Doug Morgan v. Plano Independent School Dist, 755 F.3d 757

In December 2003, parent Doug Morgan attended his son Jonathan’s third-grade classroom winter party; Jonathan planned to distribute candy canes bearing a religious message.
Principal Lynn Swanson told the Morgans religious materials would not be permitted in the classroom and suggested an information table instead; she later announced all materials were prohibited in-class.
Jonathan was excluded from the student gift exchange; the Morgans previously litigated student-viewpoint discrimination and the en banc Fifth Circuit found viewpoint discrimination but granted qualified immunity to Swanson.
Doug Morgan sued under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging Swanson violated his First Amendment right to distribute religious material to other adults at the party.
The district court dismissed Morgan’s claim on qualified-immunity grounds; the Fifth Circuit reviews de novo whether the asserted right was clearly established at the time.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether Morgan had a clearly established First Amendment right to distribute religious material to other adults at a school classroom activity	Morgan: viewpoint discrimination against private speech is always unconstitutional; comparable precedents (e.g., Chiu) show parents retain forum rights	Swanson: law in this context was not clearly established given forum, Establishment Clause, and student/school-speech complexities; no controlling, factually analogous precedent gave fair notice	Held: No. Court affirmed qualified immunity because plaintiff failed to identify a case that clearly established the asserted right

Morgan v. Swanson, 659 F.3d 359 (5th Cir. 2011) (en banc) (prior en banc decision finding viewpoint discrimination as to student but granting qualified immunity)
Tinker v. Des Moines Indep. Cmty. Sch. Dist., 393 U.S. 503 (U.S. 1969) (student non-disruptive political expression protected at school)
W. Va. State Bd. of Educ. v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624 (U.S. 1943) (compelled speech is unconstitutional)
Chiu v. Plano Indep. Sch. Dist., 260 F.3d 330 (5th Cir. 2001) (parents’ distribution of curricular materials in school-related forum)
Good News Club v. Milford Cent. Sch., 533 U.S. 98 (U.S. 2001) (limited public forum doctrine and viewpoint discrimination constraints)
Safford Unified Sch. Dist. No. 1 v. Redding, 557 U.S. 364 (U.S. 2009) (qualified-immunity principle for school officials)
Perry Educ. Ass’n v. Perry Local Educators’ Ass’n, 460 U.S. 37 (U.S. 1983) (forum analysis: public, limited public, nonpublic forums)
Holloman ex rel. Holloman v. Harland, 370 F.3d 1252 (11th Cir. 2004) (teacher liable where non-disruptive symbolic political expression was punished)
Seamons v. Snow, 206 F.3d 1021 (10th Cir. 2000) (qualified immunity denied where earlier precedents clearly established protection)