Bill derided by authors as enabling book banning heads to Ayotte's desk

Yahoo

21-05-2025

HB 324 would require all New Hampshire school boards to adopt a complaint process that parents could use to object to obscene materials – and potentially remove them. (Photo by Dana Wormald/New Hampshire Bulletin)
If New Hampshire adopts a law to make it easier to remove books from school libraries, 'Nineteen Minutes' by Jodi Picoult could be one of them.
The 2011 novel, set in the fictional Upper Valley New Hampshire town of Sterling, depicts a deadly school shooting committed by a student who was bullied for his sexual orientation. It has been banned in more than 50 school districts; many of those removals were driven by its inclusion of LGBTQ+ characters and themes.
This year, Picoult and other authors are warning that the proposed New Hampshire bill, which is heading to Gov. Kelly Ayotte's desk, amounts to a book banning bill and should be vetoed. Those pushing for the bill say it is targeted only at obscene content with no educational value.
'We know from history what the next chapter looks like when we don't fight book bans, and we know that that is a story that does not end well,' said Picoult at a May 12 press conference hosted by the organization Authors Against Book Bans. On May 15, the Republican-led Senate voted on party lines to advance the bill, House Bill 324, to Ayotte.
HB 324 would require all New Hampshire school boards to adopt a complaint process that parents could use to object to obscene materials — and potentially remove them. Currently, school districts can choose their own policies for how to allow parents to object to materials.
Under the proposed law, parents may submit written complaints alleging that a book or other material is obscene. To qualify, the content must appeal 'to the prurient, shameful or morbid interest of minors,' and depict nudity, sexual acts, or sadomasochistic abuse in a way that is 'patently offensive to prevailing standards in the adult community with respect to what is suitable for minors.'
The material must also lack 'serious literary, scientific, medical, artistic, or political value for minors,' and be inappropriate to the age group to which it is made available. If it doesn't meet all four of those requirements, it cannot be removed.
Under the law, the school principal has 10 school days to review the material in the complaint and determine whether it violates the law; if a parent disagrees with that decision, they have 14 calendar days to appeal to the local school board. If the school board also deems the material to be appropriate, a parent can appeal one more time to the State Board of Education, a seven-member panel whose members are appointed by the governor and Executive Council; that board will have the final say on the material.
The law carries consequences for school districts and teachers who don't comply with it. School districts can be sued by the state's attorney general, Department of Education, or any person 'claiming to be aggrieved' by the district for not following the law, and educators can face discipline for violating the educator code of conduct.
Rep. Glenn Cordelli, the Tuftonboro Republican who proposed the bill, disagrees that it is meant to ban books.
'I see it more as a parents' rights bill for parents to object to materials in some schools,' Cordelli said in an interview Thursday, just before the Senate vote.
Cordelli has read on the House floor passages from some books he says should be removed, including 'Here and Queer: A Queer Girl's Guide to Life,' a 2022 advice book for teenagers, and Speak, an award-winning 1999 young adult book about a high school freshman who is raped.
Both books are present in New Hampshire school district libraries, Cordelli says.
But Picoult and a handful of other authors at the press conference said the excerpts are often taken out of the context of the bigger story that is being told.
Picoult said she respects a parent's right to read books themselves before reading them to their kids, something she did too when her children were growing up.
'But there's a colossal problem when that parent decides the book isn't right for anyone's child,' she said. 'These parents will tell you that the books are exposing kids to topics that are salacious or revolutionary. What kids are really being exposed to are lives and mindsets different from their own, which creates compassion and empathy.'
Lara Prescott, the author of the 2019 novel 'The Secrets We Kept,' about the CIA's plot to smuggle Boris Pasternak's 'Dr. Zhivago' out of the U.S.S.R., noted that her book was banned from publication in China due to a love story between two women.
'It's hard to believe we're seeing echoes of that in our own country today: teachers and librarians being criminalized for the books in their classrooms,' Picoult said at the press conference.
She added: 'I want my son to grow up exposed to all kinds of stories, perspectives, and voices,'
Picoult is a plaintiff in a 2024 lawsuit featuring authors challenging a similar law in Florida, and she said if HB 324 were signed in New Hampshire, the state could expect similar litigation.
The bill touched off heated debate on the Senate floor Thursday. Democrats said the definition went too far and could be used to apply to classic works of literature, such as Shakespeare, which sometimes includes sexual content. And Democrats said the state already has obscenity laws that make it illegal to provide pornographic materials to students; HB 324 is aimed at broader books that feature LGBTQ characters, they alleged.
Sen. David Watters, of Dover, argued the bill would allow parents who have particular beliefs about LGBTQ students or other political beliefs to remove materials that other parents might be OK with.
'It violates free speech,' Watters said. 'It violates the right of certain parents and their children to have access to materials.'
Republicans said concerns over banning Shakespeare were overblown, pointing to the four criteria that must be met, including that the material has no 'literary' or 'artistic' value.
'Shakespeare is there to stay,' said Sen. Daryl Abbas of Salem. 'I wasn't always a fan of Shakespeare, but his books are staying.'
And they said the bill is aimed at obscene material.
'We're talking about flat-out pornography and things that if I, as just a regular citizen, handed to a child, I could be arrested for,' said Sen. Victoria Sullivan of Manchester. 'And this is why it's escalated to this point.'
'All people should be represented. You know, if you want to have a book (with) two moms, two dads, great. But with 'Gender Queer' in a second grader school, and it's got pornographic drawings, and the parents find that, and they go to their school board and they read excerpts from it, that's a problem,' said Sen. Denise Ricciardi, of Bedford, referring to a book often removed from school libraries for sexual content.
The bill will make its way to Ayotte's desk in the coming weeks. At that point, she can sign it, veto it, or allow it to pass without her signature.