Missouri ACLU, librarians sue over law that led to schools banning hundreds of books

Missouri librarians are suing over a new law that bans sexually explicit material from schools, leading to districts removing hundreds of books — including classic novels, human anatomy texts and Holocaust history books, according to a lawsuit filed in Jackson County Court.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Missouri is suing Jackson County Prosecutor Jean Peters Baker, in her role and as a representative of all county prosecutors across the state, on behalf of the Missouri Library Association and Missouri Association of School Librarians. The suit argues the law is unconstitutional, amounting to government censorship and the suppression of students’ First Amendment rights.

The law, which was approved last year as part of a larger bill addressing sexual assault survivors’ rights, threatens librarians or other school employees who violate it with a misdemeanor, risking up to a year in jail or a $2,000 fine.

“The law presents specific peril for school librarians, but also endangers the work and livelihoods of public and academic librarians who work with K-12 schools in various capacities,” said Joe Kohlburn with the Missouri Library Association Intellectual Freedom Committee, in a news release. “ ... Librarians have been undermined politically in this state for long enough, and the fear of prosecution is an ongoing issue for keeping qualified professionals in Missouri, as well as bringing new people into the profession.”

Michael Mansur, spokesman for the Jackson County prosecutor, said the office had not yet seen the lawsuit so could not comment Thursday.

After the law went into effect in late August, districts across the state pulled hundreds of titles from school libraries, many of which are authored by or feature characters who are people of color or identify as LGBTQ.

The legislation specifically prohibits images in school materials that could be considered sexually explicit, such as depictions of genitals or sex acts. As a result, most of the banned books are graphic novels. The law does provide some exceptions, such as for works of art or science textbooks.

Proponents of the legislation argued it would protect children from inappropriate content.

“In schools all across the country, we’ve seen this disgusting and inappropriate content making its way into our classrooms,” state Sen. Rick Brattin, R-Harrisonville, said in a statement after the legislation passed last session. “Instead of recognizing this as the threat it is, some schools are actually fighting parents to protect this filth. The last place our children should be seeing pornography is in our schools.”

In the Kansas City area, the Independence school district removed a dozen graphic novels from library shelves, including a comic book version of Kurt Vonnegut’s American classic “Slaughterhouse-Five,” the iconic graphic novel “Watchmen” by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons, “Blankets” by Craig Thompson and “Home After Dark” by David Small, according to records previously obtained by The Star.

The district also banned “Gender Queer” by Maia Kobabe and “Fun Home” by Alison Bechdel. Both graphic novels feature LGBTQ themes and have been targeted by conservative groups.

In the North Kansas City district, nine books were removed, including the graphic novel version of Margaret Atwood’s bestselling book “The Handmaid’s Tale,” “This Book Is Gay” by Juno Dawson and the queer comic anthology “Be Gay, Do Comics.”

In the St. Louis region, the Kirkwood district banned the graphic novel version of “1984,” George Orwell’s signature novel of a society under dystopian government surveillance and control, according to a list compiled by PEN America of books removed in response to the law.

The Wentzville school district, according to the list, removed several books related to the history of the Holocaust, including “Hitler’s Final Solution” by John Allen, as well as “Holocaust Camps and Killing Centers,” “Holocaust Rescue and Liberation” and “Holocaust Resistance,” all authored by Craig E Blohm.

As of November, about 300 titles had been banned from school libraries across the state, the lawsuit says.

Missouri and federal law already prohibit and criminalize the provision of obscene and pornographic materials to minors, the ACLU says in its lawsuit. Districts and librarians follow school-board approved policies regarding criteria for selecting age-appropriate books, including standards that prohibit obscene materials.

“School librarians in Missouri serve as trained, certified experts when curating developmentally appropriate collections for our students,” Melissa Corey, president of the Missouri Association of School Librarians, said in the release. “This statute has created a chilling effect on school library collection development, resulting in fewer representative books within our collections, due to fear of prosecution.”

The lawsuit says school librarians across the state have begun censoring their collections over concerns they will be criminally charged, and are now often reluctant to add new books or materials reflecting diversity.

Many school librarians, the suit says, “were asked to look through entire collections of titles for visuals that could be deemed ‘explicit sexual material’ and have been ordered to remove certain titles yet have not received any additional guidance on the application of (the law) and how it applies to any of the removed titles.”

The ACLU argues the law is unconstitutionally vague and broad, inviting discriminatory and arbitrary enforcement.

The lawsuit says it “could subject a parent who is a school employee to criminal prosecution for providing books or other materials to her own children or their friends who are students even if this is done in the privacy of her own home because the law places no limitations on when and where it applies.”

The ACLU is asking the court to find the law unconstitutional and render it unenforceable, or enter a judgment clarifying how and when the law applies to eliminate the concern of arbitrary enforcement.

Over the past couple of years, GOP lawmakers, political action committees and conservative parent groups in the Kansas City metro and across the country have spearheaded challenges to school library books, mostly featuring racially diverse or LGBTQ characters.

Librarians have raised concerns over harassment, with some questioning whether to stay in their jobs.

Missouri Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft has proposed a rule that would threaten public libraries’ state funding for making “age-inappropriate materials” available to minors. Ashcroft’s office received 20,000 public comments on the proposal, including widespread criticism from librarians and free speech advocates who say it is an attack on intellectual freedom.

In December, the ACLU of Missouri sued the Independence school district over its book removal policy, following a school board vote banning a book from elementary school libraries because it features a nonbinary character. The pending lawsuit aims to end the school district’s policy of automatically removing library materials after it receives a challenge, before any review has taken place.

Meanwhile the Lee’s Summit school district has received nearly 200 challenges to 90 book titles so far this year. The deluge of complaints, submitted by only six individuals, has led the district to form 28 committees to evaluate the challenged books and make recommendations on whether to retain or remove them, district spokeswoman Katy Bergen said.