SACRAMENTO, CA — When it meets Thursday afternoon, the Sacramento Public Library Authority Board is expected to make a decision that’s almost guaranteed to leave someone unhappy and considering legal action.A resolution before the board would reduce the amount of internet filtering on Sacramento’s public library computers. The American Civil Liberties Union has said restricting adult patrons’ access to potentially inappropriate material like pornography violates the First Amendment. The ACLU has advised the library board to unfetter free speech in publicly funded facilities. Library staff members have said they agree and have urged the board to remove all filters except those that screen for patently illegal content like child sexual abuse.
The Pacific Justice Institute, a conservative family values organization, disagrees.
“The Constitution doesn’t require that we pay for public access to porn,” Matthew McReynolds, a PJI staff attorney, told WorldNetDaily. “It may require, at least under current interpretation, to be allowed in homes, but not that you and I pay for it.”
McReynolds said sexual predators are attracted to free internet pornography and cluster in libraries to view it. That leads to trouble, he noted, because libraries traditionally are safe havens for children. However, once predators have worked themselves into a lather by viewing porn, they’re liable to assault children in library bathrooms.
“Undercover, investigative-type reporting has found that sexual offenses are taking place in public libraries,” McReynolds told WorldNetDaily. “Offenders sit down, go to porn websites, and next thing you know they are fondling themselves, or in the worst cases assaulting kids in the bathroom. It’s absolutely a horrendous situation. It creates a public safety disaster.”
Worse than subjecting children to abuse, according to PJI President Brad Dacus, is taxpayers are required to fund potentially reprehensible behavior.
“The notion that taxpayers must subsidize the viewing of internet porn is absurd,” Dacus said in a statement released by PJI.
He also suggested the library board could face legal action if it removes the filters.
“The library board should be more concerned about potential liability from failing to adequately protect innocent children than from failing to please the ACLU,” Dacus said in the statement.
McReynolds added his voice to the statement: “This issue boils down to protecting kids and using public resources responsibly. Benjamin Franklin would be rolling over in his grave if he knew that ‘free speech’ was being used to justify turning libraries into adult entertainment venues.”
