Minersville School District v. Gobitis
E148632
Minersville School District v. Gobitis was a 1940 U.S. Supreme Court decision, authored by Justice Felix Frankfurter, that upheld mandatory flag salutes in public schools and allowed the expulsion of Jehovah’s Witness students who refused on religious grounds.
All labels observed (2)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Minersville School District v. Gobitis canonical | 3 |
| Minersville School District v. Gobitis, 310 U.S. 586 (1940) | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T1293858 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Minersville School District v. Gobitis Context triple: [Felix Frankfurter, notableCase, Minersville School District v. Gobitis]
-
A.
West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette
West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette is a landmark 1943 U.S. Supreme Court decision, authored by Justice Robert H. Jackson, that held the government cannot compel public school students to salute the flag or recite the Pledge of Allegiance, firmly protecting freedom of speech and religious liberty.
-
B.
Everson v. Board of Education
Everson v. Board of Education is a 1947 U.S. Supreme Court case that applied the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause to the states and articulated the modern “wall of separation between church and state” doctrine.
-
C.
Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District
Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District is a 1969 U.S. Supreme Court case that established students do not lose their First Amendment free speech rights at school, so long as their expression does not substantially disrupt the educational environment.
-
D.
Yick Wo v. Hopkins
Yick Wo v. Hopkins is an 1886 U.S. Supreme Court case that held racially discriminatory enforcement of a facially neutral law violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
-
E.
Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas
The Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas was the school district authority that served as a central defendant in the landmark U.S. Supreme Court desegregation cases following Brown v. Board of Education.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Minersville School District v. Gobitis Target entity description: Minersville School District v. Gobitis was a 1940 U.S. Supreme Court decision, authored by Justice Felix Frankfurter, that upheld mandatory flag salutes in public schools and allowed the expulsion of Jehovah’s Witness students who refused on religious grounds.
-
A.
West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette
West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette is a landmark 1943 U.S. Supreme Court decision, authored by Justice Robert H. Jackson, that held the government cannot compel public school students to salute the flag or recite the Pledge of Allegiance, firmly protecting freedom of speech and religious liberty.
-
B.
Everson v. Board of Education
Everson v. Board of Education is a 1947 U.S. Supreme Court case that applied the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause to the states and articulated the modern “wall of separation between church and state” doctrine.
-
C.
Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District
Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District is a 1969 U.S. Supreme Court case that established students do not lose their First Amendment free speech rights at school, so long as their expression does not substantially disrupt the educational environment.
-
D.
Yick Wo v. Hopkins
Yick Wo v. Hopkins is an 1886 U.S. Supreme Court case that held racially discriminatory enforcement of a facially neutral law violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
-
E.
Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas
The Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas was the school district authority that served as a central defendant in the landmark U.S. Supreme Court desegregation cases following Brown v. Board of Education.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (49)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
First Amendment case
ⓘ
U.S. Supreme Court case ⓘ compulsory flag salute case ⓘ |
| appliesTo | public school students ⓘ |
| concerns |
First Amendment rights of schoolchildren
ⓘ
expulsion of Jehovah’s Witness students ⓘ free exercise of religion ⓘ mandatory flag salute in public schools ⓘ |
| constitutionalProvisionInterpreted |
First Amendment to the United States Constitution
ⓘ
Fourteenth Amendment ⓘ
surface form:
Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution
|
| hasChiefJustice | Charles Evans Hughes ⓘ |
| hasCitation | 310 U.S. 586 ⓘ |
| hasCountry |
United States of America
ⓘ
surface form:
United States
|
| hasCourt | Supreme Court of the United States ⓘ |
| hasDecisionDate | 1940-06-03 ⓘ |
| hasDissentingJustice |
Justice Harlan F. Stone
ⓘ
surface form:
Harlan F. Stone
|
| hasDissentType | solo dissent ⓘ |
| hasFullCitation |
Minersville School District v. Gobitis
self-linksurface differs
ⓘ
surface form:
Minersville School District v. Gobitis, 310 U.S. 586 (1940)
|
| hasImpact | led to increased persecution of Jehovah’s Witnesses in the United States ⓘ |
| hasJustice |
Charles Evans Hughes
ⓘ
Felix Frankfurter ⓘ Frank Murphy ⓘ Justice Harlan F. Stone ⓘ
surface form:
Harlan F. Stone
Hugo L. Black ⓘ Justice James C. McReynolds ⓘ
surface form:
James C. McReynolds
Justice Owen J. Roberts ⓘ
surface form:
Owen J. Roberts
Stanley Forman Reed ⓘ
surface form:
Stanley F. Reed
William O. Douglas ⓘ |
| hasLowerCourt | United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit ⓘ |
| hasLowerCourtDisposition | affirmed ⓘ |
| hasMajorityAuthor | Felix Frankfurter ⓘ |
| hasOverrulingCaseCitation | 319 U.S. 624 ⓘ |
| hasOverrulingYear | 1943 ⓘ |
| hasPetitioner | Minersville School District ⓘ |
| hasRespondent |
Lillian Gobitas
ⓘ
Lillian Gobitas ⓘ
surface form:
William Gobitas
|
| hasSubjectMatter | compulsory patriotic exercises in schools ⓘ |
| hasSubsequentHistory | effectively repudiated by West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette ⓘ |
| hasVote | 8–1 ⓘ |
| hasYear | 1940 ⓘ |
| holding |
expulsion of students who refuse to salute the flag on religious grounds does not violate the First Amendment
ⓘ
public schools may compel students to salute the flag and recite the Pledge of Allegiance ⓘ |
| involvesReligiousGroup |
JehovahsWitnesses
ⓘ
surface form:
Jehovah’s Witnesses
|
| isRelatedCase |
Cantwell v. Connecticut
ⓘ
Sherbert v. Verner ⓘ West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette ⓘ |
| legalDoctrine | judicial deference to legislatures in matters of national unity ⓘ |
| locationOfOriginatingDispute | Minersville, Pennsylvania ⓘ |
| overruledBy | West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Minersville School District v. Gobitis Description of subject: Minersville School District v. Gobitis was a 1940 U.S. Supreme Court decision, authored by Justice Felix Frankfurter, that upheld mandatory flag salutes in public schools and allowed the expulsion of Jehovah’s Witness students who refused on religious grounds.
Referenced by (4)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette
→
overruledCase
→
Minersville School District v. Gobitis
ⓘ
United States Supreme Court cases of the Hughes Court
→
includesCase
→
Minersville School District v. Gobitis
ⓘ
Minersville School District v. Gobitis
→
hasFullCitation
→
Minersville School District v. Gobitis
self-linksurface differs
ⓘ
this entity surface form:
Minersville School District v. Gobitis, 310 U.S. 586 (1940)