There are just some things that, as Americans, one assumes are sacrosanct to how we operate as a free society.

So the U.S. Supreme Court chose to take a pass.

In deciding not to hear an appeal in Hosty v. Carter, the censorship case out of Governors State University in Illinois, there is no telling what prompted the Court to vote as it did. There are few places more cloaked in secrecy than the Justice's Conference Room where the Justices meet to discuss which cases they will hear. Still, bits and pieces have emerged from behind the closed conference room door over the years that make it clear the Justices' refusal to hear a particular case does not necessarily mean they believed the case was decided correctly. For most college students in the country, the important questions raised by Hosty remain to be answered.

All that can be said with certainty is that, whatever their reasoning or intent, the result is that college students in three states — Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin — are at risk of having a censorship standard applied to them that the Supreme Court said back in 1988 allows grade school officials to censor a a student newspaper that discusses the "existence of Santa Claus."

It is a truly stunning turn. And scary as hell.

There are just some things that, as Americans, one assumes are sacrosanct to how we operate as a free society. The things we learned about back in our 8th grade American Civics class. The things that we do, as the beacon of freedom to the rest of the world that we've long held ourselves out to be, that just can't be messed with.

I'm thinking of things like prohibiting the government from listening in on the private conversations of its citizens without, at some point, obtaining a warrant.

Or of not allowing the government to lock people up forever without charging them with a crime or giving them their day in court.

Or of prohibiting government-sanctioned torture.

Those, I had assumed, were givens.

I also assumed that if there was ever a place where free, robust and uninhibited speech would not just be tolerated, but actively nurtured and celebrated, it would be our country's college and university campuses. The "quintessential marketplace of ideas," the University is where adult students and faculty can freely share their thoughts and opinions without having university administrators — government officials — intefere.

But lo and behold, it looks like I may have been wrong on all counts.

America in 2006 is clearly different from the America of my 8th-grade year. Things that I learned should not be tolerated in a free society are now not only permitted, but openly advocated. Things that should shock most Americans no longer do.

Back in 1988, when the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier, which gave many school officials significantly more authority to censor the speech of high school students, and which Hosty now says is the "starting point" for deciding college censorship cases, Justice Brennan reflected the feelings I had about the case — feelings no doubt shaped by my 8th grade civics class. The new Hazelwood standard, he noted, permitted censorship of student speech on a scale never before seen in a First Amendment case. School officials, the Court said, could now censor speech, for example, where they felt it was "inappropriate," "poorly written," or "inconsistent with the shared values of a civilized social order." In his dissent, Justice Brennan warned:

"Such unthinking contempt for individual rights is intolerable from any state official. It is particularly insidious from one to whom the public entrusts the task of inculcating in its youth an appreciation for the cherished democratic liberties that our Constitution guarantees."

Unfortunately, if the last few years have shown us anything, it is that those "cherished democratic liberties" guaranteed by our Constitution are not the sure thing that Justice Brennan and many of us assumed.

And that the "inculcation of youth" works both ways.

It's frequently said these days that we live in a "new world" that requires a "new balance" between governmental authority and individual rights. That may be so. Unfortunately, however, there doesn't seem to be a lot of balancing taking place.

Now, probably more than ever before, we need our next generation to fully understand and appreciate the liberties at stake in order to help formulate a careful, reasoned and workable balance. Instead, we have in place a system of civics education, increasingly backed by the law, that makes a mockery of such liberties, with the central civics lesson being: look but don't touch. It is a lesson that will have — that has already had — consequences. We live in a country whose citizens, a recent national survey found, can name more members of The Simpsons cartoon family than the individual freedoms guaranteed by the First Amendment. Frankly, without a pretty drastic change, I'm not holding my breath that many of our future leaders and citizens will be demanding a genuine balance anytime soon.

With the Supreme Court's ruling now in the books, the battle in Hosty is over. For some college students in the Midwest, Hazelwood is, indeed, now the "starting point." Still, the bigger and more important question for those of us who continue to believe in the cherished democratic liberties we learned about in 8th grade is: the starting point of what?

Mike Hiestand is an attorney, based in the far, upper left corner of the "Lower 48," and works as a legal consultant to the Student Press Law Center.