ACLU of Wisconsin Files Lawsuit Challenging Censorship of Gay Books

Hearing Scheduled for March 3rd

February 24, 1999

On February 16, 1999 a group of parents and students filed a lawsuit challenging the removal of books on gay themes from the Barron (WI) High School library. The American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin (ACLU/WI) has brought this lawsuit on behalf of the plaintiffs to protect the right of Barron High School students to receive information that is protected by the First Amendment. The plaintiffs' action calls the removal of the books unconstitutional and seeks their unrestricted return to the high school library shelves.

ACLU/WI Executive Director Chris Ahmuty said, "The plaintiffs and ACLU have been extremely patient with the School Board, but the District continues to engage in censorship. The District is harming its own students, both straight and gay. It must stop, even if that means a lawsuit."

This controversy started in April 1998, when the parent of a former student submitted complaint forms on four books: When Someone You Know is Gay, The Drowning of Stephan Jones, Baby Be-Bop, and Two Teenagers in Twenty. Despite a recommendation from a specially convened Reconsideration Committee, the District Administrator, Vita Sherry, decided in August 1998 to ban two of the books immediately. Ms. Sherry banned Baby Be-Bop and When Someone You Know is Gay. The complainant appealed the retention of the other two books to the School Board. At its September 21, 1998 meeting the Board banned The Drowning of Stephan Jones and Two Teenagers in Twenty. At its December 21, 1998, meeting the Board reconsidered its outright ban of the books. In December it decided to continue the ban on Baby Be-Bop and The Drowning of Stephan Jones, and it decided to temporarily return Two Teenagers in Twenty to the library shelves and indefinitely return When Someone You Know is Gay until replacements could be found.

The plaintiffs' ACLU/WI attorneys argue in the lawsuit that the School District violated its own procedure by originally allowing Superintendent Sherry to remove two books and that the Board's subsequent decisions were also unconstitutional because of the Board's improper motivation. The plaintiffs argue that the District removed the books because they did not comport with the moral and religious beliefs of Barron school officials who disapproved of the books' homosexual content.  For example, explaining her decision to ban When Someone You is Gay, Ms. Sherry wrote that "The information in Chapter 6 would, I believe, lead them [students] to think that they are free to interpret the biblical references in any way they wish. I believe this is a dangerous viewpoint, .... This viewpoint does a disservice to Barron's religious community, and I cannot support it."

Ahmuty continued, "We consider allegations regarding vulgarity in the books to be unfounded and to be a pretext for the school's questionable motivation. The record couldn't be more clear.  This is unconstitutional censorship of the most damaging kind." Ahmuty continued, "School libraries should reflect a diversity of viewpoints. As the U.S. Supreme Court has said, local school boards may not remove books from school libraries simply because they dislike the ideas contained in those books, and seek by their removal to 'prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion."  See Board of Education v. Pico, 457 U.S. 853 (1982).

The plaintiffs are three minor students and their parents, and three 18-year-old students. They are Katherine A. Christenson and her mother, Bonnie J. Christenson, Ben Wigchers and his mother Maureen Wigchers, Benjamin S. Bolopue and his mother Bonnie L. Burke, and Jolene Wigchers, Abberlyn Morris and Ryan J. Hilke. The defendants are the Barron Area School District and the Board of Education, and Vita Sherry, the District Administrator.

The plaintiffs' attorneys are ACLU/WI volunteer attorneys David Harth, Anat Hakim and Lynn Splitek from the law firm of Foley and Lardner in Madison, and the ACLU/WI Foundation's Legal Director Peter M. Koneazny in Milwaukee.

The plaintiffs filed their complaint at the federal District Court, Western District of Wisconsin,  in Madison. Federal District Court judge Barbara Crabb has received the case for consideration.

Judge Crabb scheduled a hearing on the preliminary injunction for March 3, 1999, at the Federal Courthouse in Madison.