respect to the First Amendment and the First Amendment free speech all of all of the elements of the First Amendment to me are are light foundational they’re like the keystone of which you can make a democracy basically we need to be able to share our thoughts with each other and that’s what the First Amendment says and I’m I’m a big believer in democracy probably because that’s the way I was raised in the in the public school system but by our culture generally the promotion of democracy it really settled in with me I really am a believer and and so I’m I’m just trying to make it work basically I like with the radio station I moved into rural Missouri and most of the late-night talk radio is a little harsh you know to my ears so we
18:27 bring a alternative perspective here and and we have a community radio station so we have community participation we are County Commissioner would come in and do weekly weekly shows what’s going on in the county and my wife does a great job of being in contact with the school system and the city officials and so on so we’re trying to help make a community right here in rural Missouri I mean we we started out in a community we’re just trying to make it better that’s very job you know do you have any questions for John please submit them to the Q&A box and we’ll tackle those here toward the end of the program for thinking about your your response I’m curious about your thoughts on how you see free speech fitting into that idea of community communities over there we wrangle with a lot here device Institute to consider ourselves a civic organization we were to provide material that helps teachers engage in civic public conversations about their students there to grab with those issues where do you see free speech fitting into that and how do you see particularly the case that you were part of take your viewpoint on being a part of a legacy of free speech in the United States well I think it’s crucial and central and foundational and a long time
19:58 ago it occurred to me that whenever your fraid to say something that you sincerely think that you really believe that that Shearer is kind of like an arrow that can point toward the problem because someone who’s trying to make you feel afraid to say what you think you’ve really identified a major problem there and since we had been vindicated so strongly by the Supreme Court I felt like I had a certain special kind of a mantle had had fallen on me and and that it was maybe more important than ever that I not be afraid to say what I think about things and that I have a I may be wrong but I feel like I I have a certain kind of protection you know in a sense to say what I think and so I feel obligated to to exercise that and since well the student like in our case that to say that students are persons under the law with respect to the First Amendment that move of contribution to the discussion say our civic discussion by young people is a really important move because young people in my view
21:28 tend to be idealists in a sense they work with ideas they they don’t have the world experience to to work from experience so they they work with ideas and and the young people and what they think are what their ideals are tells us a lot about our society and what the ideals of society are and most of the problems that we have in society I think come because our ideals have become frustrated for one reason or other and getting getting the children the students involved in in that civic discussion I think it brings a lot to the discussions I’m really happy to have been part of the opening up of that civic discussion to students yeah I think it’s very exciting one thing it makes me think about I all speak my mind here at the office it doesn’t always go over well and he goes over justify curious you know we kind of left that off blown up on a macro scale it’s the same thing that happens in society and so why don’t you just talk a little bit about what it was like for you you know three into school at first in getting pushback for wearing the armband and then what it took for you to continue to be so convicted in for your belief it’s gonna
23:00 work what kinds of things did you have to overcome in order to to ensure that you were staying committed to what you wanted to say well when I left when I left the house that day I had my armband folded up and in my pocket I was dressed I had a white shirt and a tie and a suit coat because I wanted to be kind of formal but I had my armband in my pocket because I was afraid to wear it on the street at that point it had been in the newspaper and I was fearful just to put it bluntly about what somebody might see me on the street and might do but anyway on the way out the door my father said you know John I’m not sure you should wear that armband you said the school authorities they have a job to do and they have made the decision not to allow the armbands in the school and I said well dad this is just a black piece of cloth and there are people dying every day in Vietnam and my father who had witnessed World War two and and the and the the way that the German nation really had turned its back on on the persecution of the Jews my father said then he said then for you it’s a matter
24:32 of conscience and I said well I guess it is and he said well then I support what you’re doing because the experience of World War two for my father it Roza the concept of conscience as a very significant and import and an important part of being human so so I went to school with the armband in my pocket and I had orchestra practice I play the violin and I was really too embarrassed to be seen putting it on I it just it didn’t I was afraid I you know I was nervous apprehensive anxious and so I still didn’t have it on and by the time I got to homeroom and after after homeroom I went into the bathroom and I was trying to pin it on with one hand a safety pin you know with one hand and it was difficult and and one of the kids that I knew saw me doing it and he helped pin it on and and so I had it on over my dark suit coat and it didn’t really show up very well and the one teacher that I think really noticed it apparently decided not to say anything about it I think he really was against
26:03 the school policy and he didn’t say anything so I went to gym class and then I thought well nobody’s nobody’s seen this armband I better make it more visible so I put it back on over my white shirt and I didn’t wear my suit coat over it and so it was very visible at that point and so I I went to lunch and sat with my normal friends of my normal table and some of them warned me you know you’re going to get in trouble others said well I you know I support you and and some kids came up and started verbally harassing me calling me a commie and a coward and and so on and and one of the football players who I really didn’t know I mean I knew who he was but we weren’t friends he came up to the table and to the kids that were harassing me he said look you have your opinions about the war John has his opinion about the war John has a right to his opinion leave him alone and I thought this is great here you have a football player you know coming up and defending me really on First Amendment principles I thought I thought it was wonderful but anyway one of the one of the school clerks saw me and reported it to the office and so I was called into the office and the principal sat me down and he had he had
27:40 been in the Korean War and he he treated me with respect really he he was somewhat fraternising but in a good sense fatherly and he was thinking that maybe I’ve been listening to the wrong people about the war perhaps I didn’t understand the responsibility of the citizens to support the government at a time of war and basically I tried to convince him that the war was wrong and and that it was right that I should be able to wear the armband but they had already made the decision the the principal’s in Des Moines had already made that decision so at the end of a long period maybe 45 minutes he said well I’m gonna ask you to take off the armband and go back to class and if you do nothing more will come of it there won’t be any record in your file about it or anything like that and he said but I don’t think you’re going to take it off are you and I said no I’m not you said well then I’ll call your father and have him come and get you and that’s that’s what happened but later years later I was thinking about that conversation and first off the respect that he treated me with even though he disagreed with me about the war I thought it was outstanding and exemplary of how how a teacher or an
29:14 administrator should treat students and second I I’m thinking of that last little question that he asked me said that you know I don’t think you’re going to take it off are you and and I realized that he gave me you know an ounce of courage at that moment I think I wouldn’t have taken it off anyway but what I thought that was a wonderful what a wonderful way to treat me as a student you know to recognize that I was doing it out of conscience which is really what the teacher made the point is about it’s about respecting the autonomy and the individuality and the plurality of American young people that there is a multitude of opinions and we all have to live in society together and what are the limits of that expression is a really tense conversation that is ongoing yes I think the other piece of that to John it that you mentioned I think it’s really powerful that people listen even people who didn’t necessarily agree with your opinion that you were expressing Europe for any good way and they treated that with respect whether they agreed or disagreed and I think that listening pieces can comment upon all of us in a
30:46 world that’s banded by free speech speech comes in lots of different forms and before it it can be a very productive thing for listen if I could just add to that that we think of free speech as what we can say that I think we should also think of it as what can listen to because the the courage that we need as a free people in a democratic society we need the courage to say what we think but we also need the respect for other people that comes from hearing things that you disagree with and for instance when when when we did get a lawyer our lawyer had us come up to be interviewed so he could understand what was going on and our lawyer actually supported the war in Vietnam and and I remember trying to convince him that the war was wrong but I think I gained some respect in his eyes at that point too but anyway my point here is that free speech has two sides there’s a speaking side and there’s a listening side and and having that First Amendment gives students both experiences and to to recognize how to listen to what you disagree with even
32:18 strongly disagree with but still afford respect to that fellow citizen really to say what they think I think it’s a big part of the First Amendment as a classroom teacher and as many of the teachers listening we be able to questions unfortunately issue with the Q&A so what we’re gonna ask you to do it you can tweet your questions to us or share them to our Facebook page if you don’t have Twitter and that would be great so just tag the Bill of Rights Institute in either your Facebook your Twitter and we’ll make sure we get those questions answered in the meantime I want to pivot to talking about what classroom teachers do we have tinker bee Des Moines so as you know this was a landmark case vanilla brain since you have a number of different resources that I swear on the ground one of which is our super DBQ resource and in that resource we have an entire section called students and the Constitution and the very first the very first lesson and the opening essay is all about the taker des moines case and then the subsequent student free speech cases like Hazelwood versus choir what’s fascinating about Hazelwood become higher which is the students paper act the student case where
33:49 students wanted to publish something in the newspaper it went all the way that’s important they actually sided with the school was the dissenting opinion quoted tinker tinker beep in wine I just wanted to read this because I think it’s a wonderful encapsulation of kind of where we are with student free speech but we’re so again this is the dissenting opinion in Hazelwood versus blue Meyer which was 1988 and he said tater teaches us that the states state educators undeniable mandates to inculcate moral and political values is not a generally more intact with proxies stifling discussion of all the state approved topics the case before us hazel would be for Meyer illustrates how readily school officials and courts in Camelot viewpoint discrimination as the mere protection of students from sensitive topics and so something that the Bill of Rights Institute does is try and help teachers with resources that allow them to discuss both topics in their classrooms and I wanted to talk to you a little bit about you’ve been on the road now for fifty years talking about tinker what are some things that you don’t work with teachers and students how do you introduce this topic what is your advice to our teachers well in in the educational environment I think all teachers understand that they’re their charges the students are being prepared
35:20 to be participants in a democratic society and that that’s that’s probably the number one thing that that our case applies to and to I think there’s a natural tendency especially in previous times for the school administrators to think that their job is to maintain order and and discipline and decorum and those are all important in the educational environment but the weekends tend to suppress the the students exercise and I use that word advisedly exercise of their rights and schools are different all over the country different schools are different I was I was involved in a community discussion in Susanville West Virginia and the the gym teacher was also the ROTC the Junior ROTC instructor and at the community meeting at the public library one evening he was there and and his students were there in uniform and his daughter was one of his students and we had gone around in a big circle we had our chairs in a circle facing in and each person said what they thought and his daughter said well I believe in I
36:54 believe in freedom of speech and all of that but not when you’re in school the school is owned by the government when you’re in school you have a duty to to say what the government thinks and I was just shocked I was totally shocked by that opinion but that’s just one side there are other schools where the students and the administration are very much interested in in letting their students know what their rights are and helping their students get the experience of of expressing their rights their their thoughts and so it’s a broad spectrum it’s all over the place and it’s there are all kinds of issues that come up I think that’s one of the strengths in our in our case we we were anti-war activists protesters you could say and and we were seen as leftist although I don’t think that anti-war means that your leftist but there are also for instance religious fundamentalists that strongly agree with our case because it gives them access to the classrooms after school just like the Boy Scouts might now fact III was I was at the Supreme Court building in Washington for an evening lecture series that they had and that particular night the the
38:26 lecture was on our case and it was sponsored by Samuel Alito that Justice Samuel Alito was the the official sponsor of the event so that it could be held at that building and afterward I talked to two Samuel Alito and I reminded him that during his nomination hearing he had been asked about our case and he’d said well he he considered it star a decisis already decided case law I reminded him of that that evening and he said yes that that he hopes that our case prevails for a long time and so the support for our case is coming from all over the political spectrum and that’s very heartening to me yeah that’s great watching that play please tweet at DRI egg 10th period tradition questions but I think that’s really great John and it makes me think about the work that we do here at the Institute Rachel mentioned our resources all the resources are linked here on the webinar so there’s a resources and take a look Supreme Court Deaton cases they all digitized so it’s Bill will download for free that yeah we don’t actually sell these books anywhere they look nothing like this they’re all free for you on the internet which it’s even better that’s right and it makes you think to you know as I mentioned community and conversations and things that we think a lot about different states we think that over the source of
39:57 a good it’s sponsored by open honest conversation it taught me to build good communities and so Rachel I know one of the activities that we do as part of our my impact challenge particular is helping to build those communities in a classroom I wondered if you mentioned a couple of tactics that sometimes we think about bullying that can help facilitate open and honest conversation the flashing because I think we all grapple was the same tension that was graphical in John’s case which is I didn’t have honest conversation that’s not disruptive to what’s happening the flash and here to learn we’re here to get an education we’re here to find out more about ourselves each other and sometimes it takes a little bit of control you’ve got a bit of gate for a lot of faculties to think about the culture area MicroSociety microbe community that often mirrors the breeder community within within which you’re situated so I haven’t I’ve been blessed to be able to teach in a multi multiple different environments late on Austin Texas and in each of those cases it’s really about creating an environment that Jon basically had in order to be the person that he became it’s creating an environment of trust and respect with a deep sense of affection for the other
41:30 so the idea that that that that that football player is the perfect example of how you can help create culture that all of us have something beyond our mere opinion does that find us together you’re all a member of our community and so how do we help each other mitigate our differences in the classroom is the same is the same question of how we do it out in society so one of the things we think a lot here at the Bill of Rights Institute is how do we create help foster citizenship formal citizenship is a respect for the First Amendment and so how do you do that well you have to have little practice right so I I call them load stakes so in order to help create that community how do you put a low stakes conversation man versus Superman or watermelon versus cantaloupe or something that doesn’t find those are too terrible but something that doesn’t have any stakes attached in order to practice for Jews of dialogue and then you build up from there and you build up with sentences or with quotes from Bartlett’s quotations which is a phenomenal resource if you don’t have a copy of that there are some really great little quotation compendiums from the 18th century and 19th century that are great to just bump through you know in modernity some of the quotes may not you know always check your sources by using those quotes to help students think
43:02 through interesting ideas again Louis thanks then work those muscles to be entire entire States until they feel they until they can do what John did presence once towards towards this kind of virtuous conscience driven driven activity yeah you know I don’t makes me think of another question we have the new John you could if you could travel back in time and it talked with 15-year old John tinker as he’s about to walk out the door that day with an armband what advice would you have for yourself what kinds of things would whisper in their ear that hmm well this is this is similar to to a question that I am often asked I do I have regrets and my standard rather flippant was you know everything we’re done I’m not sure I’d wanna check engine’ thing there are some details like the day of the Supreme Court hearing I I took a red-eye out of Cedar Rapids Iowa and I the plane the flight was at 11 p.m. and
44:32 I arrived early and I was sitting down with everybody in the in the terminal right next to the gate and then I woke up and everybody was climbing but me so I you know it’s really trivial little issues don’t don’t fall asleep at the terminal later I had all of my armband memorabilia in a in a box that I had left I used the landlord’s van to to move and I’d left it in the van and the Landlord took it to the dump so I’d say you know keep track of your armband and I also my father was a Quaker a host at the Paris peace talks he was he had the hospital and the hospitality house for a while for the Quakers and and so he spoke to all sides of that conflict and I had memorabilia from from the North Vietnamese representatives and that all perished in that box that got taken to the DA but just minor trivial things like that I honestly think that the rest of it all kind of went well I I people who have read the story will know that I didn’t wear the armband the first day I I tried to get on the phone I was a newspaper delivery boy and and I I was we are was delivering newspapers that
46:04 morning that we were supposed to wear the armbands and and I I remembered from some non-violence training that I had taken earlier over it was earlier and I’d remembered that the participants should be on board and an agreement with how they’re going to deal with adversity and so I thought well we haven’t done that since we found out that the principal’s had banned the wearing of the armband so I thought I’d better get on the phone and call people and let’s put this off until we have a chance to talk to each other about it so we know what we’re going to do well my sister Mary Beth had already gone to school so anyway I got on the phone and and a number of us then didn’t wear armbands that day and when Mary Beth and Chris our cart got kicked out of school we had a meeting that afternoon we tried to call the school board president he didn’t want to talk to us and the rest of us then decided to go ahead and wear the armbands the next day well it’s put it in a position of like the the society wants to see the narrative in terms of protagonists and heroes and and so on and my view of the whole situation was not like that it was more like there was a there was a movement that was a peace movement that I was part of and we were wearing armbands it’s a part of that movement but anyway my sister Mary Beth
47:37 who does wonderful things talking to schools she’s kind of been put forward however I our lawyer put me first in the title of the case so I I think that that was partly because of that hesitancy to just kind of rush into it and to be more deliberative about what we were doing but that doesn’t play so well with the with the narrative but still I’m glad that it happened that way because I I think that I think it it helped to make our case stronger and and as I started out to say I really would be hesitant to change in anything like like in Star Trek the prime directive don’t try to change the panel but but now that first thing I said about regret I think that it is that regret a very valid emotion to have I just don’t have any regrets about this particular situation let’s transition over to some of these questions one of them was recently so this is getting into the recent long arm and there are a couple of questions about how how do you see student rice being more restricted or more extended now versus when you were in school and
49:09 specifically asking about the walkout against gun violence that happened last year so many praise the student activism there but others have criticized it because it was so sanctioned by the schools do have to be disruptive do staged protests carry less weight than fun since then truly student driven ones but really the question is how do you see student rights and student activism now versus when you worry well I’m I’m I know that my sister actually spoke said I’m Marjory Douglas at high school where the shooting happened before it happened and and so those students emma gonzalez and david hog and the rest of those students were aware of their First Amendment rights and I’m very proud and happy that they did have those rights and I’m proud of them for caring enough about their issue to do something about it now taking a look at how the school systems responded to those student protests around that incident some totally suppress it and and the school authorities have the right through our case actually through artists the decision in our case gave the school
50:39 authorities the right to to suppress the disruptive demonstrations but other school administrators thought no this is a traumatic event that students have experienced and let’s work with and and they permitted their students to disrupt as it were the educational environment although it’s more like an educational opportunity to to take advantage of if you look at it from that point of view so again there was just this broad spectrum of responses that the administration’s had toward the student protests and walkouts around that my my main point would be to pride in the students for caring about an issue and and doing what they thought they had to do to to address the issue [Music] and she’s looking for advice for how she could go against to stand up for her right to host a political affairs club at her school that the administration is not allowing them to have this is Alexis
52:13 yes excellent Alexis I’m all for it what was it worth it in a sense the cost to me was really pretty minimal it was the anxiety that I carried around with me as I wore the armband and and that was about the total of the cost to me we were trying to raise awareness about the war in Vietnam and everything that happened served to increase the awareness about the war in Vietnam that the newspaper whether people were forced or against us it increased the discussion about the war and so it was win win win win in a lot of ways that I was you know we were disappointed to lose at the Federal District I thought in each case I thought we would win because surely the courts will will validate our First Amendment rights but the the cost to media has really been minimal a lot of people pay a lot higher price for saying what they think then then I paid what my advice to students is think about what you’re doing really think it through and be sure that you’re on the right side as you see it don’t don’t just fly into
53:44 something on an impulse think it through because if there are going to be adversaries you’re going to have to you’re gonna have to defend your position and so think it through be be respectful of other people’s rights because if if you’re not that’s going to be a major strike against you like we I described I dressed in formal clothes I didn’t but I’m sorry but I I see you’re not wearing a tie either Kirk of the situation it was our protest was a silent protest we didn’t disrupt the schools and everybody knew what we what we were saying when we went back to school without the armbands on I wore all black for the whole rest of the school year and everybody knew what that meant and I wasn’t really in people space about it but I carried my message with me all the time I was invited by teachers then to talk to their classes about the war and and about our protest too but also just about the war in general so your current events are civic events group it sounds like an excellent idea and it would be
55:14 very hard for me to understand how any administration would be opposed to that so we have one last question few things together and we’re coming up to our hour which is that I’m sure we could go on longer but throughout the conversation and a couple of the questions here talk about the coalition that you had to build around your ideas you mentioned that the ACLU was supporting some of the appeals the appeal process is that correct that is correct the Iowa Civil Liberties Union originally offered to help us with the case we contacted them right away actually and that’s what we got the advice to go back to school without the armbands so that there wouldn’t be truancy involved and and to bring the suit at the federal at the federal court we got a call from a lawyer named William Kunstler who had been well actually later was the attorney for the Chicago seven the Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin and so on at Chicago around the 1968 Democratic convention riots the what they call the police riots but anyway this was before that he called us and offered to represent us pro bono and my parents asked around and and people said no he’s too radical so anyway the Iowa Civil Liberties Union now it’s the
56:45 ACLU – Iowa they a woman named Louise now and a very strong proponent of First Amendment rights and women’s rights at the time in Iowa she had inherited a fortune she was a philanthropist and she offered to to pay our expenses and so that that kind of came to us people saw it as a good case and and something they wanted to be part of earlier getting talking students into like for instance we went to the Unitarian youth group and and persuaded them to get on board with the wearing of the armbands and that was that was a good experience and a successful experience but mostly the the peace movement self was there for me I grew up in it and and identified very strongly with it at the time and it had been organized by people my parents age and my parents and so if you articulate your positions and they’re thoughtful positions you’re going to find that you have allies and if you can get those allies and discussion with you you’re going to form a team and you’re going to get some things done yeah thank you John for the lights no studio here your newest
58:19 endeavor is the combat paper foundation which is how people can get in touch with you is through the new foundation you tell us a little bit about the foundation good bye well a teacher at the university level of education law for for the past 20 years has been inviting me to speak to his classes of teachers and administrators about the case last year he took the lead in an incorporating this nonprofit educational foundation named after me I’m honoured at that but if anyone wants to contact me john dot tinker at john f thinker foundation.org will get an email to me and i’d be happy to hear from you I’d love to hear from you it’s great and that information just included bio there on the page for everyone to access we would encourage you to reach out and ask John get in touch as the more questions you have and it’s the foundation John thank you again for joining us it’s been a great conversation and thank you everyone for listening in we have allah chose for the winch on the Q&A but any follow-up questions anyone has please feel free to email us tweeting us you know get in touch with your facebook and and would be happy to answer those questions in a forum on john as well and thank you again it was a great conversation thank you for everything you’ve done for
59:50 a free-speech appreciate thank you John well thank you for having me on it’s been a pleasure I appreciate it thank you very much thanks so much and we’ll see everyone again in a couple weeks here on tender periods so thank you again hi thanks for one who participated