A federal appeals court has upheld a $400,000 jury award to an Illinois school superintendent whose contract was not renewed amid turmoil that started with her effort to have an audit of district finances.

The superintendent, Denean Adams of the 2,200-student Harvey school district in suburban Chicago, alleged in court papers that after she started the process for the audit in 2015, one school board member phoned her and said Adams was "itching for an ass-kicking."

Adams filed a complaint with the police, and after a period of further discord in which the superintendent suspended the business manager for alleged financial irregularities, the board informed Adams that her contract would not be renewed. She took medical leave in 2016 and did not return.

Adams sued the board, alleging retaliation for exercising her First Amendment free speech rights. A federal district court jury ruled for Adams and awarded $400,000 in damages. The trial judge added some $190,000 in attorneys' fees.

The school board appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit, in Chicago, arguing that a police report is a personal grievance, and not a matter of public concern, and thus was outside the scope of First Amendment protection.

In its Aug. 3 decision in Adams v. Board of Education of Harvey School District No. 152, a three-judge panel of the court ruled unanimously that Adams's report to the police was protected by the First Amendment and that the jury reasonably concluded that the report played a role in ending her employment.

While a police report might normally be considered a personal grievance, the court said, Adams's report was not a straightforward report of a crime.

"It was a report by the superintendent of a school district that she had been threatened with violence by a member of the school board," the opinion said, adding that "a potential for physical altercations between public officials (the superintendent and an elected member) implies that an important public institution was not working properly. This is a legitimate subject of public concern."

Further, the discord began when Adams proposed a forensic audit, and that idea "seems to have unsettled at least one member of the board."

The appeals court opinion suggests that much of Adams's speech during the episode was related to her job, and under Supreme Court precedent the board could have argued the speech was unprotected by the First Amendment on that basis.

"Almost everything that happened in this dispute is on-the-job speech within the scope of the superintendent's and members' duties," the appeals court said. But the board had failed to raise an argument under the Supreme Court's 2006 decision in Garcetti v. Ceballos until it was too late, the appeals court said.

The appeals panel rejected a cross-appeal from Adams seeking an increase in attorney's fees from the $190,000 that was awarded to $485,000, calling the request "outlandish."

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Court Upholds $400000 Jury Award to Superintendent Ousted Amid Discord - Education Week

In a campaign season when civil discourse seems headed to another record low, rhetorical excess has just been given a little extra boost.

For three decades Tennessee has made it a minor crime to put knowingly false statements about a candidate in oppositional campaign literature one of the more explicit restrictions on political speech in the nation's law books. But last week a state judge said it was a bridge way too far over the First Amendment.

A prominent democracy reform group, Tennesseans for Sensible Election Laws, sued and won the right to declare in print something hyperbolic in the extreme: That a Republican state legislator is "literally Hitler," the Nazi fuhrer who died in Germany three-quarters of a century ago.

The point, the group said, was to produce a campaign flyer with obviously false assertions in order to test the law, which it says has been unconstitutionally stifling properly provocative satire and criticism of state officials.

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"The framers of our Constitution believed that robust public speech and debate would be essential to self-government," it said. "This law tried to put its thumb on the scale, favoring the very people who enacted it Tennessee state lawmakers to the detriment of members of the voting public."

Judge Ellen Hobbs Lyle of Nashville agreed last week, declaring the law a violation of both the state and federal Constitutions. Its main flaw, she said, was that it punished false speech against a candidate but does nothing to rein in lies in support of a politician, "viewpoint dicrimination" not permitted by the First Amendment. She also said government regulators should not be in the business of distinguishing truth from falsity and that the law bans far more speech than Tennessee could ever punish, besides.

"For emphatic and memorable communication in its campaign materials opposing candidates, the plaintiff uses the literary device of knowingly stating a literally false statement about a candidate in the context of satire, parody and hyperbole," the judge said in her nine-page ruling, and that's one of the Sensible Election Laws group's free speech rights.

The organization was taking on state Rep. Bruce Griffey, a Republican whose first term has been marked by proposing a wave of controversial, conservartuive culture war measures, including a ban on refugee resettlement in Tennessee and a requirement that students use school bathrooms that correspond with their sex at birth. And in January, he proposed a bill that would authorize the state to chemically castrate some people convicted of sex offenses against minors a policy in place in at least seven states.

The good government group tweeted it would begin distributing its leaflets, which say "Bruce Griffey is LITERALLY HITLER" at the top and, underneath that, "Bruce Griffey: an agenda the Nazis would love."

The 1989 law makes it a misdemeanor punishable by a $50 fine and 10 days in jail to distribute "campaign literature in opposition to any candidate in an election" if any "statement charge, allegation, or other matter contained therein with respect to such candidate is false." It makes no exceptions for satire, hyperbole or parody.

The state attorney general's office has not announced whether it will appeal.

Griffey is solidly favored to win a second term in November in a rural district west of Nashville.

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Tenn. judge gives OK to call candidate 'literally Hitler' - The Fulcrum

In light of the circumstances surrounding incoming lecturer Dr. Jesse Goldberg, we at Auburn Spectrum are reminded of another situation where an employee's social media posts caused an outrage. Last year, Bruce Murray from the College of Education was shown to have made and shared several posts that deny and condemn the existence of LGBTQ+ individuals.

Despite the outcry from more than 200 faculty members and countless students who said that these comments perpetuated the harm that Auburn's LGBTQ+ students have to face every day, the University refused to condemn the comments as hate speech, saying that this professor's posts on social media and the opinions he submitted to newspapers over several years are protected by free speech.

Dr. Goldberg made posts condemning an institution he believes is violent and contributes to an oppressive system. Less than a week later his posts are condemned by the University's administration as hate speech (even though police are not considered a protected class by the University while gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation are), and his job is at risk before it ever even began.

By contrast, it was three weeks after The Plainsman published the article about Murray before anyone from the administration made a statement, and even then it was two sentences expressing vague and nonspecific support for the community harmed by the rhetoric that he had shared repeatedly.

If Auburn University is going to swiftly and harshly condemn one employee's social media posts for hate speech, it should do so in all cases.

If Auburn University is going to passively allow employees to share their opinions on social media and in newspapers - no matter how reprehensible some may find them - in the name of free speech, it should do so in all cases.

The University cannot pick and choose when it wishes to allow freedom of speech and expect people to stand idly by in the face of such hypocrisy.

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If Bruce Murray's bigoted remarks are protected by the First Amendment, then Jesse Goldberg's anti-police remarks should receive similar protection.

Heather Mann is the president of Spectrum, Auburn University's Gay-Straight Alliance.

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Heather Mann | Spectrum President

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LETTER TO THE EDITOR | "Free Speech" should apply to all, not just some - The Auburn Plainsman