Law Commons^™

Corporal Punishment In The Public Schools: The Legal Question, William Irwin Arbuckle Iii

Akron Law Review

PUBLIC EDUCATION in the United States has come a long way since the one-room schoolhouse days. This phenomenal growth has been paced by the controversy surrounding the use of corporal punishment as a means of enforcing discipline in the schools. From the oldest reported case reaching the issue of corporal punishment' back in 1833 down to the present, the proponents of corporal punishment have had to defend their actions in the courts from a wide variety of attacks based on criminal law, tort law, state statutes, school board regulations and, most recently, constitutional guarantees. Although the attacks on corporal punishment …