Banned books back in circulation in Llano
Four of the 12 books listed in a civil lawsuit against Llano County remained available for checkout in the Llano County Library as of Monday, April 3. The other eight were checked out as soon as they were replaced on the shelves on Friday, March 31, as per the orders of a U.S. District judge in a preliminary injunction issued Thursday, March 30. Staff photo by Dakota Morrissiey
Twelve books were returned to the shelves and the digital catalog at the Llano County Library by 3:30 p.m. Friday, March 31, as ordered in a preliminary injunction by U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas, Austin Division.
Only four were remaining as of Monday morning, April 3. Head librarian Amber Milum, a defendant in the case of Green et. al. v. Llano County et. al. said that the other eight were checked out almost immediately.
“After I received the order, I got all of the books ready, put them back in the system, put the stickers on them,” she said. “I believe we had until around 3:30 p.m. (March 31) to get them back on the shelves. I came, located the shelf in the fiction section, put them back on there for them to be ready to check out if anybody wanted to.”
The order was issued on Thursday, March 30, giving defendants 24 hours to return the books, which were being kept behind the counter and were not listed in the county library system’s catalog while the lawsuit was pending. They were available for checkout if the library patron knew to ask for any of them specifically. The suit was filed on April 25, 2022. The motion for injunction was filed on May 9, 2022.
Pitman issued the order after two days of testimony during preliminary hearings on Oct. 28 and Oct. 31 in Austin.
On Friday, plaintiff Leila Little checked out four of the books involved in the lawsuit: “In the Night Kitchen” by Maurice Sendak, “My Butt is So Noisy!” by Dawn McMillian; “Freddie the Farting Snowman” by Jane Bexley, and “Gabi, a Girl in Pieces” by Isabel Quintero.
“I was very happy to check out several books on Friday,” she said, naming the books to DailyTrib.com. “I read them to my children over the weekend.”
Milam told DailyTrib.com that several plaintiffs visited the library just after 2 p.m. on Friday, an hour and a half before the 3:30 p.m. deadline to put the books back in circulation.
The books were placed together on a shelf rather than intermingled with the rest of the library’s inventory using the Dewey Decimal system for nonfiction and the author’s last name for fiction. She grouped them, she said, because they would be easier to find and she expected patrons would be looking for them to check out.
The defendants’ attorney, Jonathan Mitchell of Mitchell Law Firm in Austin, filed an appeal in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit on the same day the judge’s order was issued. Because no stay was filed, the injunction order had to be followed.
(Additional reporting by Dakota Morrissiey)
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Cheers for the resumption of printed freedom. The Texas Governors’ cult has been fairly put back where it belongs, on the shelf.