Topeka Library Board Restricts Access to Four Books on Sex

Norman Oder -- Library Journal, 2/20/2009

• Vote, 5-3,  goes against director’s recommendation
• Lawsuit possible
• Mixed public reaction

In a 5-3 vote that contradicted the recommendation of the library director, Gina Millsap, and has drawn warnings of a lawsuit, the board of the Topeka and Shawnee County Public Library agreed yesterday to restrict minors’ access to four books: Sex for Busy People (LJ review); The Lesbian Kama Sutra; The Joy of Sex; and The Joy of Gay Sex.

“We believe our request will maintain a consistency with other restricted access that is already in place at the libraries, i.e., Playboy, R-rated films, and computer access,” Kim Borchers, of a group called Kansans for Common Sense Policy, had written the library. “We believe these books are [harmful to minors]. If you have any doubt, upon viewing ask yourself the following: If these books were in film what would they be rated, could the local paper print excerpts, if the “affirmative defense” were no longer in statute could the library maintain its current policy?”

The state “harmful to minors” law, however, provides an affirmative defense to libraries for materials acquired in accordance with library policies. Outside of that, the law defines “harmful to minors” as appealing to a prurient interest in sex; as “patently offensive to prevailing standards in the adult community with respect to what is suitable for minors;” and lacking “serious literary, scientific, educational, artistic or political value for minors.

Director's position
Millsap, the library’s executive director, sent a letter to the board warning that Borchers’s request violated the library’s materials selection policy, which says customers may not restrict the access of others and that the library does not label materials to make value judgments. Borchers’s request that the books be shelved behind a desk, thus requiring patrons to ask for them, would violate the library’s user confidentiality policy.

“Whatever the decision is, we will implement it to the best of our ability,” Millsap wrote. (Implementation has not been decided.) 

However, Millsap warned of unintended consequences and a slippery slope should the library start restricting materials by age. She noted that the library has 600-plus books with subject headings relating to sex, sex instruction, sexual behavior, and fertility: "Will staff be expected to review all of these titles and assign some or all of them to a restricted collection?" She said the policy might lead staff to become wary of ordering certain books.

Millsap asked that the board affirm its current policies but make two changes that, in a sense, responded to Borchers’s argument: to lift the restriction on R-rated films in the collection and discontinue the practice of putting certain magazines behind the service desk, including Playboy. (It is not uncommon for libraries restrict magazines like Playboy and Consumer Reports to prevent theft.) Those changes were not approved.

The packet also contained the text of a speech by State Librarian Christie Brandau, who stated, “[I]f the library begins to limit access or label materials, there is no end to the materials that are considered objectionable.”

Public reaction
Millsap warned that the decision could have negative repercussions among partners and donors, as well among libraries regionally.

During a three-hour meeting Thursday, 14 of 16 people who spoke during the public comment section opposed restricting access. "There is not a librarian's desk big enough to hide all the books that someone may find objectionable," said Jason Chaika, vice chairman of the Topeka chapter of the Kansas Equality Coalition, according to the Capitol-Journal.

One supporter of the change, a Topeka pastor, read several explicit lines from a book, but, as the newspaper reported, the passage was not from one of the books at issue.

Kerry Onstott Storey, chairwoman of the board, said she was “extremely disappointed in the board” and noted that several of the board members who approved the restriction attend church with Borchers, according to the newspaper.

(The newspaper published a follow-up article February 21 headlined Library peers dismayed at board's decision.)

Lawsuit coming?
One lawyer at the meeting told the newspaper he had already been approached by potential plaintiffs. “Because it would take these books off the shelves and place them out of reach of patrons browsing the shelves, the proposed policy is unconstitutional,” warned the American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas and Western Missouri in a letter to the board.

Deborah Caldwell-Stone, deputy director of the American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, told LJ the action most resembled the decision last year by the board of the Nampa Public Library, ID, which voted to move two books, The New Joy of Sex and The Joy of Gay Sex, into the director’s office.
 
The board rescinded its decision after a challenge from the American Civil Liberties Union, calculating that the legal fight wasn’t worth the expense.

She said other cases in which children’s books had been put on restricted shelves were struck down as unconstitutional.

“It will stigmatize those adults that have a need for this information,” she said of the Topeka board’s decision. “I think it certainly raises some constitutional questions.”

Comments on the web
Among the comments on the newspaper’s web site:

• These books are not pornography. They are not tawdry romance novels that gush about heaving breasts and throbbing manhood. They teach the pro's and con's and consequences of being sexually active. They are not harmful to anyone.
• I will add that I'm not thrilled that the library has these books, but it is parents, no one else, who must teach their children.
• If the kids want to find information on sex, they are just a keyboard away. They will find information more offensive, more derogatory and more likely to be wrong, on the internet, from their friends, under parent's bed, from a magazine snuck to school.
• I understand about problems with banning books, but there should be restrictions just like movies. Do you let your kids watch ***** so they will learn about sex?
• The people on the library board who voted to restrict should be ashamed of themselves, they spent over 3 hours on an issue that will embarrass Kansas, have huge repercussions - for them!, and dibilitate (sic) the professional staff from doing their job. The strategic plan on the agenda got less than 5 minutes.
• I just don't get the outrage. These books are not banned. They will just be age restricted. Sexually explicit publications and movies are restricted by age everywhere. I am a democrat and liberal on most social issues, but this perverts the cause.
• Seriously how many minors go to the medical section of the library looking for these books, prior to this news anyway. Seriously is it that big a deal.