“Discard [Library] Books … That Reflect Gender, Family, Ethnic, or Racial Bias"

Eugene Volokh
Volokh Conspiracy, Reason Magazine

Excerpt: Next week, the entire en banc Fifth Circuit will be hearing Little v. Llano County, a case involving allegations of viewpoint-based book removals in a public library. As I've noted before, the Supreme Court has never resolved whether such removals are unconstitutional. Pico v. Bd. of Ed. (1982), which considered the matter as to public school libraries, split 4-4 on the subject, with the ninth Justice, Justice White, expressly declining to resolve the substantive question.

I'm not sure what the answer here should be. I tentatively think a public school is entitled to decide which viewpoints to promote through its own library: School authorities can decide that their library will be a place where they provide books they recommend as particularly interesting/useful/enlightening/etc., essentially as supplements to the school curriculum (over which the school has broad authority).

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