SAN ANTONIO – A new Texas law is causing censorship and financial concerns among bookstores in San Antonio and across Texas.
The legislation, known as House Bill 900, has been signed by Gov. Greg Abbott and is set to take effect Sept. 1. But a group of Texas bookstores is asking a federal judge in Austin to keep the law off the books.
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HB 900 will require vendors that sell books to public school libraries to assign ratings — “sexually explicit material, sexually relevant material, or no rating” — to all books before they can be distributed. Those ratings must also be submitted for review to the Texas Education Agency (TEA), which has the authority to overrule the vendor’s rating “without explanation.”
Book vendors who do not follow the requirements would be banned from selling material to public schools under the new law, which Dallas Republican state Rep. Jared Patterson authored.
The lawsuit was filed in late June by BookPeople in Austin, BlueWillow Bookshop in Houston and three national associations. It lists the top executives in the Texas State Library and Archives Commission, the Texas Board of Education and the TEA as defendants.
The plaintiffs claim that the law will establish “an unconstitutional—and unprecedented—state-wide book licensing regime that compels private companies and individuals to adopt the State’s messages or face government punishment.”
Booksellers would need to submit lists of books currently in their possession — and sold to schools in the past — that contain sexually explicit material to the TEA no later than April 1, 2024, the law reads.
“The Book Ban unconstitutionally burdens Plaintiffs by requiring them to search past records to find the entire universe of library materials they ever sold to any Texas public school and review and rate those materials based on the Book Ban’s vague definitions,” the lawsuit reads.
The rating system booksellers would need to follow is “vague” and “subjective,” the plaintiffs said.
San Antonio bookstores: ‘Potential impact is overwhelming’
One of the associations listed as a plaintiff in the lawsuit is the American Booksellers Association (ABA), which has 156 members in Texas who are vendors to school districts subject to the law, including the Twig, Nowhere Bookshop and San Antonio’s five Half Price Books locations.
KSAT interviewed representatives from several local bookstores about the legislation and lawsuit.
Elizabeth Jordan, the general manager of Nowhere Bookshop, located in Alamo Heights, questioned why booksellers are required to generate the ratings and not teachers or librarians.
“Putting aside that the standards in the law are vague, we, as booksellers, are not qualified to decide on what makes for appropriate reading materials for local school children,” Jordan wrote in a statement to KSAT. “That work is best left to trained professionals like teachers and librarians.”
“The potential impact is overwhelming,” Claudia Maceo, manager of The Twig Book Shop at Pearl, wrote in a statement to KSAT. “That we are to be held accountable for books sold in the past is incomprehensible.”
In a written statement, Kathy Doyle Thomas, president of Half Price Books, reiterated the company’s stance on the legislation.
“Half Price Books will not stand for a law in Texas that would require our booksellers to participate in the censorship of books,” she said. “Not only is the law unconstitutional, it is unrealistic and impossible for any bookseller to read and rate every book we might sell to a school or library. The ‘contemporary community standard’ rating criteria is vague and completely subjective to each person.”
Jordan said the law is untenable.
“We cannot possibly read and rate every book we sell (or have sold in the past),” Jordan said. “We cannot know which books being purchased in our store or at our many offsite events are intended for classroom or public school library use.”
What is sexually explicit material?
The law defines sexually explicit material as “any communication, language, or material, including a written description, illustration, photographic image, video image, or audio file ... that describes, depicts, or portrays sexual conduct ... in a way that is patently offensive.”
It provides an exception related to library material related to the curriculum that the state has already approved.
Supporters of HB 900, including Cindi Castilla, president of the conservative policy group Texas Eagle Forum, say the law will protect children.
“Our schools must not sexualize our students or provide them pornographic reading material or introduce them to inappropriate materials that distract from the educational goals we’ve set as a state,” she said in The Texas Tribune’s report.
Working with schools
Both Nowhere and Twig often see their books used in schools by teachers and librarians.
The new legislation works against that partnership, they say.
“The librarians are heading back to school now,” Maceo said. “Many of them have already set up their book fairs for this school year. We anticipate hearing from them about any restrictions they may have to impose.”
While Nowhere is a relatively new bookstore, their plans to get more involved with area schools have since been halted due to the new law.
“I had envisioned growing into more author events and possibly book fairs at local schools,” Jordan said. “We’re putting those plans on hold as we wait for clarification on the law.”