CA1: academic freedom and textbook prices

Garcia-Padilla v. Assoc. de Educaction, No. 06-1146.  This is a fairly interesting case involving the First Amendment rights of private schools not to be constrained by the Puerto Rican law on textbooks.  After a first dismissal resulted in a reversal, a one-day bench trial was held.  The First reverses in part.  There are two laws at issue:  Rule 11 of Regulation 6458 and Law 116.

The First writes a bunch of stuff about academic freedom and the like.  However, since most of us know that, I will skip to the application. 

“Rule 11 of Regulation 6458" which “requires the private schools to announce what books will be used in a school year” and to “to disclose the book prices and any agreements they may have with book sellers, [] to inform parents of any price changes, [] and to disclose to parents the existence and applicability of Regulation 6458."  Controversially, it also requires that the schools notify the parents of changes in the books, and if the changes are minor, that the parents can choose to buy the older versions of the books.  Therefore, if the government determines that changes between textbook editions are not significant, a school cannot require parents to buy the newer edition.  (There is no provision for reviewing the government’s decisions.)  Hence, this violates the First Amendment right to academic freedom by forcing schools to use certain content.  But, since the government wasn’t trying to censor things, only intermediate scrutiny is applied, and the First finds that it is narrowly tailored to meet the legitimate state goals of not gouging parents via high textbook prices (and numerous editions.)  However, the potion of the law that “requires that parents have the option of purchasing the old edition of an assigned textbook” is unconstitutional, because there was nothing in the record that showed that there actually was price gouging going on.

As to Law 116, which provides that "[e]very private school accredited by the General Council of Education that requires the acquisition of school textbooks to [sic] their students shall have the consent of the Association or Council of Parents or of an Assembly of Parents to determine the maximum budget applicable for each school grade for the acquisition of said books required in each school year..” the District Court finds that even assuming that ensuring parental participation in private school management is a valid government interest, the law is too broad, because there are many ways that parents could participate in the management.