Wasilla librarian letter of termination

On Thursday, January 30th, 1997, the mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, now Governor Sarah Palin, served the city librarian with a letter informing her she intended to terminate her employment in two weeks. The following day, Palin reversed herself, announcing that the librarian, Mary Ellen Emmons, could stay. Palin explained the attempted dismissal by saying that she did not feel she had the librarian's full support, and explained her reversal by saying that Emmons had assured Palin she was behind her.

Emmons, and the Wasilla police chief whom Palin dismissed at the same time, both supported her opponent, the incumbent John Stein, when she ran against him for office the previous year.

But Palin and the librarian also had other disagreements. Soon after Palin was elected mayor, in December 1996, Emmons was quoted by the Wasilla newspaper, The Frontiersman, as saying Palin had asked her multiple times about removing books from the library. Emmons added that she had refused to participate in any kind of censorship.

On at least one occasion, Palin brought up removing books from the library in public. In October 1996, at a meeting of the City Council, Anne Kilkenny, a Wasilla resident, said that Palin asked Emmons: "What would your response be if I asked you to remove some books from the collection?" According to Kilkenny, Emmons responded: "The books in the Wasilla Library collection were selected on the basis of national selection criteria for libraries of this size, and I would absolutely resist all efforts to ban books." At the time, Palin called her inquiries about book removal "rhetorical."

Emmons resigned in 1999, shortly before Palin was re-elected mayor. Palin is now the vice-presidential nominee of the Republican Party.

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