Goss v. Lopez

''Goss v. Lopez'', 419 U.S. 565 (1975), was a US Supreme Court case. It held that a public school must conduct a hearing before subjecting a student to suspension. Also, a suspension without a hearing violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the US Constitution.

Background

Nine students, including a student named Dwight Lopez, were suspended from Central High School in Columbus, Ohio for 10 days for destroying school property and disrupting the learning environment.

Ohio Law § 3313.66 empowered the school principal to suspend students for 10 days or expel them.

The law required students' parents to be notified of the action within 24 hours to be given the reason.

If students were expelled, they could appeal to the Board of Education, but §3313.66 gave no such allowances if they were suspended.

A three-judge District Court struck down the law as a violation of students' right to due process of law. The United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio held:

The District Court reprimanded the school for its violation of the 14th Amendment, as there were "minimum requirements of notice and a hearing prior to suspension, except in emergency situations." The case was appealed by the school to the Supreme Court.
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Majority opinion

Justice Byron R. White delivered the opinion of the Court, on behalf of a narrow 5-4 majority. It held that the state had violated due process by suspending the students without a hearing. The state had made education a fundamental right by providing for free public education for all residents between 5 and 21. The Court stated that protected interests are created not by the Constitution but by its institutions ('' Board of Regents v. Roth'').

The Court held that a 10-day suspension was not a ''de minimis