The Chicago Gay Men's Choir performing at Emily Drabinski's inaugural luncheon Photo by Katharine Phenix

On June 26, the eve of Emily Drabinski’s ALA presidency, campaign workers, school librarians, activists, colleagues, friends, and family members gathered in her suite in the Chicago Hilton Hotel on Michigan Avenue. Against the backdrop of boats slowly moving across Lake Michigan, she addressed supporters. “Tonight we’re celebrating library wins,” she said. “In our communities, against censorship, and for the common good.”

It was an acknowledgement of a particular moment in American Library Association (ALA) history. A critical pedagogy librarian at the City University of New York (CUNY) Graduate Center, Drabinski campaigned on a platform of collective action, economic justice, racial equity, and public infrastructure for public goods. The first “Marxist lesbian” ALA president, as she famously tweeted when she won, Drabinski has recently been writing for Truthout about library labor organizers, fights against book bans, and how progressive library boards can block right-wing censorship and support the LGBTQIA+ community. As her 2023–24 term was about to begin, Drabinski approached it with an air of surprise to be in a position of power, but also with a determined understanding of the opportunity to make a difference where she could.

The following afternoon, on the first official day of her presidency, past ALA presidents, staff, and a packed crowd of onlookers attended the inauguration banquet, a luncheon reception. After introductions of division presidents, ALA executive board members, and ALA president-elect Cindy Hohl, director of policy analysis and operational support at Kansas City Public Library, outgoing ALA president Lessa Kananiʻopua Pelayo-Lozada announced and welcomed Drabinski as the incoming president.

Then Drabinski, sitting next to her twin sister Kate, chair-danced along with most people in the audience to a performance by the Chicago Gay Men’s Choir. The ensemble sang a variety of upbeat “toe tapper” tunes—as the choir director called them—from “Flashdance…What a Feeling” to “This is Me” from The Greatest Showman and “Hail Holy Queen” from Sister Act.

Before everyone enjoyed the baked potato bar—a nod to Drabinski’s Idaho roots—she addressed the gathered crowd. “Everything worth doing is worth doing with others, as Mariame Kaba says,” she began, thanking her family and ALA colleagues. “We need the future to know: We fought,” she continued. “We find ourselves in a time of attack on the basic freedoms and economic well-being of the most vulnerable sections of the population.”

Here, she was invoking E.J. Josey, the librarian, historian, and activist who was the first chair of the ALA Black Caucus. He also served as ALA president from 1984–85, and Drabinski quoted from his June 27, 1984 inaugural speech—39 years ago to the day of her own address.

“The public good, in an even broader sense of the general welfare, is closely related to progress for libraries. In a time of attack on the basic freedoms and economic well-being of the most vulnerable sections of populations, professional groups must recognize their stake in the outcome of that attack and their responsibilities to support the freedoms and welfare of these people.

Librarians therefore need to integrate their goals with the goals of greatest importance of the American people, e.g., the preservation of basic democratic liberties, the enlargement of equal opportunity for women and minorities, and the continuance of earlier national planning to raise the level of the educational and economic well-being of greater numbers of the population."

Drabinski went on to challenge those present to make a difference in their own libraries and communities, to find inspiration from ALA history, and to share those stories with others.

“Find one thing in your world that you would like to change, that you wish was different. It doesn’t have to be big. It can be small. It probably should be small. But it needs to be real, material, consequential. It needs to matter.

And then I want you to make a plan to win. I want you to make a spreadsheet and put everybody’s name in it. I want you to figure out your ask, for your colleagues and your community members. I want you to plan some actions and make some noise. And then I want you to share your story with someone else. We need more stories about more wins. Let’s make them and tell them.

We have a lot of examples in this room of people who have made extraordinary change. I see it in every single one of you.

The world needs strong libraries and strong library workers. A strong American Library Association makes all of us stronger. Let’s do great things together, and let’s do them through our beloved ALA.”