Group suing Arkansas says book ban law seeks to ‘criminalize librarians’

Plaintiffs argue new law is illegal because it is a direct attack on free speech guaranteed by the US constitution

A coalition of publishers, booksellers, librarians and readers filed a lawsuit on Friday against the Arkansas state government, over a book ban law set to go into effect in August.

Carol Coffey, president of the Arkansas Library Association and lead plaintiff, told the Guardian: “Library workers across Arkansas are rightly concerned that the overly broad edicts of Act 372 will prevent them from serving their patrons as they have always done, by providing a wide variety of materials to fill their information needs, and perhaps more importantly, materials that allow each child to see themselves in the books in their library.”