• Teenagers looking to learn about sensitive subjects — say, homosexuality or pregnancy — could have found their parents looking over their shoulders if Massachusetts state representative John Quinn, a Dartmouth Democrat, had had his way. Quinn was the lead sponsor of a bill that would have let parents and guardians peek at the library records of their children, up to and including the age of 17. The bill’s stuck in committee and seems unlikely to go anywhere. And Quinn appears to have seen the light: he tells Muzzle Central that he’d be content with a lower age limit — say, 12 or 14 — and that his main goal was to let parents find out if their kids had any overdue library books lying around. We’ll cancel his Dishonorable Mention when he files corrective legislation to that effect.

• Last October, Massachusetts Department of Correction commissioner Michael Maloney proposed ending a 30-year-old program through which Harvard Law School students helped prison inmates with their legal issues. Maloney’s plan would have allowed only third-year law students to take part, which would have virtually shut down the Harvard Prison Assistance Project. Later that fall Maloney himself stepped down, part of a housecleaning that took place following the prison murder of defrocked priest John Geoghan, who’d been convicted of child molestation. And, fortunately, Maloney’s replacement, Kathleen Dennehy, restored this vital program.

• The Fourth of July is supposed to be a time when we celebrate our liberties. But last July 4, with tens of thousands of people gathering on the Esplanade for the annual Boston Pops concert and fireworks, the Massachusetts State Police decided that free speech just didn’t fit in with the holiday theme. According to the ACLU of Massachusetts, members who tried to hand out fliers on the state of civil liberties post-9/11 were turned away because they didn’t have a permit. The ACLU later found out that it wasn’t alone: dozens of would-be pamphleteers, from Howard Dean campaigners to Jews for Jesus, were also kicked out or forced to wait while their bona fides were checked. Reportedly, one woman was arrested. This took place even though the Metropolitan District Commission, which runs the Esplanade, had assured the ACLU ahead of time that it would not need a permit.

• Donna Hughes, a women’s-studies professor, is a recognized expert on the international trafficking of women and children. Unfortunately her employer, the University of Rhode Island, is not letting her do her job. In May, the ACLU of Rhode Island called on URI president Robert Carothers to reverse a decision to remove two articles from Hughes’s Web site in which she referred to a suspected trafficker and a suspected pimp, neither of whom she named. Carothers had made the decision after a law firm in London had threatened to sue Hughes and URI for defamation. "Academic freedom is essential to my work on sexual slavery and exploitation of women and children," Hughes said in a statement on the ACLU’s Web site. "My scholarly work includes researching and writing about organized crime, corruption, and harmful government policies. The University of Rhode Island’s capitulation to intimidation threatens the progress of my work and the work of other scholars in the future." Louis Saccoccio, URI’s general counsel, told the Associated Press that the university was attempting to work out a solution with Hughes. "Academic freedom is a core value of the university. The university must also exercise appropriate diligence to protect the resources entrusted to its care by the people of Rhode Island. At times, this presents a difficult balance," Saccoccio said.

• Frederica Williams, the president and CEO of the Whittier Street Health Center, in Roxbury, may or may not have had a good idea when she decreed that employees should speak English most of the time when they are on the job. But certainly her Spanish-speaking employees had a right to protest the new policy, known as "English first." According to published reports, about a dozen employees were let go earlier this year. Williams says they were the victims of a financial squeeze, but at least some of the ex-employees claim she retaliated against them for speaking out. The National Labor Relations Board has filed a complaint against the center, and could order it to rehire the employees.

— Dan Kennedy