Board of Education v. Pico
E425628
Board of Education v. Pico is a 1982 U.S. Supreme Court case in which a divided Court held that public school boards may not remove books from school libraries simply because they dislike the ideas contained in them, recognizing students’ limited First Amendment right to receive information.
All labels observed (1)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Board of Education v. Pico canonical | 2 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T4267645 — 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: Board of Education v. Pico Context triple: [United States Supreme Court cases of the Burger Court, hasNotableCase, Board of Education v. Pico]
-
A.
Plyler v. Doe
Plyler v. Doe is a 1982 U.S. Supreme Court decision that held states cannot deny free public education to children based on their immigration status, recognizing such exclusion as a violation of the Equal Protection Clause.
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B.
Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier
Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier is a 1988 U.S. Supreme Court case that limited student First Amendment rights by allowing public school officials greater authority to regulate school-sponsored student speech, such as in school newspapers.
-
C.
Pickering v. Board of Education
Pickering v. Board of Education is a landmark 1968 U.S. Supreme Court case that established First Amendment protections for public employees speaking as private citizens on matters of public concern.
-
D.
Lee v. Weisman
Lee v. Weisman is a 1992 U.S. Supreme Court decision that held clergy-led prayer at public school graduation ceremonies unconstitutional under the Establishment Clause.
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E.
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.
- 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: Board of Education v. Pico Target entity description: Board of Education v. Pico is a 1982 U.S. Supreme Court case in which a divided Court held that public school boards may not remove books from school libraries simply because they dislike the ideas contained in them, recognizing students’ limited First Amendment right to receive information.
-
A.
Plyler v. Doe
Plyler v. Doe is a 1982 U.S. Supreme Court decision that held states cannot deny free public education to children based on their immigration status, recognizing such exclusion as a violation of the Equal Protection Clause.
-
B.
Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier
Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier is a 1988 U.S. Supreme Court case that limited student First Amendment rights by allowing public school officials greater authority to regulate school-sponsored student speech, such as in school newspapers.
-
C.
Pickering v. Board of Education
Pickering v. Board of Education is a landmark 1968 U.S. Supreme Court case that established First Amendment protections for public employees speaking as private citizens on matters of public concern.
-
D.
Lee v. Weisman
Lee v. Weisman is a 1992 U.S. Supreme Court decision that held clergy-led prayer at public school graduation ceremonies unconstitutional under the Establishment Clause.
-
E.
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.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (49)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
First Amendment case
ⓘ
United States Supreme Court case ⓘ education law case ⓘ |
| appliesTo | public school libraries in the United States ⓘ |
| areaOfLaw |
civil rights law
ⓘ
constitutional law ⓘ education law ⓘ |
| arguedDate | 1981-11-03 ⓘ |
| citation | 457 U.S. 853 ⓘ |
| concurringInJudgmentBy | Byron R. White NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| constitutionalProvisionInterpreted | First Amendment to the United States Constitution NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| court | Supreme Court of the United States ⓘ |
| decisionDate | 1982-06-25 ⓘ |
| dissentingOpinionBy |
Lewis F. Powell Jr.
NERFINISHED
ⓘ
Sandra Day O'Connor NERFINISHED ⓘ Warren E. Burger NERFINISHED ⓘ William H. Rehnquist NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| docketNumber | 80-2043 ⓘ |
| fullName | Board of Education, Island Trees Union Free School District No. 26 v. Pico NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| holding |
A local school board may not remove books from a school library simply because it dislikes the ideas contained in those books.
ⓘ
Students have a limited First Amendment right to receive information and ideas in a school library. ⓘ |
| impact |
limited the discretion of school boards to remove books from school libraries for ideological reasons
ⓘ
recognized the school library as a place of voluntary inquiry for students ⓘ |
| joinedByInPlurality |
Harry A. Blackmun
NERFINISHED
ⓘ
John Paul Stevens NERFINISHED ⓘ Thurgood Marshall NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| jurisdiction | federal question jurisdiction ⓘ |
| legalIssue |
First Amendment freedom of speech
ⓘ
authority of public school boards over school libraries ⓘ right to receive information ⓘ |
| locationOfIncident | Island Trees Union Free School District No. 26, New York NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| majorityOpinionBy | William J. Brennan Jr. NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| originatingCaseType | civil rights action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 ⓘ |
| page | 853 ⓘ |
| permittedGroundsForRemoval |
educational unsuitability
ⓘ
pervasively vulgar content ⓘ |
| petitioner | Board of Education, Island Trees Union Free School District No. 26 NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| pluralityOpinionBy | William J. Brennan Jr. NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| proceduralPosture | appeal from the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ⓘ |
| rearguedDate | 1982-03-02 ⓘ |
| recognizedRight | students' limited First Amendment right to receive information ⓘ |
| reporter | United States Reports ⓘ |
| respondent | Steven Pico NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| standardArticulated |
school boards may not remove books from libraries in a narrowly partisan or political manner
ⓘ
school boards may not remove books simply because they dislike the ideas contained in them ⓘ |
| subjectMatter | removal of books from public school libraries ⓘ |
| subsequentCitationFrequency | frequently cited in cases involving school library book removals ⓘ |
| volume | 457 ⓘ |
| votePlurality | 4-4-1 ⓘ |
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: Board of Education v. Pico Description of subject: Board of Education v. Pico is a 1982 U.S. Supreme Court case in which a divided Court held that public school boards may not remove books from school libraries simply because they dislike the ideas contained in them, recognizing students’ limited First Amendment right to receive information.
Referenced by (2)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
United States Supreme Court cases of the Burger Court
→
hasNotableCase
→
Board of Education v. Pico
ⓘ