A 34-member coalition of literary organizations, publishers, libraries, and right to read advocates have cosigned a letter of concern to Tennessee Secretary of State Tre Hargett.
In response to White House Executive Order 14168, titled “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government,” Hargett has directed 211 public libraries to review their youth materials for “age-appropriateness” within 60 days, causing gridlock as institutions have rushed to comply with a January 19 deadline.
Among those registering opposition to Hargett’s directive are the Independent Book Publishers Association and Independent Publishers Caucus, along with Bivins Books, Candlewick Press, Holiday House Books, Macmillan Publishers, Peachtree Publishing, Penguin Random House, and Simon & Schuster. Other signatories include the American Booksellers for Free Expression, the American Library Association, the Authors Guild, the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, GLAAD, Lambda Literary, Libro.fm, Military Families for Free Expression, Teaching for Change, and We Need Diverse Books.
The letter, hosted on PEN America’s website, reminds Hargett that EOs “are not legislation, and Congress has declined to pursue such a bill” concerning “gender ideology.” There are no clear protocols for complying with the EO, and “the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), the agency that runs library grant programs, has not created regulation or policies in support of the Executive Order,” the letter says.
In addition, court cases including San Francisco AIDS Foundation v. Trump and Schiff v. Office of Personnel Management have challenged the constitutionality of EO 14168, resulting in portions of the EO being “enjoined for violating First Amendment and equal protection principles.” The letter notes the potential cost to taxpayers of the content review process and warns as well that legal fees are steep when patrons, publishers, and other advocates take legal action to prevent censorship.
The signatories attest that content reviews “create widespread confusion, fear, and operational disruption” for libraries, which have limited operations budgets. Content reviews pose “immense administrative burdens for library systems,” which sometimes close branches so that staff can manage the workload, and the process can “lead to illegal censorship” when libraries remove potentially controversial material out of an abundance of caution and a fear their funding will be taken away for noncompliance. In early November, branches of Tennessee's Rutherford County Library System announced emergency closures in order to review inventory.
Co-signatory EveryLibrary concurred in a separate statement that presidential EOs “do not apply to states and do not authorize censorship or collection audits in public libraries.” The advocacy group wrote that “public libraries cannot and must not be forced into unconstitutional censorship, vague political tests, or destabilizing operational burdens.”
EveryLibrary also published detailed guidance that expands on the legal and constitutional questions raised by Hargett’s order. According to EveryLibrary, “The Secretary of State’s interpretation is not only legally unsound, but it also undermines the Constitutional structure that protects both state autonomy and the rule of law.”
