Elizabeth School District loses fight to ban books, ordered to return books

A U.S. District Court Judge has dismissed a motion to end the legal proceedings in a lawsuit over book bans and removals in Colorado’s Elizabeth School District. The motion filed by the district just south of metro Denver this spring was another effort to keep 19 books — primarily by or about LGBTQ people, people of color, or both — out of school libraries. 

The fight began last December when the American Civil Liberties Union sued the 2,600-student district in federal court following the book's removal from school shelves. The plaintiffs, including two students and a chapter of the NAACP, argued the bans were a violation of federal and state free speech protections. 

During legal proceedings, Dan Snowberger, the superintendent of schools at the district, maintained the books were removed for inappropriate content. They included titles like “The Kite Runner” and “The Perks of Being a Wallflower.” 

Over the course of months, the district and the ACLU volleyed legal pursuits back and forth, which led a judge to rule the district was in the wrong. The most recent motion was a final effort by the district to stop that ruling. But, now that it’s been dismissed, the district will have to put the books back. 

“We're very pleased that the court essentially saw it our way,” said legal director for the ACLU of Colorado Tim Mcdonald. “The district court's order to put the books back on the shelves and to keep the board's political views out of the book business is now in effect.”

But how and when the books will end up back in Elizabeth libraries remains to be seen since the district discarded the original copies. 

Wheeler Trigg O'Donnell, a law firm working with the ACLU, did donate the books after learning they’d been discarded, but at last check, the district had rejected the gift. 

“Governments should not be in the business of making decisions about what books are available to kids based on their political viewpoints,” Mcdonald said. “Kids need diversity of books, diversity of viewpoints, all kinds of authors on all kinds of subjects. This is a major victory for the students of Elizabeth and all Coloradans.”

CPR News reached out to the school district for comment on the motion and to learn its plan for returning the books but has not yet heard back. 

Mcdonald believes this ruling will have a wider impact across the country. “We've seen an increased desire of governments and school boards to engage in book banning, and we hope that this case will show them, stop banning books, let the kids choose what they want to read and keep your politics out of that aspect of the educational environment,” he said. 

This story includes reporting from Chalkbeat