Librarian on the Verge of a Legal Breakthrough

Staff -- School Library Journal, 10/1/1999

A Louisiana librarian challenges her high school's book-selection policy

After three years of protracted litigation, Doloris Wilson, a school librarian, is close to winning a federal lawsuit against the Ouachita (LA) Parish School Board. Wilson filed the lawsuit after the school board decided to ban four books from the West Monroe High School library. A tentative settlement was reached on August 17.

Under the pending agreement, the four banned books will be returned to the library's collection and a new book-selection policy, consistent with Louisiana's guidelines for school media programs, will be developed. The offending titles were removed from the high school library after one of Wilson's colleagues, a school librarian, complained, in May 1996, about the books' sexual content. The censored titles are Everything You Need to Know About Incest (Rosen, 1992) by Karen Bornemann Spies; Everything You Need to Know About Sexual Abstinence (Rosen, 1995) by Barbara A. Moe; Gays: In or Out? The U.S. Military and Homosexuals: A Source Book (Brassey's, 1994) by Ronald Ray; and Heartbreak and Roses: Real-Life Stories of Troubled Love (Turtleback, 1996) by Janet Bode and Stan Mack.

Although Wilson's attorneys from the American Civil Liberties Union and the Louisiana Association of Educators are cautiously optimistic about the outcome, further legal action may be taken later this month if an agreement is not reached.