Penguin Random House, alongside Hachette Book Group, HarperCollins Publishers, Macmillan Publishers, Simon & Schuster, and Sourcebooks, has filed a lawsuit challenging the book removal provisions of HB 710, a law that restricts books in both public and school libraries in Idaho and was enacted into law on July 1, 2024
HB 710 forbids anyone under age 18 from accessing library books that contain “sexual content,” regardless of the work’s literary or educational merit. HB710’s definition of sexual content is comprehensive, vague, and overtly discriminatory.
The ban extends to classics such as Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five, Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye, Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, and Maya Angelou’s I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, and bestsellers including Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin, I’ll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson, The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky, and Forever. . . by Judy Blume. HB 710 also impacts nonfiction, imperiling access to factual resources such as “What’s Happening to My Body?” Book for Girls by Lynda Madaras, and erasing history by removing books about the Holocaust and other historical events. The law makes no distinction between infants and 17-year-olds—books are classified as harmful regardless of the age and maturity level of the child.
According to Michael Grygiel, an adjunct faculty member with Cornell Law School’s First Amendment Clinic, “HB 710 has resulted in the removal of classic works of literature from library shelves across Idaho as libraries attempt to protect themselves from liability under the law’s vague and overbroad provisions. This type of self-censorship is inimical to First Amendment liberties and has suffocated the right of Idaho students to read books deemed appropriate for their age and maturity level by their parents. In short, the law is an affront to the Constitution. It is a privilege to represent the publishers, authors, libraries, parents, and students who have joined this lawsuit to challenge HB 710 and stand up for the First Amendment rights of all Idaho citizens.”
