In the age of litigation, teachers have a responsibility to protect students in their care from injury, to act as a reasonably prudent teacher would act to prevent loss or damage to their students, and to exercise sound judgement and authority over students, to correct misbehavior and to provide for their orderly instruction. Whenever a teacher is the responsible cause for pupil injury--which is so often the case when punishment is involved--the possibilities of a negligence suit are great. With a contemporary back-to-basics approach that stresses more law-and-order in the classroom, teachers are often expected by school boards and administrations to exercise greater control over misbehaving students. Such an expectation is likely to increase instances of punishment (corporal and non-corporal) of students and, consequently, instances of negligence cases brought against teachers. The classroom teacher, caught between conflicting forces, will need to develop greater understanding of both the legal liabilities of improper punishment and the effective means of establishing good discipline in the classroom. This article examines a few of the central questions--legal and pedagogical--that exist or are emerging in the area of pupil punishment and suggests some general responses to those questions.