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In the mid-1990s, the American Civil Liberties Union sued the district for banning the book Voodoo & Hoodoo and won. Then, in 2000 the ACLU again sued the district for a gag order it placed on parent Dana Thompson at a school board meeting. More recently, in February the principal at Fontainebleau High School in the district forced students to alter an article on teen pregnancies before he would let it run.

In the latest saga of censorship, principal Ron Styron at Mandeville High School banned the distribution of an independent student newspaper because he said it had an unfair advantage over the school-sponsored newspapers, which fall prey to his censorship.

In an e-mail to Above Underground, he said his decision in early March to clamp down on distribution was done "out of fairness" to school publications that "must work through sponsors and administrators before distribution." Prior to this, distribution had been allowed before and after school.

School board member Neal Hennegan said Superintendent Leonard Monteleone had expressed his dislike for the paper several weeks prior to Styron's ban, but did not know if he had initiated the ban.

Hennegan said he planned to question the constitutionality of and reasoning for the ban at an upcoming April board meeting.

Above Underground is "slick" and "very professional," Hennegan said, and there is burgeoning community support for the paper. After the ban at Mandeville, local network news channels rushed in to cover the story.

The content does not include anything controversial or unfit for a mainstream newspaper, Hennegan said.

"We're real careful about content," said Andrew Preble, editor of Above Underground. In an e-mail Preble sent to principals at three St. Tammany Parish high schools after Styron's ban, he challenged them "to find something in our paper that they wouldn't allow in the official school newspaper.

He did not immediately receive a response.

Preble, a junior at Fontainebleau High School, has no prior journalism experience but said he developed an interest in desktop publishing since his father works in public relations.

Above Underground is entirely student-run and is supported by local advertising, Preble said.

"[Styron] stopping us really hasn't hurt us that much," Preble said, adding that circulation of Above Underground has grown immensely since its first issue last December and is now close to 7,000 copies across several St. Tammany Parish high schools. "We'd like to be able to pass them out at his school, and we're hoping that he compromises," he said.

Before the ban, Above Underground was distributed at Mandeville, Fontainebleau and Covington high schools.

"It's our purpose to be fun, interesting and just something positive for students. Some kids do drugs and some kids vandalize stuff, and we like to do this paper," he said.

Hennegan said the past history of censorship in St. Tammany Parish is unfortunate, but he sees it as a product of the community, an upscale "bedroom community" for New Orleans.

"The schools from Louisiana standards are the best in the state and the administration and some of the board members think they can kind of flaunt the laws, or people have to do what they say," he said. "That's unfortunately the attitude, and then we get into problems like this."

Despite his prior review of the Gazette article on teen pregnancies in February, Fontainebleau principal Randy Morgan has not clamped down on distribution of Above Underground in his school, Preble said.