Tenn. Secondary Sch. Ath. Ass'n v. Brentwood Acad.

In Tenn. Secondary Sch. Ath. Ass'n v. Brentwood Acad., 127 S. Ct. 2489 (2007) (Brentwood II), the U.S. Supreme Court rejected lower court rulings against the athletic association in this long-running dispute that had been before the U.S. Supreme Court once before. The Court held that an anti-recruiting rule does not violate the First Amendment and that the athletic association did not deprive the school of any due process rights either.

The Tennessee Secondary School Athletic Association (TSSAA) is a not-for-profit membership corporation organized to regulate interscholastic sports among its members, which include some 290 public and 55 private high schools in Tennessee. There is a similar athletic association in most states, and many (such as the New Jersey NJSIAA) discriminate against homeschoolers by excluding them from the leagues and competitions, though this was not an issue in this case.

In a prior trip to the U.S. Supreme Court, the Court held that the TSSAA is a state actor even though it is a non-profit organization. Brentwood Academy v. Tennessee Secondary Sch. Ath. Ass'n, 531 U.S. 288 (2001) (Brentwood I). This ruling is helpful to homeschoolers. In the 2007 ruling (Brentwood II), Justice Clarence Thomas criticized that finding of state action, saying that "Brentwood I departed so dramatically from our earlier state-action cases," and he said the Court should have held for the athletic association on that basis