MORRISON AND MARY WILEY LIBRARY FREEDOM TO
READ POLICY
The Morrison
and Mary Wiley Library subscribes to the American Library Association
Freedom to Read Statement which follows:
1. It is in the public interest for publishers and
librarians to make available the widest diversity of views and expressions,
including those which are unorthodox or unpopular with the majority.
2. Publishers, librarians and booksellers do not need to
endorse every idea or presentation contained in the books they make available. It would conflict with the public interest
for them to establish their own political, moral or aesthetic views as a
standard for determining what books should be published or circulated.
3. It is contrary to the public interest for publishers
or librarians to determine the acceptability of a book on the basis of the
personal history or political affiliations of the author.
4. There is no place in our society for efforts to coerce
the taste of others, to confine adults to the reading matter deemed suitable for
adolescents or to inhibit the efforts of writers to achieve artistic
expression.
5. It is not in the public interest to force a reader to
accept with any book the prejudgment of a label characterizing the book or the
author as subversive or dangerous.
6. It is the responsibility of publishers and librarians,
as guardians of the people’s freedom to read, to contest encroachments upon
that freedom by individuals or groups seeking to impose their own standards or
tastes upon the community at large.
7. It is the responsibility of publishers and librarians
to give full meaning to the freedom to read by providing books that enrich the
quality and diversity of thought and expression. By the exercise of this affirmative
responsibility, they can demonstrate that the answer to a bad book is a good one;
the answer to a bad idea is a good one.