Sanitizing American Library History: Reflections of a Library Historian

Librarianship has a propensity to sanitize its history. As evidence for this statement, this article uses the Library Bill of Rights that the American Library Association adopted in 1939 and the School Library Bill of Rights that the American Association of School Librarians adopted in 1955 as lenses through which to view the profession’s response to selected events in American library history since 1939. By such means, the article attempts to show that librarianship has manifested a consistent desire to control the narrative surrounding libraries and their defense of intellectual freedom and opposition to censorship.