Booksellers Sue TX Over Law Mandating Book Ratings

The Texas Tribune reports:

A coalition of Texas bookstores and national bookseller associations filed suit on Tuesday over House Bill 900, which aims to ban sexually explicit material from school libraries. HB 900 passed in the Legislature and was signed by Gov. Greg Abbott earlier this year. It is set to go into effect on Sept. 1 and requires book vendors to assign ratings to books based on the presence of depictions or references to sex.

In school libraries, books with a “sexually explicit” rating will be removed from bookshelves. And students who want to check out school library books deemed “sexually relevant” would have to get parental permission first. Plaintiffs in the suit include two Texas bookstores, Austin’s BookPeople and West Houston’s Blue Willow Bookshop, as well as the American Booksellers Association, the Association of American Publishers, the Authors Guild and the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund.

Read the full article.

The plaintiffs allege that the law is vague, overbroad, and violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments. Additionally, they note that assessing millions of books to apply ratings is simply impossible for companies to do. The bill’s author, Rep. Jared Patterson [photo], previously appeared here for his “Don’t Say Gay” and anti-drag bills.

Texas bookstores and national bookseller associations file a lawsuit over House Bill 900, which requires book vendors to rate books on appropriateness and bans “sexually explicit” material from school libraries. https://t.co/Tfy3Bqlcyy

— Texas Tribune (@TexasTribune) July 25, 2023