The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit Wednesday ruled that two South Carolina school disturbance laws cannot be used to prosecute students for disruptive behavior. The could said that children as young as seven were referred to prosecutors by their schools under these laws.

One law makes it a crime to “conduct [one]self in a disorderly or boisterous manner” or use profanity near a schoolhouse. The other, South Carolina’s so-called “disturbing schools law,” makes it a crime to disturb or loiter in a school building. The disturbing schools law was later amended in 2018 to exclude students from its scope.

The laws generated particular controversy because of their impact on Black students. The court specifically mentioned that “evidence submitted…  shows that between 2015 and 2020, Black youth were charged with disorderly conduct for incidents in schools at roughly seven times the rate of their white peers.”

The court held that the two laws are unconstitutionally vague “as applied to elementary and secondary school students.” Judge Toby Heytens said in the majority opinion that it would be impossible to distinguish criminal boisterousness from the “garden-variety” boisterousness that one would expect from children and teenagers.

He further wrote that, “[b]ased solely on the dictionary definitions of the statutory terms—particularly disorderly and boisterous—it is hard to escape the conclusion that any person passing a schoolyard during recess is likely witnessing a large-scale crime scene.”

However, Judge Paul V. Neymeyer wrote in his dissent that similarly vague disorderly conduct laws are consistently applied across the United States and that “[a]s the Supreme Court has recognized, conduct that disturbs the learning environment is a proper target of regulation.”

This decision comes one year after a US district court struck down South Carolina’s school disturbance laws. ACLU Staff Attorney Sarah Hinger said at the time, “The court has sent a clear message: Rather than funnel children into the school-to-prison pipeline over minor rule breaking and protected First amendment activities, schools must recognize and protect students’ rights.”