Michigan Democrats introduced two bills in the House last week to codify how residents can ask libraries to remove material from their shelves.
The bills come in response to a recent uptick in attempts to ban books or other material from public libraries, said Debbie Mikula, the executive director of the Michigan Library Association.
“Censorship, it's not new,” she said. “But three years ago, we were starting to see a pretty large, pretty significant increase in book banning, across the country and here in Michigan.” Requests to ban books started to rise in 2021, according to the American Library Association.
Municipalities like cities and townships run libraries, but advocates want a statewide structure for responding to requests to remove materials from circulation. That structure will give librarians much-needed tools, sponsor Rep. Veronica Paiz (D-Harper Woods) said.
“I wanted something that would address policy for libraries and that would protect librarians and employees at the library,” Paiz said. She sponsored HB 6034, which applies to public libraries. Rep. Carol Glanville (D-Walker) sponsored HB 6035, its district library twin.
The bills are identical except for which library systems they would govern. They do not include libraries in public schools. The Michigan Library Association helped draft the bills and is “very supportive” of them, Mikula said.
The legislation would create standards for both selecting new material and withdrawing already owned material from the library. It would establish a process for residents to request that a library reconsider materials it possesses.
That includes setting baseline conditions for those requests to be considered at all. Anyone challenging library material would have to review it first. That means reading the book or watching the movie they want the library to remove.
The bills would also limit requests to residents within a library's service area.
“You really want to know that your city is being represented by your residents,” Paiz said. “Why should anybody from outside come in to tell you how you can get your information or what information is available to you or for you?”
That provision is in the legislation because past requests have come from people who don’t live near or use a library, Mikula said.
“What we were seeing [was] people from outside of their districts come in and challenge books,” she said. Book challenges have become easier than before COVID, in part because conservative activist groups like Moms for Liberty distribute online lists of books they consider objectionable.
Requests couldn’t be based on subject matter or viewpoint of the material, according to the bills. They also can’t be based on a variety of personal characteristics of the author or subject matter, including sexual orientation, gender identity, and race, among others.
That's an effort at applying additional protections for materials that are the most frequent targets of book bans, according to the American Library Association.
“It offers the same protections that you would get under the Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act,” Paiz said, referring to Michigan's civil rights and anti-discrimination law.
That includes the right to free speech, Mikula said.
“We understand we're living in tumultuous times,” she said. “We want to make sure that every individual has their First Amendment rights.”
