Opinion ID: 78271
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: A Dangerous Precedent

Text: The majority concludes that the book is inaccurate because of what it does not say, in that it leaves out the horrors of the Castro regime. [Majority Opinion at 1211.] Opening the door to the majority's interpretation of inaccuracy would lead to a host of challenges. [June Transcript, 34:4-34:11 (School Board member Greer pointing out that if the School Board adopts this standard then next week we will have another complaint about another book from another group, and if this standard is applied, we will go through almost every book in our system with legitimate objections that people can raise about the omissions from their point of view of the content of those materials).] For example, a reference book for children about cars and trucks would be inaccurate without information about how their emissions contribute to global warming. Brief for American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression et al. as Amici Curiae Supporting Appellees at 18, ACLU v. Miami-Dade County School Board, No. 06-14633 (11th Cir. Nov. 22, 2006). The sanctioned banning of a simple book like this would be logically supported by a finding that age-appropriate, politically neutral texts are rendered inaccurate by their omission of information that would express a particular political viewpoint. I am also troubled by the majority's discussion about how the book was not being banned ... [but rather] removed from a school's library shelves. [Majority Opinion at 1217.] The majority argues that because the book was removed from a school's library shelves, but could still be found in other public libraries in the area and was available for purchase, the booked was not banned. I disagree. At the outset, I note that our argument here is largely semanticalwhat the majority calls removal I call banning. No matter what we call it, I would still find that the record supports that the School Board's removal/banning violated the First Amendment. Nevertheless, the majority's definition of banning does not comport with the dictionary definition. According to Webster's New Twentieth Century Dictionary, ban means simply to prohibit or to forbid. WEBSTER'S NEW TWENTIETH CENTURY DICTIONARY 144-45 (1976). According to Black's Law Dictionary, it means to prohibit, especially by legal means. BLACK'S LAW DICTIONARY 139 (7th ed.1999). This is precisely what the Miami-Dade School Board did when it passed a resolution to prohibit, by legal means, public school libraries from carrying Vamos a Cuba. [8] The School Board prohibited even the voluntary consideration of the book in schools. This book was not a part of the curriculum or required readingit was a library book. The dictionary does not require, as the majority does, that one must be prohibited from having a book altogether for that book to be banned. [9] Moreover, the majority's definition of the word does not comport with the common usage of the word. Indeed, it does not comport with our own Circuit's usage of the word. See Virgil v. Sch. Bd. of Columbia County, 862 F.2d 1517, 1525 (11th Cir.1989) (suggesting that a book is banned if it is not available in a school library). [10] See also Scott v. Sch. Bd. of Alachua County, 324 F.3d 1246, 1247-49 (11th Cir.2003) (per curiam) (calling school administrators' prohibition of the display of Confederate flags on school grounds banning, even though the prohibition does not apply elsewhere); Denno ex rel. Denno v. Sch. Bd. of Volusia County, 218 F.3d 1267, 1277-78 (11th Cir.2000) (calling a prohibition of Confederate flags on school grounds, and not elsewhere, a ban). Similarly, other courts define the word ban the way that I have. See, e.g., B.W.A. v. Farmington R-7 Sch. Dist., No. 07-3099, at , , 2009 WL 211934, 554 F.3d 734, 736-37 (8th Cir. filed Jan. 30, 2009) (calling a school board's prohibition against depicting the Confederate flag on clothing in schools banning); Barr v. Lafon, 538 F.3d 554, 557-77 (6th Cir.2008) (calling the prohibition against wearing clothing displaying the Confederate flag banning, even though the students were not prohibited from wearing that clothing outside of school); Sypniewski v. Warren Hills Reg'l Bd. of Educ., 307 F.3d 243, 248-63 (3d Cir.2002) (calling the prohibition against wearing or possessing items depicting racial hatred a ban, even though those items were not prohibited outside of the schools); Monteiro v. Tempe Union High Sch. Dist., 158 F.3d 1022, 1028 (9th Cir.1998) (referring to the removal of books in schools as banning); Pratt v. Ind. Sch. Dist. No. 831, 670 F.2d 771, 773-80 (8th Cir.1982) (referring to the banning of a film in schools based on their ideological content); Cary v. Bd. of Educ., 598 F.2d 535, 536 (10th Cir.1979) (calling books banned when they were removed from use in classes); Sund v. City of Wichita Falls, 121 F.Supp.2d 530, 533 (N.D.Tex.2000) (referring to the removal of books in libraries as banning); Borger v. Bisciglia, 888 F.Supp. 97, 98, 100 (E.D.Wis.1995) (referring to a film removed from the curriculum as banned); Sheck v. Baileyville Sch. Committee, 530 F.Supp. 679, 681-83 (D.Maine 1982) (referring to a book as banned when it was removed from a school library). Moreover, in other contexts, we use the word ban as I use it here. See, e.g., Searcey v. Harris, 888 F.2d 1314, 1318, 1322 (11th Cir.1989) (calling a school board's regulation prohibiting certain groups from presenting at career day banning, even though they were not prohibited from presenting elsewhere). For example, we say that smoking has been banned on airplanes and in restaurants, even though people are free to have cigarettes and smoke in other venues. See, e.g., FLA. STAT. ANN. § 386.206 (2008) (referring to the smoking ban in workplaces when people are allowed to have cigarettes and smoke in other venues); Roark & Hardee LP v. City of Austin, 522 F.3d 533, 550 (5th Cir.2008) (referring to smoking bans even though smoking is permitted in some areas). In sum, our usage of the word ban does not require that people be forbidden from having the object entirely, as the majority contends. [11] Furthermore, under the majority's definitionwhere a government or its officials forbid or prohibit others from having a book, [Majority Opinion at 1218], a school board could never ban a book. It has the authority to remove books only within its school system. If it does this, according to the majority, it has not banned the book, as it could only be banned if people cannot have the book altogether. Can it be that a school board can never take any action that would constitute banning? Can it be that [i]f a Democratic school board, motivated by party affiliation, ordered the removal of all books written by or in favor of Republicans, [or] if an all-white school board, motivated by racial animus, decided to remove all books authored by blacks or advocating racial equality and integration, Pico, 457 U.S. at 870-71, 102 S.Ct. at 2810, this would not constitute banning because the schoolchildren are not also forbidden from owning these books at all? Such a definition limits the word's application to almost nothing. Furthermore, it does not somehow lessen the School Board's important, delicate, and highly discretionary functions if the book remains available in other venues. The majority suggests that a school board's removal action is less repugnant to the First Amendment when it discusses all the ways one can still get his hands on a copy of the book, including online vendors, like Amazon.com. However, the requirements of the First Amendment are [not] minimized by the availability of the disputed book in sources outside the school. Minarcini v. Strongsville City Sch. Dist., 541 F.2d 577, 582 (6th Cir.1976). See also Denver Area Educ. Telecoms. Consortium v. FCC, 518 U.S. 727, 809, 116 S.Ct. 2374, 2418, 135 L.Ed.2d 888 (1996) (Kennedy, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part) ([T]he possibility the Government could have imposed more draconian limitations on speech never has justified a lesser abridgment.... [F]ew of our First Amendment cases involve outright bans on speech.). Restraint on protected speech generally cannot be justified by the fact that there may be other times, places or circumstances for such expression. The symbolic effect of removing the [book] ... is more significant than the resulting limitation of access to the story. Pratt v. Ind. Sch. Dist. No. 831, 670 F.2d 771, 779 (8th Cir.1982) (citations omitted). As in Pratt, the Miami-Dade County School Board has used its official power to perform an act clearly indicating that the ideas contained in the [book] are unacceptable and should not be discussed or considered. This message is not lost on students and teachers, and its chilling effect is obvious. Id. The majority's discussion of what constitutes banning chips away at the important limitations the First Amendment imposes on state-supported censorship of speech.