TX Librarian Wins Free Speech Award

Williams insisted upon a formal review of Robie Harris's It's Perfectly Normal (1994) and It's So Amazing (1999, both Candlewick) last October, after County Judge Alan B. Sadler pulled the books from library shelves following complaints that they promoted homosexuality (see November 2002, News , p. 18). Sadler had acted without having read the books and, according to PEN, disregarded established procedures for challenging materials.

Williams also made sure there was a fair hearing—she coordinated changes in the review committee to include five citizens and provided committee members with all the necessary background information. PEN says Williams eloquently opposed censorship in public meetings and in dealings with the press, all in the face of personal threats and an organized campaign by Bill Craft, a local community member who demanded that she be fired and that the Montgomery County Library withdraw from the American Library Association.

Pat Schroeder, president of the Association of American Publishers, says, "Librarians like Jerilynn Williams are on the frontlines of censorship battles every day. Her actions are doubly impressive because her fight to keep books on the shelves was carried on even as she sought needed library funding."

The PEN's First Amendment Award was established in 1993 by actor Paul Newman and author A. E. Hotchner to honor U.S. residents who fight courageously, despite adversity, to safeguard the First Amendment right to freedom of expression as it applies to the written word.