““Today the Court declines to decide whether a public school may constitutionally refuse to permit a student to attend solely because his hair style meets with the disapproval of the school authorities. The Court also denied certiorari in Olff v. East Side Union High School District, 404 U.S. 1042 , 92 S.Ct. 703 , 30 L.Ed.2d 736 , which presented the same issue. I dissented in Olff , and filed an opinion. For the same reasons expressed therein, I dissent today. I add only that now eight circuits have passed on the question. On widely disparate rationales, four have upheld school hair regulations (see Freeman v. Flake, 448 F. 2d 258 (C.A.10, 1971); King v. Saddleback Junior College District, 445 F.2d 932 (C.A.9, 1971) ; Jackson v. Dorrier, 424 F.2d 213 (C.A.6, 1970); and Ferrell v. Dallas Independent School District, 392 F.2d 697 (C.A.5, 1968), and four have struck them down (see Massie v. Henry, 455 F.2d 779 (C.A.4, 1972); Bishop v. Colaw, 450 F.2d 1069 (C.A.8, 1971); Richards v. Thurston, 424 F.2d 1281 (C.A.l, 1970); and Breen v. Kahl, 419 F.2d 1034 (C.A.7, 1969)). “I can conceive of no more compelling reason to exercise our discretionary jurisdiction than a conflict of such magnitude, on an issue of importance bearing on First Amendment and Ninth Amendment rights.””
““Today the Court declines to decide whether a public school may constitutionally refuse to permit a student to attend solely because his hair style meets with the disapproval of the school authorities. The Court also denied certiorari in Olff v. East Side Union High School District, 404 U.S. 1042 [ 92 S.Ct. 703 , 30 L.Ed.2d 736 ], which presented the same issue. I dissented in Olff, and filed an opinion. For the same reasons expressed therein, I dissent today. I add only that now eight circuits have passed on the question. On widely disparate rationales, four have upheld school hair regulations (citations omitted), and four have struck them down (citations omitted). “I can conceive of no more compelling reason to exercise our discretionary jurisdiction than a conflict of such mag-, nitude, on an issue of importance bear ing on- First Amendment and Ninth Amendment rights.” Freeman v. Flake, 405 U.S. 1032 , 92 S.Ct. 1292 , 31 L.Ed.2d 489 (1972).”
103 federal appellate · 7 district · 26 state decisions — followed in 14 states
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
¶4I can conceive of no more compelling reason to exercise our discretionary jurisdiction than a conflict of such magnitude, on an issue of importance bearing on First Amendment and Ninth Amendment rights.
