Industry & Advocacy News

Authors Guild Files New Amicus Brief in Ongoing Fight Against Temecula Valley School District Book Ban

Book Banning

January 15, 2024

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Update, October 11, 2024: In a decisive move to protect students’ rights to read diverse books, the Authors Guild, Penguin Random House, and several other literary and First Amendment advocacy organizations have stepped up their fight against a California school district’s attempt to ban certain books. The lower court denied plaintiffs’ motion for a preliminary injunction and also denied defendants’ motion to dismiss, decisions that the parties appealed to the Courts of Appeal of the State of California.

Expanding on our prior brief to the Superior Court of the State of California, our amicus curiae brief in the case of Mae M. v. Joseph Komrosky et al, filed on October 2, 2024, explains why Resolution 21 of the Temecula Valley Unified School District is harmful and unconstitutional. Building on the earlier brief’s assertion that the ban unlawfully restricts students’ educational rights, the new filing discusses the impact of book bans on students and the development of their independent critical thinking skills (which is vital to their ability to participate in our culture and society), and the harm resulting from the nationwide increase in laws restricting the First Amendment rights of students, parents, educators, and authors. 

January 15, 2024: Authors Guild Submits Brief to Challenge Critical Race Theory Book Ban in California Court

On December 22, 2023, the Authors Guild joined Penguin Random House and several First Amendment advocacy organizations in an amicus curiae (or “friend of the court” brief) submitted to the Superior Court of the State of California in Mae M. v. Joseph Komrosky et al. The lawsuit, filed in Riverside County, was brought by the Temecula Valley Educators Association, students, parents, and individual teachers to challenge Resolution 21, a measure adopted by the Temecula Valley Unified School District’s board of trustees that bans books espousing critical race theory. The brief supports the plaintiffs’ request to preliminarily enjoin the enforcement of Resolution 21 because the ban unlawfully restricts students’ educational rights by imposing the district’s own ideological stance.

Resolution 21 is one of many recent attempts to limit the First Amendment rights of students, teachers, and authors around the country. As the amicus brief stated: “Books play a central role in educating young Americans. The School District’s actions to censor a spectrum of viewpoints from the marketplace of ideas based on subjective opinions will disparately remove historically marginalized voices from being heard. Censorship efforts like this have historically chilled speech and negatively impacted entire generations of students by stripping them of their autonomy to read important works.”

Read our brief here (PDF).