Republican attorneys general from 21 states are trying to help sway a federal appeals court to uphold a 2023 Florida law that led to books being removed from school libraries.
The attorneys general filed a friend-of-the-court brief filed last week at the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals as Florida challenges a district judge’s August ruling that said the law is “overbroad and unconstitutional.”
The brief echoed arguments by Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier that decisions about what books go on school library shelves involve “government speech” and, as a result, are not regulated by the First Amendment.
Much of the case has focused on part of the law that seeks to prevent the availability of reading material that “describes sexual conduct.”
“Refusing to recognize that public-library curation decisions are government speech subverts the democratic process,” said last week’s brief, led by Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin. “Rather than having democratically accountable officials decide the content of public-school libraries, unelected federal courts will become the decisionmakers forced to referee countless disputes between students, parents, publishers, and various associations over what books should and should not be in schools. This case therefore also implicates (the 21) states’ interest in preserving our constitutional structure.”
Uthmeier’s office went to the Atlanta-based appeals court in September after U.S. District Judge Carlos Mendoza sided with publishing companies, authors and parents challenging the constitutionality of the law. The named defendants in the case are members of the State Board of Education and the school boards in Orange and Volusia counties.
Mendoza, who is based in Orlando, wrote that the law “does not evaluate the work to determine if it has any holistic value” and “does not specify what level of detail ‘describes sexual conduct.’”
“As plaintiffs note, it is unclear what the statute actually prohibits,” Mendoza wrote. “It might forbid material that states characters ‘spent the night together’ or ‘made love.’ Perhaps not. Defendants do not attempt to explain how the statute should work.”
The law (HB 1069) set up a process in which parents could object to reading material that is “pornographic” or “depicts or describes sexual conduct.” It required books that received such objections to be removed within five days and to remain unavailable until the objections were resolved.
Battles have played out in various school districts during the past few years about removing books from library shelves. The lawsuit cited removals of books such as “The Bluest Eye” by Toni Morrison and “Love in the Time of Cholera” by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Both of those authors were awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for their novels and other work.
In last week’s brief, the attorneys general from the other states argued that allowing parents to object to books and requiring school boards to consider the objections “does not change the fact that, at the end of the day, it is the government making the ultimate curation decision.”
Also, it said the law doesn’t affect students’ ability to receive information.
“HB 1069 does not prevent or prohibit students from receiving those books from their parents (or any source other than public-school libraries), nor does it restrict student speech,” the brief said. “It simply prohibits age-inappropriate books describing sex acts from being in K-12 public-school libraries at taxpayer expense.”
But in his August ruling, Mendoza cited the role of parental objections in driving decisions to remove books.
“To be sure, parents have the right to ‘direct the upbringing and education of children,’ but the government cannot repackage their speech and pass it off as its own,” he wrote, partially quoting a U.S. Supreme Court precedent.
Along with Arkansas, attorneys general signing on to last week’s brief were from Alabama, Alaska, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and West Virginia.
The plaintiffs in the lawsuit are publishing companies Penguin Random House LLC, Hachette Book Group, Inc., HarperCollins Publishers LLC, Macmillan Publishing Group, LLC, Simon & Schuster, LLC and Sourcebooks LLC; The Authors Guild; authors Julia Alvarez, John Green, Laurie Halse Anderson, Jodi Picoult and Angie Thomas; and parents Heidi Kellogg and Judith Anne Hayes.
Bo Peep says
It is not a book ban as anyone can still buy these books and read them at their leisure. This law only restricts schools.from giving age inappropriate materials public schools students without parental approval. If liberals would stop trying to advance LGBTQ acceptance through social engineering during the times when progressive Democrats are in power these laws would not be needed. Meanwhile if you want to read to your own children about being gay or any other activity in your own home you can buy any of these books not allowed to given out in school on on the shelf in the school library you can do that. Therefore this is not a book ban.
The dude says
Aside from the fact that you bemoan “accepting” people for who they are, I don’t disagree with you on maybe not having some books available in public school libraries.
The problem is that MAGA morons want them removed from all public libraries as well, then the next logical step with the rigid ideologues (or should I say demagogues) will be a total book ban with the state deciding what the people are allowed to read. This has been proven by history itself.
Of course the MAGA morons also are trying to rewrite history as well.
Skibum says
Rabid maga morons are so consumed with sexual hang ups to the point that it makes rational people wonder why is it that you look at things you don’t agree with and suddenly your minds are in the gutter with sexual thoughts. You look at a guy and a girl walking down the street holding hands and think that is so romantic, but if you see two legally married gay guys innocently walking down the street holding hands, all YOU want to picture in your filthy minds is visions of them naked, romping sexually on the floor with crowds of onlookers, including little children with parents holding their hands over their little ones’ eyes!
It is people like YOU, Bo Peep, and the holier than thou “mothers of liberty” crowd, many of whom can’t keep their own marriages or relationships together but think it is their business to preach irrational nonsense to everyone else about what is appropriate, and inappropriate, for others. Who are YOU to tell other people, and other people’s school students, what they can and cannot read that were previously approved and included in school libraries???
This world has way too many “Karens” who are nothing but sexually consumed busy bodies who apparently can’t get it at home, but get off on thinking nasty thoughts about other people in the privacy of their own bedrooms.
I, for one, cannot wait… absolutely CANNOT WAIT for the midterms and the next presidential election to oust the extremist, white nationalist kristian hipocrites who walk around with gold crosses around their necks and spout continuous hate, division, and naziesque bullshit about gay people, as if you supported the same kind of concentration camps and throwing humans in ovens and burning them to death simply because of their sexual orientation and who they love.
It is people like YOU who are going to be DAMNED and condemned in the afterlife because Jesus never, ever uttered a single bad thought about two people of the same sex loving each other!
So as for me, all the extremist hater “Karens” out there who want me, my husband of 34 years, and all other gay Americans dead for no reason other than we are gay, can GO TO HELL!
PaulT says
Banning books that express liberal thoughts while forcing K – 12 kids to watch PragerU right wing propaganda videos in class sounds familiar.
Should we append the LGBTQ to Pastor Martin Niemoller’s
‘First They Came’
First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist
Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist
Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me
Merry Christmas To You All
from a proud member of President Donald J Trump’s ‘Radical Left Scum’
.
Sherry says
Thank you Paul T.! Happiest of Holidays!
Endless dark money says
The only thing inappropriate in schools is republicans. Defunding and book banning like the old Nazis. I’d much rather my kids be around trans people than republicans. We see how they protect a global pedophile ring. They obviously could care less about any children only unborn fetus.
Marek says
Absolutely agree with ” Endless dark money ” . And it is essential to protest.
Bradley says
They are books. Ban republicans and their hate! Send those pedo terrorists to prison!! Start with the racist immigrant ron and his con job of a family! Defascsist crime family stole millions from taxpayers! Deport to Salvadoran death camp! Treat others the way you wanna be treated right ! The orange bootlicker and his wife wouldn’t last a week hahahaha could livestream them eating roaches for dinner! Stealing millions is far worse than the civil offense of overstaying a visa! Who’s the real criminals? The gop!
Pogo says
@So banning writing is wrong
… and if no one read it to begin — well, that’s even better.
Please, do not adjust your set…
Hypocrisy is the homage vice pays to virtue.
— Francois de La Rochefoucauld
https://www.bing.com/search?q=Francois+de+La+Rochefoucauld