States aim to limit titles students can search for

Republican lawmakers across the country are proposing legislation that would target online library databases and library management technology — tools built by a halfdozen large companies that catalogue millions of books, journals and articles that students peruse for assignments.

These bills — already enacted in Utah and Tennessee, on the verge of becoming law in Oklahoma, and proposed in at least six other states — are broadly similar. They require databases to remove and block student access to material that is obscene, pornographic, sexually exploitative of children or “harmful to minors” — designations that opponents say could encompass a wide range of texts.