CLYDE — The book battle in the Clyde-Savannah Central School District is not over.

Last month, during a raucous meeting in the high school gym, school board members voted to rescind a previous decision removing five books from the Junior/Senior High School Library — books that a Clyde pastor described as pornographic in nature.

That decision not only angered Jacob Marchitell, pastor of Christ Community Church, but his conduct at that meeting ultimately resulted in his banishment from school property for a year because of what Superintendent Mike Hayden called his violation of the district’s code of conduct.

Now, Marchitell and Wayne County Moms for Liberty, a group whose members turned out in large numbers at that meeting to loudly support him, have retained a national law organization protecting socially conservative values to take the fight to the state’s education commissioner, Betty Rosa.

Meanwhile, a group opposed to pulling the books from the library is lobbying Rosa to sustain the school board’s decision.

Attorneys for the American Center for Law and Justice, an organization that NPR said wages “legal battles against gay rights, abortion and laws considered anti-religious,” have filed an appeal with Rosa asking that Clyde’s school board decision be annulled. Previous to that move, ACLJ lawyers wrote a letter to Board President Pam Anstee asking members to once again reverse course and take the books out of the library shelves.

The books include “People Kill People,” by Ellen Hopkins; “It Ends With Us,” by Colleen Hoover; and “All Boys Aren’t Blue,” by George M. Johnson. All five in question have been labeled Young Adult in the school library. None are part of the school curriculum.

In court papers provided by ACLJ attorneys, they ask that the commissioner annul the Sept. 13 school board decision, issue an immediate stay of the action, and grant “different relief as the commissioner may deem just and proper, including costs and disbursements of this proceeding.”

ACLJ attorney Abby Southerland did not respond to a question of whether they are providing their legal service for free. Marchitell said Thursday he could not comment on the legal action.

Olivia Summers, a senior litigation counsel with the ACLJ, outlined their position in a piece on ACLJ’s website.

Summers said that in “August of this year, one of our clients brought to the school board’s attention that books — five specifically — containing obscene, sexually graphic content were widely available to minor students in the school libraries. These five books contain, among other things, graphic accounts of sexual encounters between minors as well as the rape of a minor child by an adult. To say that the content is revolting is an understatement. It is stomach-churning and abhorrent that any material of this nature would purposefully be made accessible to children — especially by the very people who are tasked with protecting children.

“When the board’s attention was initially drawn to this matter, it responded correctly by voting to restrict the access of minor children to these books by having them removed from the school libraries,” Summers continued. “Incredibly, the board’s decision was then challenged by a ‘library media specialist’ and a parent of a student in the Clyde-Savannah Central School District. They filed a petition to reverse the board’s decision, claiming that the First Amendment protects the ‘right’ of children to access this kind of pornographic and sexually graphic content. Unfortunately, the board unnecessarily caved into the demand, reversed course, and allowed the books to remain freely accessible to children. … Now, on behalf of parents in Wayne County, the ACLJ has delivered a letter to the board that explains the law regarding sexually explicit, vulgar, and lewd content and the board’s duty to protect children from exposure to such content.”

Summers said that while the petition by Junior/Senior High School Library Media Specialist Emilie Bastian and a district teacher, Matthew Drahms, argued for book reinstatement based on First Amendment rights and other arguments, those liberties only go so far.

She said the Supreme Court has ruled that the First Amendment has limitations “where the speech is sexually explicit and the audience may include children.” Summers said there “is absolutely no educational interest in exposing children to gratuitous and graphic sexual content such as is contained in the books the school board allowed to remain accessible to minors,” and that even if there is “some educational interest in exposing children to that material, it is greatly outweighed by the grave harm that such content has upon children, including grooming children to believe that such conduct is normal or OK.”

Hayden said the “district does not have a comment at this point in time,” but defended the inclusion of the books earlier this year, explaining that “our library offers a wide range of literary works that reflect different cultures, experiences, and perspectives. This diversity not only enriches our students’ educational experience but also fosters critical thinking, empathy, and open-mindedness. While we understand that individual preferences may differ, it is crucial to acknowledge that literature often explores sensitive topics or difficult themes to challenge students’ thinking and broaden their understanding of the world. Exposure to diverse perspectives through literature helps develop important skills and values in our students.”

A group formed to fight against book-banning efforts, Call to Action, is “urging Commissioner Rosa to deny all appeals” of the Board of Education’s Sept. 13 decision.

“There is more than just one voice in this wave of banning books,” the group said in a statement. “We as parents, caretakers, teachers and concerned community members band together to take a stand with the youth in our community who find themselves in the minority. The books in question have helped students we stand with realize they are not alone. The books affirm to our youth that it is OK to be who they are. Other extreme voices attempt to censor and change that which they do not agree with. We cannot stand by silently allowing propaganda and manipulative words to restrain the voice of the minority … We are a group of parents, teachers, caretakers, teens, community members who are standing for the voice of the minority. We stand for the marginalized that seem to be targets of book bans. Our focus is the youth who will be wounded by the removal of the books. Those who do not have examples to relate to in everyday life.”