Homeland Security Cracking Down on Library Porn

Give some guys a baseball cap, and they think they rule the world.

Two uniformed men sauntered into the main room of the Little Falls library in Maryland last week and asked all patrons using computers for their undivided attention. Then the men made their announcement: Viewing Internet pornography was expressly forbidden.

The men were wearing baseball caps emblazoned with the words “Homeland Security.” They must have authority, right?

Wrong.

The incident occurred Feb. 9 and left some residents confused. It also forced Montgomery county officials to explain how employees assigned to protect county buildings against terrorists decided it was their personal mission to police the viewing habits of library patrons.

After the two men made their announcement, one of them challenged an Internet user’s choice of viewing material and asked him to step outside, according to a witness. A librarian intervened, and the two men went into the library's work area to discuss the matter. A police officer arrived. In the end, the only ones stepping outside were the men in the baseball caps.

It turns out the zealous defenders of morality were officers of the security division of Montgomery County’s Homeland Security Department, an unarmed force that patrols about 300 county buildings. They may have many duties, but enforcing obscenity laws isn’t among them.

Later that afternoon, Bruce Romer, Montgomery County’s chief administrative officer, issued a statement calling the incident “unfortunate” and “regrettable,” and said the officers had been reassigned to other duties.

Romer tried to explain that the officers believed they were enforcing the county’s sexual harassment policy but had “overstepped their authority” in their zeal. Romer also pointed out that the officers were reminded that Montgomery County “supports the rights of patrons to view the materials of their choice.”

While the county’s sexual harassment policy forbids the “display of offensive or obscene printed or visual material,” that doesn’t hold in a library, which is both a public arena and a county workplace. In that setting, the U.S. Constitution trumps the rules of Montgomery County, according to officials.

At most public libraries in the Washington area, an adult can view pornography on a library computer more or less unfettered. Montgomery County asks library customers to be considerate of others when viewing websites. If others are put off, librarians will provide the viewer of the offending material with a “privacy screen.”

Fairfax County forbids library use of the Internet to view child pornography or obscene materials or to engage in gambling or fraud. But Fairfax library spokeswoman Lois Kirkpatrick said, “Librarians are not legally empowered to determine obscenity.”

D.C. library spokeswoman Monica Lewis said the system is working on guidelines for Internet use, but she added that recessed computer screens generally ensure patrons their privacy.

Although many library systems in the United States use filtering software, the D.C. and Fairfax systems do not, and Montgomery County uses such software only on computers available to children. Leslie Burger, president-elect of the American Library Association, said the reality is that “libraries are not the hotbed of looking at porn sites.”

However, the incident has led Romer to vow that the county’s security officers will undergo training “so they fully understand library policy and its consistency with residents’ First Amendment rights under the U.S. Constitution.”

And not a moment too soon.