An opinion was handed down last week in a U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals case where it was charged that requiring students to read Mark Twain's _Huckleberry Finn_ and "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner "created, exacerbated and contributed to a hostile work environment" at a Tempe, Arizona, high school, and that failure to remove the books from the curriculum amounted to discrimination against African American students. From the court's opinion: "The complaint, brought on Doe's behalf by her mother, Kathy Monteiro, alleged that each of these literary works 'contains repeated use of the profane, insulting and racially derogatory term "nigger."' It also alleged that neither work is a necessary component of a freshman English class and that none of the assignments in the curriculum refers to Caucasians in a derogatory manner." The court ruled against banning books based on their content but ruled that school districts can be held financially liable if they do not address racially hostile environments at schools. Its opinion is online at: Monteiro vs. Tempe Union High School District, 97-15511 http://laws.findlaw.com/9th/9715511.html Most efforts to remove books from school curriculums are directed towards local school boards (like the successful challenges in Maryland last winter to Maya Angelou's _I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings_ and Toni Morrison's _Song of Solomon_ as "anti- white"). The people in Arizona used civil rights legislation to make it a legal case. Does anyone know of other challenges to books that have actually gone to the courts in this way? Jim Zwick [log in to unmask] http://home.ican.net/~fjzwick/ http://marktwain.miningco.com/