Following an outcry from civil libertarians and religious groups, the Federal Bureau of Prisons has authorized the return to chapel libraries of all appropriate religious materials that it had ordered removed as part of its new Standardized Chapel Library Project, an effort to restrict prison reading lists to 150 titles per denomination. In an e-mail quoted by the September 26 New York Times, the bureau reported that the only exceptions would be “any publications that have been found to be inappropriate, such as material that could be radicalizing or incite violence.”
Prison chaplains began removing books from chapel libraries in May as a belated response to an April 2004 Department of Justice report that recommended steps prisons should take to limit the spread of radical or militant Islamic materials. This prompted two inmates of the Federal Prison Camp in Otisville, New York—Orthodox Jew Moshe Milstein and Protestant John J. Okon—to file a class-action lawsuit against the bureau August 21 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, claiming that their rights to free exercise of religion and due process of law were infringed.
After the Times provided links September 21 to the approved book lists for 19 different denominations, religious organizations began to object to the seemingly arbitrary nature of the choices. Marvin Olasky of World Magazine wrote, “The list includes Praying by J. I. Packer, but if a library had Packer’s Knowing God it would have to be purged.” The September 26 Roman Catholic Our Sunday Visitor pointed out that “Jesus of Nazareth, Pope Benedict’s new bestseller, is not on the approved Catholic list [but] C. S. Lewis, N. T. Wright, and Martin Marty—all non-Catholics—are.”
Bureau spokeswoman Traci Billingsley declined to give the Times the names of the religious experts who were compiling the lists, but said they included chaplains and scholars in seminaries and at the American Academy of Religion. Although the books are being returned to the prison chapels, the bureau has not abandoned the concept of maintaining lists. Bureau spokeswoman Judi Simon Garrett said the “review of all materials in chapel libraries will be completed by the end of January 2008.”
American Library Association President Loriene Roy issued a statement on the book removals September 24, saying “it is illogical that the Bureau of Prisons is removing the very resources that may help incarcerated persons change their lives for the better. The idea that removing religious books will create better citizens is ridiculous, and goes against the democratic fiber of our society.”
Even though the books are being returned, ALA Office of Intellectual Freedom Deputy Director Deborah Caldwell-Stone told American Libraries that the lawsuit by the Otisville inmates might not be rendered moot if the Bureau of Prisons new policy continues, because “it contends that limiting reading materials to government-approved religious texts burdens the inmates’ free exercise of religion and their right to read and access information.” She added that the federal guidelines do not affect state prisons in any way.
“It’s swatting a fly with a sledgehammer,” Mark Earley, president of the Prison Fellowship, a Christian group founded by ex-Watergate convict Chuck Colson, said in the September 10 Times. “There’s no need to get rid of literally hundreds of thousands of books that are fine simply because you have a problem with an isolated book or piece of literature that presents extremism.”
Bob Moore, director of the Jewish advocacy group Aleph, told the newspaper that the lack of transparency about how the lists are compiled troubled him. He added, “Our position is there should not be a list of what should be on the shelves, but what shouldn’t be.”
Prison chaplains began removing books from chapel libraries in May as a belated response to an April 2004 Department of Justice report that recommended steps prisons should take to limit the spread of radical or militant Islamic materials. This prompted two inmates of the Federal Prison Camp in Otisville, New York—Orthodox Jew Moshe Milstein and Protestant John J. Okon—to file a class-action lawsuit against the bureau August 21 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, claiming that their rights to free exercise of religion and due process of law were infringed.
After the Times provided links September 21 to the approved book lists for 19 different denominations, religious organizations began to object to the seemingly arbitrary nature of the choices. Marvin Olasky of World Magazine wrote, “The list includes Praying by J. I. Packer, but if a library had Packer’s Knowing God it would have to be purged.” The September 26 Roman Catholic Our Sunday Visitor pointed out that “Jesus of Nazareth, Pope Benedict’s new bestseller, is not on the approved Catholic list [but] C. S. Lewis, N. T. Wright, and Martin Marty—all non-Catholics—are.”
Bureau spokeswoman Traci Billingsley declined to give the Times the names of the religious experts who were compiling the lists, but said they included chaplains and scholars in seminaries and at the American Academy of Religion. Although the books are being returned to the prison chapels, the bureau has not abandoned the concept of maintaining lists. Bureau spokeswoman Judi Simon Garrett said the “review of all materials in chapel libraries will be completed by the end of January 2008.”
American Library Association President Loriene Roy issued a statement on the book removals September 24, saying “it is illogical that the Bureau of Prisons is removing the very resources that may help incarcerated persons change their lives for the better. The idea that removing religious books will create better citizens is ridiculous, and goes against the democratic fiber of our society.”
Even though the books are being returned, ALA Office of Intellectual Freedom Deputy Director Deborah Caldwell-Stone told American Libraries that the lawsuit by the Otisville inmates might not be rendered moot if the Bureau of Prisons new policy continues, because “it contends that limiting reading materials to government-approved religious texts burdens the inmates’ free exercise of religion and their right to read and access information.” She added that the federal guidelines do not affect state prisons in any way.
“It’s swatting a fly with a sledgehammer,” Mark Earley, president of the Prison Fellowship, a Christian group founded by ex-Watergate convict Chuck Colson, said in the September 10 Times. “There’s no need to get rid of literally hundreds of thousands of books that are fine simply because you have a problem with an isolated book or piece of literature that presents extremism.”
Bob Moore, director of the Jewish advocacy group Aleph, told the newspaper that the lack of transparency about how the lists are compiled troubled him. He added, “Our position is there should not be a list of what should be on the shelves, but what shouldn’t be.”
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