An amended version of House Bill 1239, Bethany Soye’s Librarian lock-up bill was passed in the Senate after State Senator David Wheeler proposed that sanity be brought back into the discussion, and Rep. Ismay’s desired image of librarians being hauled off in handcuffs was taken off the table.
Senator Wheeler proposed an amendment which brings discussions over naughty books back into the civil arena, versus frog-walking librarians off to jail..
No more jail for Librarians amendment HB1239 by Pat Powers on Scribd
And thankfully, after an amazing amount of pearl clutching, the amendment passed 18-16, with the bill passing handily after that.
Opponents mentioned changing the bill in the concurrence process.. so this may not be over.
Representative Ismay stands ready.
“Let your plans be dark and impenetrable as night, and when you move, fall like a thunderbolt.”
― Sun Tzu, The Art of War
Representative Ismay stands confused, eating and waiting for someone to tell him what to think.
“Let your mind be empty and impenetrable by the light of reason and your appetite be insatiable, so that when you move, your footsteps are heard like thunder.”
Dumb Zoo, The Art of Ismay
Worthless bill in the first place.
Wheeler just put lipstick on a pig.
Senator Wheeler didn’t pick the animal. He just worked, successfully , to make the Soye beast less ugly
He could have worked to kill it but that would have taken more skill. This was the easier path for him but a worse path for our state.
“easier path” – its about counting to 18. If you have’m you can do it, and if you don’t, you can’t. He worked with what the voters gave him. Was your senator part of the solution or the problem?
Just start serving alcohol in the libraries and make them for adults only.
Wine goes well with books anyway
Pearl clutcher. Like the high schoolers who testified that they are so afraid to read a book, because it might be a “bad” book. Shut the front door.
If anyone has raised children, you understand that you raise them to make decisions. Because options are available around every corner. Raise them right now, and they will continue to make those decisions after their 18th birthday.
Agreed. Blanc’s testimony about the girl afraid to read books was embarrassingly ridiculous.
He’s embarrassingly ridiculous and must have missed that “shall not lie” part at seminary. Simply makes stuff up every time he opens his mouth. A less than serious man and a horrible legislator.
Blanc loves to hear himself speak. Is he another California import who came to South Dakota to seek their FreeDumb? Another Black Hills nutball.
I’m going to put aside what I think about the bill for purposes of this comment.
Speaking as a former City Councilor, the amended version does create some unique challenges for local governments. It will put governing boards like school boards, county commissions, and city council’s in a very unique, and actually unenviable position.
Each city is potentially different, but I’ll speak to it from the City of Sioux Falls perspective. With the strong mayor form of government, the Mayor handles the day to day operations of the city, and city employees report to the Mayor. City Council is barred by charter from giving any orders to city employees. I, nor the Council as a whole could hire/fire or sanction a city employee directly (excluding the couple we had on our staff). We had no authority to hire/fire library staff. We only had advice and consent over the library director when he/she was appointed, and we have no authority to fire the director. At the end of the day, the day to day operations, and employee management sits with the Mayor, period. The Council passes laws and holds the purse strings. The Council can pass certain ordinances, and can fund/defund. There were a number of things that based on charter we could be challenged as it related to passing city ordinances even if it got too “operational” and deemed outside of our authority. We appropriated money to buy books, but we couldn’t decide what books to buy. We authorize a total budget for payroll for departments, but they decide who to hire, and what position to have them in. The library director and the library board create their policies. All of this simply to say I won’t envy sitting local government elected officials like City Councilors if this passes and becomes law, who will find themselves in the book review business. Presumably if you are going to judge a book as to whether it passes the 3 prong Miller test, codified in SDCL 22-24-27, you really would need to read the whole book. Part time councilors, county commissioners, or school board members could find themselves spending nights reading young adult books. Something I bet they thought they’d never have to do. And ironically, at least in Sioux Falls, the one elected official who could hold the library directly accountable, if there is an issue, the Mayor, wouldn’t have to take a stand publicly, and likely would not have to even cast a vote. The Mayor only votes if there is a tie. As Councilors we sometimes found ourselves taking fire for a policy decision the city (read: Mayor) made and having to vote on it, or address the consequences of it from the citizens, while the Mayor got to simply sit there, say nothing, and not have to vote one way or the other.
I can also imagine more spectacles like we saw months ago in Sioux Falls with graphic passages being read at a City Council meeting and the Councilors squirming in their chairs. The city decided to attach a advisory on the recording warning about the content being potentially offensive, which does raise the question about whether the books in question should be, or are in the right location, in the library (I don’t know where each of these are or if they still are at the library so I’m not passing judgement). But in adding that advisory, the city really kind of created its own mess I think.
Ultimately, if it does pass, local units of government are going to need to figure out how to manage this. On the potential upside, if these are coming to public meetings repeatedly, it could lead to action, if there is in fact an issue not being addressed. Accountable government, in general, is a good thing. City Councils and school boards and potentially county commissions will need to make sure that the review process before it gets to them is meaningful and robust unless they want to be reading lots of books and making some really uncomfortable decisions. If I were still a Councilor in Sioux Falls, I’d be looking at whatever ordinance I could bring forward that would not conflict with state law that would ensure that any decision of the library has to be reviewed by, and approved by the Mayor ultimately, so that the Mayor, the one elected official who can control the library and its staff, has to take a position, whatever it is. City Councils and part time governing bodies shouldn’t have to take a beating if the Mayor won’t stand behind the decision.
It’s an interesting dynamic because it will put part time elected bodies in the position of having to make decisions that are really not in their purvue, the day to day decisions that full time staff and Mayor’s should be making.
I suspect these votes would be a major no win decision for part-time elected officials. After hearing graphic passages read, they would have to either vote up or down on whether it is obscenity or not. To be clear, that’s part of being elected, to make tough decisions, knowing that some people are going to be mad at you. That’s part of the gig. But I would be frustrated if I was having to make these judgement calls, potentially vetoing or approving decisions of staff I can’t ultimately control, at least directly. A council would be forced into some blunt instrument type threats or actions, like defunding or blanket ordinances that could have some far reaching consequences, and ironically would be probably stepping out of our legislative role, and more into the operational day to day role (although sometimes that line wasn’t bright anyway).
Finally, the 3 prong test of obscenity in the Miller test, and repeated in state law, tells me that most of what would come to a governing body, if you followed that test, would not be obscenity, even if there are some pretty graphic passages. I say that not being a lawyer and without reading specific cases testing this. Those 3 prongs also likely mean, I assume, that most of the fears about librarians actually being arrested wouldn’t happen, unless a state’s attorney was really aggressive. From the state law:
“Obscene material,” material:
(a) The dominant theme of which, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest;
(b) Which is patently offensive because it affronts contemporary community standards relating to the description or representation of sado-masochistic abuse or sexual conduct; and
(c) Lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.
Many of the passages I have read or heard would pass the (b) test. But you have to pass all 3. That’s where it gets murky. Is the “dominant theme” taken as a whole appealing to a purient interest? What if its a novel, with a theme about teenagers growing up, that is 200 pages long, with various themes and characters, but happens to contain a 5 page sex scene? Does that pass (a) where its “dominant theme” is appealing to purient interests? Maybe/probably not. And (c) lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value. I suspect most novels/fiction/artwork is going to pass that test.
If a library has a collection of stories from Penthouse forum that’s probably going to fail the test, but I’ll go out on a limb and assume that’s not in the library. All that to say, there are things that are potentially very offensive, at least in part, and some things for which many of us, myself included, would not want our children reading, and we may even want it not available at all (or at least restricted) in the library, but it very well may not be ‘obscene’ by the legal standard. Any governing body is going to be getting confidential executive session discussions with legal counsel about what ‘obscenity’ is and they will be faced with trying to follow the law and potentially defending some pretty graphic passages in an otherwise literary work or potentially taking too much off the shelves, maybe.
Long story short, I think this may just end up passing a really hot potato down from the state legislature to local elected bodies who will potentially not be entirely equipped to address the issue either. I definitely sense some feel like they don’t have a meaningful process to appeal. I can’t say if they do or they don’t, and I’m sure it differs based on each individual library system. It’s also possible in any given case, someone may not like the decision that was made, but they were given a meaningful review. That is very different than not having any review. Interested to see what happens with this, but I suspect city attorneys and local elected bodies may find themselves in a very interesting predicament if this becomes law as written.
That was not a long story short.