HOUSTON — On Tuesday, a federal judge dismissed the majority of claims in a lawsuit filed by Darryl George, a Black high school student from the Houston area. George alleged racial and gender discrimination after facing punishment for refusing to change his hairstyle.
The lawsuit had targeted the Barbers Hill Independent School District, which enforces a policy on hair length for male students. The district claims this rule promotes discipline and respect for authority. However, U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Brown questioned whether the policy might do more harm than good, stating, “Not everything that is undesirable, annoying, or even harmful amounts to a violation of the law, much less a constitutional problem.”
The Associated Press reached out to both the school district and George’s attorney, Allie Booker, for comments but received no immediate response.
George, 18, spent most of his junior year in either in-school suspension or an off-site disciplinary program due to the district’s assertion that his long locs, worn tied and twisted atop his head, violated the dress code. The district maintained that his hairstyle would fall below his shirt collar, eyebrows, or earlobes if untied, breaching their policy. It also noted that other students with locs adhered to the hair length guidelines.
In response, George and his mother, Darresha George, filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the school district, the district superintendent, his principal and assistant principal, as well as Texas Governor Greg Abbott and Attorney General Ken Paxton. The lawsuit argued that the school’s actions violated the CROWN Act, a state law enacted in September to prevent race-based hair discrimination. The CROWN Act prohibits penalizing individuals based on hair texture or protective hairstyles, including locs, braids, twists, and Bantu knots.
The suit also claimed that the policy was disproportionately enforced against Black students. However, Judge Brown found no evidence of a “persistent, widespread practice of disparate, race-based enforcement of the policy.” Additionally, the lawsuit asserted that George’s First Amendment rights to free speech were violated. Yet, Brown noted that no legal precedent supported the notion that hair length is protected under the First Amendment as expressive conduct.
Several claims, including those concerning George’s due process rights under the 14th Amendment, were dismissed. Judge Brown also removed Abbott, Paxton, the district superintendent, and other school officials from the case. However, he allowed one claim to proceed: an allegation of sex discrimination. The lawsuit argued that the district’s dress code lacked justification for allowing girls to have long hair while restricting boys. Brown acknowledged that the district failed to provide a reason for the gender-based differences in its policy, allowing the claim to move forward.
In February, a state judge ruled that the district’s punishment did not violate the CROWN Act in a separate lawsuit filed by the school district. At the conclusion of his ruling, Brown referenced a 1970 case in El Paso, Texas, where a judge ruled against a school district’s hair length policy, noting that the enforcement of such rules caused more disruption than the hair they sought to regulate. “Regrettably, so too here,” Brown commented on George’s situation.
The Barbers Hill hair policy has faced legal challenges before. In May 2020, a federal lawsuit was filed by two other students, one of whom returned to the school after a federal judge granted a temporary injunction. That lawsuit remains unresolved.