Plaintiffs seek permanent injunction of Arkansas’ blocked library obscenity law
The "social section" in Crawford County Library's Van Buren branch (Screenshot from court documents)
The 18 plaintiffs challenging an Arkansas law that would alter libraries’ processes for reconsidering materials asked a federal judge Wednesday to make his temporary injunction of the law permanent, according to court documents.
Sixteen of the plaintiffs sued the state and Crawford County in June over Act 372 of 2023, which would create criminal liability for librarians who distribute content that some consider “harmful to minors” and give local elected officials the final say over the availability of challenged materials.
Two residents of Crawford County, where the local library system segregated LGBTQ+ children’s books in response to public outcry, joined the suit in February.
U.S. District Judge Timothy Brooks temporarily blocked the two challenged portions of Act 372 in July, three days before the law went into effect. The case is scheduled for trial in October.
Who is challenging Act 372 in federal court?
Central Arkansas Library System (CALS)
Fayetteville Public Library
The Eureka Springs Carnegie Public Library
Garland County Library executive director Adam Webb
CALS executive director Nate Coulter
Arkansas Library Association
Advocates for All Arkansas Libraries
The Authors Guild, the oldest and largest professional organization for writers in the United States
The American Booksellers’ Association
The Association of American Publishers
The Freedom to Read Foundation
The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund
WordsWorth Books, an independent bookstore in Little Rock
Pearl’s Books, an independent bookstore in Fayetteville
Olivia Farrell, an adult CALS patron
Leta Caplinger, an adult Crawford County Library System patron
Madeline Partain, a 17-year-old Crawford County Library System patron
Miel Partain, Madeline’s mother
Hayden Kirby, an 18-year-old CALS patron, and her mother, Jennie Kirby, were initially plaintiffs in the case. They withdrew from the lawsuit earlier this year because Hayden is no longer a minor.
The blocked Section 1 of Act 372 would have put librarians at risk of being charged with a Class D felony for “knowingly” distributing “obscene” material or informing others of how to obtain it. Knowingly possessing obscene material would risk conviction of a Class A misdemeanor.
The other blocked provision, Section 5, would have given city and county elected officials the final say over whether a book challenged on the basis of appropriateness can remain on library shelves or should be relocated to a place minors cannot access.
Brooks wrote in his 49-page ruling that the two sections were too vague and could lead to arbitrary interpretation and “content-based restrictions” that violate the First Amendment.
A 2003 state law banned displays of reading material deemed “harmful to minors,” a phrase included in Act 372. Then-Gov. Mike Huckabee signed the 2003 law; his daughter, Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, signed Act 372 in March 2023.
The Arkansas Supreme Court struck down the previous law in 2004, partially basing the ruling on the fact that the law applied broadly and equally to all minors regardless of age and maturity, and Brooks upheld this precedent in his ruling.
The plaintiffs reiterated many of Brooks’ statements in Wednesday’s motion and in a brief supporting the motion. They said a permanent injunction via summary judgment is appropriate because “there are no factual issues that prevent final resolution of this matter.”
“Sections 1 and 5 restrain public libraries and booksellers in Arkansas from making available constitutionally protected books and other materials to their patrons and customers, which burdens the rights of those individuals to read and to receive information,” the motion states.
The motion included several declarations of support from librarians throughout the state who are not plaintiffs, including Patty Hector, whom the Saline County judge fired from running the local library system after she refused to relocate books about LGBTQ+ topics and sex education at the county quorum court’s request last year.
The case’s defendants are the prosecuting attorneys in each of Arkansas’ 28 judicial districts, as well as Crawford County and its county judge, Chris Keith.
On Wednesday, the attorneys representing the Crawford County defendants filed a motion asking Brooks to dismiss the case against them alone. They filed a similar motion in July, claiming the plaintiffs did not have standing to sue them. Brooks denied the July motion, ruling that the county and its county judge will be responsible for implementing Act 372 if it goes into effect and if appeals of challenged material reach the county government.
Wednesday’s motion repeated the defendants’ assertion that the plaintiffs could not sue them, especially since “plaintiffs seek a statewide remedy” and “Crawford County is not tasked with statewide enforcement of Act 372,” according to court documents.
The Crawford County Library System created “social sections” of LGBTQ+ children’s books at its five branches several weeks before Act 372 was filed as a bill in the Arkansas Legislature, so the two issues are unrelated and the plaintiffs’ case against Crawford County is moot, the motion states.
Attorney General Tim Griffin’s office, representing the state defendants, filed a brief Wednesday in support of the Crawford County defendants’ motion.
The other suit against Crawford County
The library system’s then-director, Deidre Grzymala, “reached a compromise” with the county quorum court at its December 2022 meeting after several residents complained about the LGBTQ+ children’s books, according to a transcription from the January 2023 meeting of the system’s governing board, included in a separate lawsuit filed last year.
The three plaintiffs are suing not only Crawford County and Keith but also the library board and Eva White, the system’s former director who reassumed the role on an interim basis from February 2023, upon Grzymala’s resignation, to January 2024.
In their May 2023 complaint, the three mothers of minor children who are library patrons called the social sections “unlawful censorship” based on “an extreme and malevolent view of the Bible.” This violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, which prohibits government entities from favoring an establishment of religion, the plaintiffs claimed.
In August, they asserted that Brooks’ temporary injunction of the two challenged sections of Act 372 supported their case. U.S. District Judge P.K. Holmes denied their request for a temporary injunction in September.
On Thursday, Holmes denied the two defendants’ request to dismiss the case. The defendants again asserted that the plaintiffs had no standing to sue, but Holmes wrote that the plaintiffs have established their standing on First Amendment grounds.
Holmes also denied the defendants’ motion to dismiss an expert witness called by the plaintiffs, library and information science professor Dr. Daniel Joudrey. The defendants claimed Joudrey’s expertise on library cataloging would be unhelpful, but Holmes disagreed.
“The central issues and disputes in this case concern Defendants’ library cataloging practices, whether or to what extent those practices interfere with Plaintiffs’ First Amendment right to access information, and how (if at all) the Court should order Defendants to modify those library cataloging practices,” Holmes wrote.
Additionally, Holmes granted a motion from the plaintiffs to supplement their case with the Crawford County Library’s material selection policy.
The policy in question, according to court documents, includes “the Library Bill of Rights of the American Library Association,” which states: “A person’s right to use a library should not be denied or abridged because of origin, age, background, or views.”
Far-right conservatives nationwide have claimed this statement is proof that the ALA believes in forcing content about sexual activity and LGBTQ+ topics onto children.
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