The Cases Against Book Bans (publishersweekly.com)
Amid a three-year nationwide surge in book bans, 2024 began on a hopeful note for freedom-to-read advocates, with legal victories in book-banning lawsuits in Iowa, Florida, and Texas. But after some early successes, several cases are poised to enter a critical next phase. As the wheels of justice grind on, PW rounded up the status of some of the more closely watched book-banning suits. Perhaps no lawsuit has generated more attention than the challenge to HB 900 in Texas, which, among its provisions, would have forced booksellers in the state to rate books for sexual content as a condition of doing business with Texas public schools. In January, a three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals upheld district court judge Alan D. Albright’s decision to block the most odious parts of the law. But a subsequent order from the Fifth Circuit has delivered something of wake-up call for freedom-to-read advocates. In another closely watched case featuring library books, federal judge Sharon Gleason is weighing whether to order dozens of books taken from library shelves in the Mat-Su Borough School District in Alaska returned while a lawsuit challenging their removal is heard.