First Amendment litigation involving book censorship in schools has usually turned on the rights of a school board to control classroom curricula by prohibiting the use of certain texts, and an inquiry into whether a certain challenged text is vulgar. Some federal courts have distinguished between objective vulgarity—which a school board may prohibit—and the subject matter of a book (witchcraft, lesbian romance) with which the school board members may personally disagree or have a distaste for—and which a school board may not prohibit.

But one federal court recently stated that book banning takes place when a government or its officials forbid or prohibit others from having a book. The term does not apply where a school district—through its authorized school board—decides not to continue possessing the book on its own library shelves. The school board is the entity that has the ultimate authority to decide what books will be purchased and kept on the shelves of the schools in the district—and the school board can decide not to purchase and shelve a book in the first place.

In Maine, as in other states, First Amendment litigation related to book censorship in schools often hinges on the balance between a school board's authority to manage classroom curricula and the rights of individuals against censorship. Federal courts have generally held that while school boards can regulate the use of texts that are objectively vulgar, they cannot prohibit books based on their subject matter, such as themes of witchcraft or LGBTQ+ relationships, simply because board members personally disagree with the content. However, a recent federal court ruling clarified that a school board's decision not to purchase or to remove a book from its library does not constitute 'book banning' in the traditional sense. Instead, it is within the school board's discretion to determine the selection of books available in school libraries. This means that while outright prohibition of a book's possession is not allowed, school boards in Maine have the authority to decide which books to acquire and maintain in their libraries.