(WASHINGTON)—PEN America has filed an amicus brief supporting an appeal to the Supreme Court in the Little v. Llano County case challenging book removals from the Llano County, TX public library. If the high court grants review of the lower court ruling, it would be the first case on book bans before the justices since 1982.
In its brief submitted Tuesday, PEN America urges the Supreme Court to overturn the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeal’s “alarming” opinion. Previously, PEN America criticized the ruling for denying library patrons’ First Amendment right to receive information, and for embracing the dangerous application of the government speech doctrine to decisions about books in public libraries.
In its legal filing, PEN America focuses on the First Amendment and material harms that library book removals pose to authors. The brief includes direct testimonials from writers about the financial, reputational, and creative costs of book bans and reflects the reality that “authors are actively worried that their books may be removed because they express certain viewpoints.” As a result, authors are choosing either to shy away from those viewpoints, or forgo writing altogether.
“It should be axiomatic that government officials cannot remove library books because they disapprove of the viewpoints expressed in them–that is what decades of First Amendment precedent require,” said Elly Brinkley, staff attorney for U.S. Free Expression Programs at PEN America. “Unfortunately, the movement to ban books across the country has been premised on radical misinterpretations of the First Amendment that deny patrons the right to receive information and allow government officials to impose their ideological beliefs on the public with impunity. These dangerous arguments pose a grave threat to our democracy. This case is an opportunity for the Court to affirm what we know to be core First Amendment rights.”
In 2021, Llano County removed 17 books from the public library at the urging of a small group of county residents. These books include books about race, such as Caste: The Origins of Our Discontent by Isabel Wilkerson, and children’s books about LGBTQ+ identities, such as Being Jazz.
If the Supreme Court grants review of the Fifth Circuit ruling, Little v. Llano County will be the first case the Court has heard on book bans since Island Trees Sch. Dist. v. Pico in 1982. Justice Brennan’s plurality decision in that case affirmed students’ right to receive information in school libraries, and seven out of nine justices agreed that library books cannot be removed for narrowly partisan or ideological reasons.
Since 2021 PEN America has led in documenting the spread of book bans in public schools nationwide. Its latest report counted 23,000 cases of bans in school libraries and classrooms.
About PEN America
PEN America stands at the intersection of literature and human rights to protect free expression in the United States and worldwide. We champion the freedom to write, recognizing the power of the word to transform the world. Our mission is to unite writers and their allies to celebrate creative expression and defend the liberties that make it possible. Learn more at pen.org.
Contact: Suzanne Trimel, [email protected], (201) 247-5057