We want to address elected officials who are elected by popular vote to represent the will of their constituents doing things that are decidedly unpopular and, in some cases, against the will of their constituents
A popular, but disingenuous talking point regarding the American political system is ‘we don’t live in a democracy, we live in a republic.’ And to a degree, this is true. The United States does not operate by direct democracy: we elect officials to represent us and make decisions on our behalf.
Of course, those officials are elected by direct democracy, so it is difficult to discern exactly why the hair splitting over ‘are we a democracy or a republic’. In both cases, local and state officials are elected by popular vote.
Why the civics lesson? Because we want to address elected officials who are elected by popular vote to represent the will of their constituents doing things that are decidedly unpopular and, in some cases, against the will of their constituents.
We’re talking about school board members who ban books.
There is plenty of data that shows people are largely opposed to book bans or the broad removal of books from libraries and schools to comport with the extreme ideology of a few. In fact, studies have shown that 92% of parents agree with the phrase, ‘I should be allowed to decide what my child can and cannot read.’ It’s a fundamental liberty of being a parent.
Yet, counties in Florida increasingly continue to ban books at an alarming rate. In a recent case from Brevard County, books were banned against the recommendation of a review committee and against the popular will of the people who lived there.
Let’s take a look at what happened.
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At the root of the bans in question were three books: People Kill People by Ellen Hopkins, Damsel by E.K. Arnold, and Sasaki and Miyano by Shou Harusono. All three books had been challenged for removal from school libraries, and the county decided to enter them into a formal review process. The district review committee, made up of board-appointed parents, read the books and submitted a recommendation on whether they should be retained.
This part is very important. It must be understood that the school board majority in Brevard is hostile to retaining books. They have shown a deference to removing them from school shelves. This board hand-picked a review committee that they felt assured would follow their beliefs.
In short: we can reasonably assume, based on the ideologies of the board members in Brevard, that the review committee that they assembled (hand-picked!) should have overwhelmingly voted to ban the books.
But guess what? After reading and discussing them, the review committee issued a surprising recommendation.
They recommended two of the books be retained.
Ultimately, Damsel was recommended for removal. But Sasaki and Miyano was recommended for full retention, and People Kill People was recommended to remain on High School shelves.
The school board’s chosen committee said, ‘we don’t think these books should be banned.’
Now, guess what the school board did?
Banned them anyway.
AGAINST the recommendations of their review committee, the Brevard School Board majority voted to remove all three books, strictly on ideological lines.
Not only does this go against the popular will and the recommendation of the committee they assembled, it is constitutionally questionable! And the Board themselves knew this! They went out of their way to ask their attorney, Paul Gibbs, if banning books that did not actually violate state statute would leave them open to litigation. He responded with one word.
Yes.
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This is not the first time a school board has taken action like this, either. Ban This Book, a book we wrote about in a recent article, was, in fact, banned from Indian River County, again on strictly ideological lines. The book itself does not violate state law, but the Indian River Board majority banned it anyway because they did not like the idea of it.
For the record, their School Board attorney told them they were leaving themselves open to litigation in that case as well.
And how does all this relate to our civics discussion earlier?
Because the people of Indian River have spoken, and they have let their feelings on those board members who ban books be known. In a recent election, one of the board members who was only recently appointed to the Board by Governor DeSantis was voted OUT after they decided to vote to ban Ban This Book against recommendations. Another Board Member was also up for re-election; however, she voted in line with the committee’s recommendation and voted to keep the book - a decision that helped her retain the trust of voters and her seat.
The person who wanted to ban books got voted out. The person who wanted to keep the book stayed.
This should have been a loud and clear message to school boards across the state.
If you ban books, you will get voted out. Yet, one Brevard Board Member in a tight runoff election still voted against the district review committee based on purely ideological reasons.
It is NOT the will of the constituents to have books restricted from schools. It is NOT the will of the people to have educational opportunities taken away from their students. It is NOT the will of the majority to ban books.
Quite the opposite, in fact.
We elect people to represent us and make decisions on our behalf. When those representatives act undemocratically and against the wishes of those who put them into power, we have a choice.
Vote them out.
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