Illinois lawmakers are voting to prevent books from being banned at public and school libraries.
The legislation denies funding to libraries that toss out certain books. It was spearheaded by Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias who says it’s needed to fight back against extremist groups that challenged 69 different titles last year in Illinois.
“Is it any surprise that these objectionable books are predominately about people of color, LGBTQ, or other ethnicities. They are books containing information about history, race, gender or social justice. We are reaching the point where hate speech is protected but the simple act of reading a book is a restricted right.”
Among the 19 senators voting against the bill was Republican Jason Plummer who sees the measure as another move to strip away local control.
“It deprives local tax payers of the vary revenue that they spend to support their local schools and libraries. And it allows unidentified and unelected random people at some organization at the national level to ban books, to set local policy and to usurp authority of local elected officials that our constituents voted into their position to make decisions on their behalf.”
Plummer called the bill a very dangerous path to take. “
State Senator Terry Bryant notes we already have two Bill of Rights, one within the Illinois Constitution and another in the U.S. Constitution. She says these Bills of Rights as well as the entire state and federal Constitutions are the codes of conduct that govern all elected Illinois officials, including locally elected library boards. Bryant says there is absolutely no reason for Illinois libraries to be forced to adopt a so-called ‘Library Bill of Rights’ created by a little-known national organization that is not elected or beholden to the people of our state. She adds it’s wrong to threaten the funding of local libraries if they disagree.
The bill earlier passed the house and is now on the Governor’s desk.
