Whitefish’s superintendent of schools, Kate Orozco, needs a refresher course in the First Amendment. So do some other members of that community.
Earlier this fall, reports the Whitefish Pilot:
…a citizen addressed the Whitefish School Board concerning Mary Vail’s campaign signs. The citizen complained that the signs seemed to show Vail has the endorsement of the school district because the signs use school colors — green and gold — and have bulldog footprints on them.
As frivolous complaints go, this ranks in the upper quintile for constitutional ignorance and stupidity. And the CYA response to it ranks equally high in unwillingness and inability to forthrightly explain and defend the First Amendment.
Orozco and the school board should have lectured the complaining citizen on freedom of speech.
Instead, Orozco wrote a letter raising the issue to the state’s commissioner of political practices, who, of course advised Orozco that Vail’s sign was protected by the First Amendment:
“We can’t do anything,” Orozco said of the state’s response. “(Candidates) can choose their colors and unless we have a copyright on the paw print we’re out of luck.”
(Even with a copyright on the paw print, it might be a case of fair use under the copyright act.)
Orozco sounds as though she regrets not having the power to order a candidate to stop using a color scheme similar to the sacred hues of Whitefish High.
This incident contributes nothing useful to the discussion of issues in this fall’s municipal elections in Whitefish. But it certainly shines a spotlight on the pockets of constitutional ignorance blighting that town and its school system’s administrators. And it leaves defenders of the First Amendment seeing red.