All but seven of the 56 books the Matanuska-Susitna Borough School District removed from school libraries must be reshelved, pending a trial next year, ruled U.S. District Court Judge Sharon Gleason on Aug. 6.
The banned books, including well-known titles like Toni Morrison’s “The Bluest Eye,” Kurt Vonnegut’s “Slaughterhouse-Five” and Khaled Hosseini’s “The Kite Runner,” were removed from schools last year without individual consideration of their content after parents and community members complained of “LGBTQ themes” or sexually explicit content in district meetings.
Gleason’s order said the district’s action violated students’ constitutional rights and “raises the specter of official suppression of ideas.” That caused irreparable harm and would continue to do so if they stayed off library shelves until trial, her order found. The order is a preliminary injunction; the books’ ultimate fate will be determined in a trial scheduled for April of next year.
A spokesperson for the district said the district and its legal counsel were still in the process of reviewing the ruling and did not have an immediate comment.
Savannah Fletcher, attorney for the plaintiffs with the Northern Justice Project, said the court’s ruling shows that the Constitution doesn’t allow the government to remove books without a compelling reason for an indefinite period of time.
“The Constitution doesn’t allow the government to remove ideas simply because some people disagree with them,” she said.
“I think it’s a really great reminder during this time of tension around our schools, around students rights and parents rights and the protection of teachers and educators, that there is a baseline we all have to follow, and our Constitution is going to protect that. It really reaffirms the rights of students to access ideas, to access information.”
The case comes against the backdrop of a national reckoning about which books and what kind of material should be available to students. Fletcher said the Alaska case is unique because the district removed such a large quantity of books without individual review.
Meanwhile, some books have already been approved to go back to library shelves by the community. After the district removed them, it established a library committee, a majority of whose members were selected by the school board. The committee was tasked with determining whether the books were “criminally indecent” and it allowed 14 books to remain in schools.
An additional 14 titles were referred to the district for a final decision; others were not reviewed or found to be out of circulation or missing entirely. The court’s decision overrides these determinations, unless the school administration or board provides the court with a compelling reason to remove a specific title.
Scott Adams and his wife Dawn were plaintiffs in the case with their middle school-aged daughter, who he said is an avid reader and fan of the Harry Potter series.
He said he joined the lawsuit because the family felt the district’s action was a violation of the First Amendment and he was “ecstatic” with the court order.
He said he wants to see a better process for deciding which books should be in the library, and said teachers and librarians should be trusted with those decisions.
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