| Viewing the public library trustee within a complex policy-making environment, this exploratory study examines the relationships between the way a trustee officially responds to a censorship threat and the following variables: (1) the trustee's personal stand on intellectual freedom, and (2) the trustee's view of the community's collective stand on intellectual freedom. Differences in these stands were also tested, based on the trustee's personal characteristics.; The study included a controlled, nonrandom sample of 55 trustees from seven rural Illinois libraries. The selected libraries had: (1) adopted the Library Bill of Rights as library policy, (2) a board-approved, written collection development policy, and (3) experienced a censorship problem between 1981 and 1986.; Visits were made to the seven libraries, and data were collected through pretested questionnaires and interviews. Trustees were asked to assume their official roles and to respond to four case studies, indicating how they would act in hypothetical cases involving censorship conflicts. In addition to the calculations of means, standard deviations, and frequencies, the following tests were applied: Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient tests, T-tests, analysis of variance, and regression analysis.; Findings include: (1) A significant, moderately strong relationship between the trustee's personal stand on intellectual freedom and his/her official role in responding to a censorship threat; (2) A significant, but moderately weak relationship between the trustee's view of the community's stand on intellectual freedom and his/her official role in responding to a censorship threat; (3) Significant differences in the trustee's official role, based on the following characteristics: (a) membership in the state trustee association, and (b) level of education; (4) Significant differences in the trustee's personal stand on intellectual freedom, based on: (a) use of the library collection, (b) membership in the state trustee association, (c) prior involvement in a censorship incident, and (d) means of acquiring office; and (5) Significant differences in the trustee's view of the community's stand on intellectual freedom, based on (a) prior involvement in a censorship incident, (b) parental status, (c) level of education, and (d) age. |
