On Wednesday, a federal judge permanently enjoined the sections of House Bill (HB) 900, the READER Act, passed by the Texas Legislature in 2023, that would have compelled booksellers to rate books under the act.  

HB 900 by Rep. Jared Patterson (R–Frisco) would have required book publishers to develop a rating system based on sexual content. Additionally, it charged the Texas State Library and Archives Commission (TSLAC) and the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) with creating school library collection development standards, as well as charged districts with setting up a system to block access to books based on parental consent and implement an exhaustive and ongoing review and reporting requirement. 

What did the court say in Book People v. Morath?  

The decision by Judge Alan Albright in the Western District Court of Texas applies the April 2024 ruling by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in the prior HB 900 case to the portion of the case that had been remanded to the lower court. In the Fifth Circuit decision, the court sided with the bookstores and publishers arguing the rating system was an unconstitutional restriction on speech while allowing for TSLAC and SBOE to move forward with creating library collection standards, which were approved in December 2023.  

 “Texas has a strong interest in regulating what children can access in schools and preventing inappropriate content from schools,” Albright said in Wednesday’s decision. “But READER’s [unconstitutional] methods are not the way to further that interest.” 

“While READER may seek to achieve a noble and important goal, it cannot do so by compelling Plaintiffs’ speech in both ways the Supreme Court has clearly forbidden,” the court stated in its decision. “The biggest problem of READER stems from the State of Texas trying to compel speech and violate vendors’ First Amendment rights.”  

The decision further critiques the process for how book vendors were charged with rating the contents of books, calling the guidelines “unclear” and concluding that the process is “void for vagueness in combination and in its applications.” Albright further argues in the decision it is not the Legislature’s place to compel book publishers to review and analyze library material. 

Bill author Patterson has previously defended the law’s constitutionality and asked Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) to appeal the Fifth Circuit ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court. He released the following statement Wednesday: “I am deeply disappointed by [Judge Albright’s] decision that the State of Texas cannot require a vendor to ensure their products are safe for a child’s consumption in the lone circumstance of selling their products to Texas public schools.” Patterson went on to cite his work to pass SB 412 in 2025, which he describes as closing a “so-called ‘obscenity exemption’ loophole” and holding school employees accountable for “choos[ing] to expose children to harmful explicit content.”  

How does the court blockage of HB 900 affect SB 13, the 2025 library bill? 

In its 2025 session, the Legislature passed Senate Bill (SB) 13 by Sen. Angela Paxton (R–McKinney), another library materials bill. SB 13: 

• Grants parental access to records of the books their children check out of school libraries and allows them to restrict their child’s access to specific titles; 
• Mandates that school districts adopt policies for acquiring library materials, including a 30-day public review period before approval; 
• Allows communities to petition for the creation of local school library advisory councils, which must include a majority of parent members and help guide decisions about library content; and 
• Prohibits materials considered harmful, indecent, or profane. 

SB 13 also requires compliance with newly adopted state library standards. To the degree that Book People, Incorporated v. Morath impacts the newly adopted state library standards, the ruling may affect the implementation of SB13.

Finally, the bill establishes a formal challenge process for library materials and mandates that challenged books be removed from circulation pending review. While not binding, the court did note that a parental mechanism similar to the one found in SB 13 would not present the same constitutional challenges brought by the booksellers/plaintiffs resulting in the injunction against HB 900. SB 13 became effective on Sept. 1, 2025, and has not yet been challenged in court.