Courts need to balance and reconcile two competing and equally important legal rights when determining whether public high schools can limit student speech that disparages other people on the basis of race, religion, sexual orientation and similar protected statuses, according to a legal brief filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois in a case now on appeal in Chicago. The organization's position is presented in an amicus curiae brief filed in the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago in Nuxoll, et.al. v. Indian Prairie School District #204. The case grows from a challenge by a Naperville, Illinois high school student who was prevented from wearing a t-shirt with the message "Be happy, not gay" in her public school the day after other students were participating in the "Day of Silence," an event designed to promote tolerance of LGBT youth.

A copy of the ACLU of Illinois' brief in Noxall v. Indian Prairie School District #204 can be found at http://www.aclu-il.org/legal/courtdocuments/nuxoll.pdf.