Advocates clarify that the bill protects public funds and library missions without compromising copyright or author royalties.
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Authors and Library Advocates Support Illinois’ HB5236, Digital Library Protection Act
May 12, 2026
Advocates clarify that the Illinois eBooks bill protects public funds and library missions without compromising copyright or author royalties.
SPRINGFIELD, IL - The following joint statement is from David Hansen of Authors Alliance and Kyle K. Courtney of the eBook Study Group:
Illinois' eBooks bill, HB5236 is a practical, pro-reader, pro-author, and pro-library bill. It does not seize copyrights, mandate piracy, or eliminate licensing. It simply says Illinois libraries should not spend public dollars on digital contracts that block ordinary library functions, suppress contract transparency, charge libraries more than the public for the same digital item, or undermine patron privacy.
The bill does not abandon the rules of lending; it enforces them fairly. It relies on the existing framework of loan periods, checkout limits, and technological protection measures to ensure secure access, while guaranteeing those terms are dictated by the library's mission of service to the public, not by a publisher's licensing terms.
The publishers’ recent claim that this bill does not help readers or libraries turns the issue upside down. Readers need timely, equitable access to e-books and digital audiobooks. Authors need their works to be discoverable across communities and libraries are one of the most powerful discovery engines in the literary marketplace: they buy and license books, promote authors, host programs, sustain backlist readership, and introduce readers to writers they later purchase. But library budgets are not endless: in the current licensing environment, more and more libraries spend huge portions of their limited budgets relicensing bestsellers. Big publishers and big-name authors shouldn't profit at the expense of smaller competitors just because their market power allows them to force unfair terms on libraries. HB5236 would address this imbalance and allow libraries to license a wider array of ebooks.
Our organizations know that authors and libraries are natural allies, and that fair e-book legislation helps authors by keeping works visible, available, and valued.
Further, HB5236 does not create “unfettered access.” A library loan remains a time-limited transaction, and the bill expressly recognizes technological protection measures used to secure lending. Nor does the bill dismantle licensing. It prevents Illinois libraries and library consortia from agreeing to a narrow set of contract terms that interfere with core library operations, including preservation, interlibrary loan, reasonable lending practices, transparency among Illinois libraries, and compliance with the Library Records Confidentiality Act.
The sky-is-falling rhetoric from publisher associations should be understood for what it is: an attempt to preserve a market in which public institutions must accept non-negotiable, expiring, and often overpriced digital licenses. Illinois lawmakers saw through that rhetoric when the House passed HB5236 without a single no vote. The Senate should do the same and advance this carefully drafted, pro-access legislation.
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Additional Background Information:
Myth Busting Publishers Claims about HB5236
Myth: HB5236 is a backdoor copyright bill.
Fact: HB5236 does not change who owns copyrights, does not authorize piracy, and does not give libraries the right to distribute works outside a license. It regulates the terms Illinois libraries may accept when entering contracts for electronic literary materials. Existing contracts are not affected, and the bill contains severability language.
Myth: E-book costs are not straining libraries because they are less than 5% of total operating budgets.
Fact: Comparing e-book and audiobook costs to total operating budgets is misleading. Operating budgets include staff, buildings, technology, utilities, programming, and other essential services. The relevant pressure point is the materials budget; the limited pool libraries use to build collections. Library Journal reported that public libraries allocated an average of 28% of materials spending to digital materials in 2024, with urban and suburban libraries devoting even higher shares, and that 46% of responding libraries reported an increase in the percentage of their budget dedicated to digital materials. (See Library Journal’s numbers)
Myth: Record digital checkouts prove the current licensing market works.
Fact: Record usage proves public demand, but it says nothing about whether licenses reflect the interests of the reading public. OverDrive reported 820.5 million digital checkouts from libraries and schools in 2025, including 379.4 million e-book borrows and 315.9 million audiobook borrows. That demand is exactly why sustainable, fair licensing matters: when digital use grows under expiring or restrictive terms, libraries must spend more and more just to maintain access to works they have already paid to provide.
Myth: HB5236 threatens authors and independent bookstores.
Fact: Libraries pay for books and digital licenses, and they help readers discover authors. HB5236 would let libraries stretch limited public dollars across more titles, which can especially benefit midlist, debut, local, scholarly, and backlist authors who lose out when libraries are forced to spend disproportionate sums re-licensing a small number of high-demand titles. The bill does not regulate bookstores or consumer sales.
Myth: HB5236 creates “unfettered access.”
Fact: The bill defines a loan as a transaction with a loan period and deletion at the end of that period, and it expressly protects libraries’ ability to use technological protection measures for secure lending. That is the opposite of “unfettered access.”
Myth: Publishers may have no choice but to cut off Illinois libraries.
Fact: That argument is not a reason to reject HB5236; it is evidence of why fair-contract protections are necessary. A market in which public libraries can be threatened with losing access unless they accept unreasonable terms that undermine their own public-facing mission is not a balanced market. Connecticut has already enacted a library e-book law using a contract-focused model, and Authors Alliance and the eBook Study Group have supported that approach as a way to align digital licenses with libraries’ public mission of lending, access, and preservation.
Kyle K. Courtney is founder of the eBook Study Group, a nonprofit championing the library mission through research, drafting, targeted legal action, and multilevel advocacy to secure the fair, sustainable, and equitable rights libraries need to serve their communities in the digital age
Dave Hansen is Executive Director of Authors Alliance, a nonprofit organization that supports authors who want to serve the public good by sharing their work widely with the world.
Media Contacts:
Kyle K. Courtney at [email protected]
Dave Hansen at [email protected]