No superintendent or school committee of any city or town, or any person officially connected with the government or direction of the public schools, shall receive any private fee, gratuity, donation, or compensation in any manner for promoting the sale or the exchange of any school book, map, or chart in any public school, or be an agent for the sale or the publisher of any school textbook, or be directly or indirectly pecuniarily interested in the introduction of any school textbook; and any agency or interest shall disqualify any person acting or interested as described from holding any school office.
R.I. Gen. Laws § 16-38-7