Abstract
The use of corporal punishment against children has fallen more and more out of vogue in the past half-century as research has shown that the practice only harms children. But, despite that research and the growing public distaste for the practice, the use of corporal punishment in schools remains legal in eighteen states, including Florida. A fifty-year-old Supreme Court case, Ingraham v. Wright, upholds the legality of corporal punishment in schools. The Court has not revisited the topic despite changes in public attitudes and research and that it was confronted with the ability to revisit it as recently as 2021. In the 2017–2018 school year, about 70,000 students received corporal punishment in the United States. Although this is a small minority of the millions of students in the U.S. public school systems, this Note argues that even one instance of in-school corporal punishment is too many. After arguing that in-school corporal punishment should be abolished, this Note explores the federal precedent related to the practice. Finding the federal precedent lacking, this Note turns to the Florida constitution for answers. Finally, this Note calls on state legislators and citizens to enact new legislation or a constitutional amendment to abolish the practice.
Recommended Citation
Pressly Pratt,
Hitting Back: Methods of Abolishing Corporal Punishment in the Florida School System,
76 Fla. L. Rev.
789
(2024).
Available at: https://scholarship.law.ufl.edu/flr/vol76/iss3/5