Final_Judgment

715 Final Word? [617]
suppose, would have justified the inclusion of the Warren Report in the
library. But my book hasn't gotten those kind of favorable reviews—nor
that any real surprise.
THE ADL, YET AGAIN
In any event, at a hearing of the library board of directors, a furor
erupted when Bollyn pointed out that several directors were partisans of
Israel, suggesting the book was rejected because of the Israeli lobby's
fervent objections to the book.
When Bollyn raised First Amendment concerns, one pro-Israel
partisan, Debbie Miller, dismissed him, proclaiming rather candidly: 'We
own the First Amendment," although not saying who "we" were—although
anyone with any understanding of the realities of modern-day "freedom of
speech" in America could reach their own conclusions.
Already involved behind the scenes, the Chicago office of the ADL
publicly stepped into the picture, with ADL spokesman Richard Hirschhaut
declaring, "We believe this is a cynical ploy, an attempt to create a First
Amendment issue as subterfuge for an effort to exploit the goodwill and
fair-mindedness of the public library system. The library should not be
forced to put itself in a position of being a warehouse or central address for
every bigot with an agenda."
Previously based in the ADL's San Francisco office, Hirschhaut did not
mention to the press that he had a personal axe to grind with me and with
my then-employer, The Spotlight. Hirschhaut, in fact, had been one of the
ADL officials under criminal investigation by the FBI and the San
Francisco Police Department in 1993 for illegal domestic spying.
At the time, top ADL spy Roy Bullock revealed that a June 30, 1986
Spotlight article that I had written had set in motion the events that led to
the ADL scandal. Hirschhaut was transferred to Chicago by the ADL when
the spy agency was busy trying to clean up the mess caused by the affair.
In any case, the resulting brouhaha attracted the attention of the media and
no less than five area newspapers and the PBS radio affiliate reported on
the controversy as it dragged on over the next five months.
Bollyn tried to get the self-styled "Office of Intellectual Freedom"
(OIF) of the American Library Association (ALA) to take a stand, but the
OIF's director, Judith Krug, refused to condemn the censorship.
This was no surprise. Seven years previously, Krug sided with the ADL
when the Israeli lobby raised a fuss after a Chicago librarian sponsored a
resolution—endorsed by the ALA national convention—condemning Israeli
censorship. With Krug's support, the resolution was scrapped.
While smaller local papers contacted me, Carri Karuhn, the reporter
for the "big" Chicago Tribune, refused to return my calls. The Tribune also
refused to publish a letter to the editor from me, responding to its coverage.
Despite the pressure, Bollyn wouldn't back down. This presented a
problem for the STDL board which ordered a new book selection process,
under which the library's staff director appointed a three-member team of