Papers and Proceedings of the Twenty-Third General Meeting of the American Library Association
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Title: Papers and Proceedings of the Twenty-Third General Meeting of the American Library Association
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PAPERS AND PROCEEDINGS OF THE TWENTY-THIRD GENERAL MEETING OF THE AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION ***
PAPERS AND PROCEEDINGS
OF THE
TWENTY-THIRD GENERAL MEETING
OF THE
AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION
HELD AT
WAUKESHA, WISCONSIN
JULY 4-10
1901
PUBLISHED BY THE
AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION
1901
CONTENTS.
TITLE. AUTHOR. PAGE.
Address of the President _Henry J. Carr_ 1
What may be done for libraries by the city _T. L. Montgomery_ 5
What may be done for libraries by the state _E. A. Birge_ 7
What may be done for libraries by the nation _Herbert Putnam_ 9
The trusteeship of literature--I. _George Iles_ 16
" " " " II. _R. T. Ely_ 22
Book copyright _Thorvald Solberg_ 24
The relationship of publishers, booksellers
and librarians _W. Millard Palmer_ 31
Library buildings _W. R. Eastman_ 38
The relationship of the architect to the
librarian _J. L. Mauran _ 43
The departmental library _J. T. Gerould_ 46
Suggestions for an annual list of American}
theses for the degree of doctor of } _W. W. Bishop_ 50
philosophy }
Opportunities _Gratia Countryman_ 52
Some principles of book and picture selection _G. E. Wire_ 54
Book reviews, book lists, and articles on }
children's reading: Are they of practical} _Caroline M. Hewins_ 57
value to the children's librarian? }
Books for children:
I. Fiction _Winifred L. Taylor_ 63
II. Fairy tales _Abby L. Sargent_ 66
III. Science _Ella A. Holmes_ 69
Bulletin work for children _Charlotte E.
Wallace_ 72
Reference work with children _Harriet H. Stanley_ 74
Vitalizing the relation between the library
and the school:
I. The school _May L. Prentice_ 78
II. The library _Irene Warren_ 81
Opening a children's room _Clara W. Hunt_ 83
Report on gifts and bequests, 1900-1901 _G. W. Cole_ 87
Report of the A. L. A. Publishing Board _J. Le Roy
Harrison_ 103
Proceedings 107-141
First Session: Public meeting 107
Second Session 107-118
Secretary's report 107
Treasurer's report and necrology 108
Report of Trustees of Endowment Fund 111
Report of Co-operation Committee 113
Report of Committee on Foreign Documents 113
Report of Committee on Title-pages and Indexes of
Periodical Volumes 114
Report of Committee on "International Catalogue of
Scientific Literature" 116
Memorial to John Fiske 117
Third Session 118-125
Report of Committee on Public Documents 118
Report of Committee on Co-operation with N. E. A. 120
Report of Committee on International Co-operation 122
Report of Committee on Library Training 124
Collection and cataloging of early
newspapers. _W. Beer_ 124
Some principles of book and picture selection 124
Fourth Session 125-127
Some experiences in foreign libraries. _Mary W. Plummer_ 125
From the reader's point of view, and the era of the
placard. _J. K. Hosmer_ 127
Fifth Session 127-137
Report on gifts and bequests 127
Report of A. L. A. Publishing Board 127
Invitation from L. A. U. K. 128
Report of Committee on Handbook of American libraries 128
By-laws 129
Memorial to John Fiske 130
Co-operative list of children's books 130
Printed catalog cards 131
Book copyright 131
Trusteeship of literature 131
Relationship of publishers, booksellers and librarians 134
Sixth Session 137-140
Relationship of publishers, booksellers and
librarians, _continued_ 137
Seventh Session 141-142
Election of officers 141
Report of Committee on Resolutions 141
College and Reference Section 142-145
Catalog Section 146-162
Section for Children's Librarians 163-170
Round Table Meeting: State Library Commissions and
Traveling Libraries 171-183
Round Table Meeting: Work of State Library Associations
and Women's Clubs in Advancing Library Interests 183-195
Trustees' Section 196
Round Table Meeting: Professional Instruction in
Bibliography 197-205
Transactions of Council and Executive Board 206-208
Elementary Institute 208
Illinois State Library School Alumni Association 208
The social side of the Waukesha conference
_Julia T. Rankin_ 209
Officers and Committees 211
Attendance register 212
Attendance summaries. _Nina E. Browne_ 218
CONFERENCE OF LIBRARIANS.
_WAUKESHA, WISCONSIN._
JULY 4-10, 1901.
BEING A LIBRARIAN: ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT.
BY HENRY J. CARR, _Librarian Scranton (Pa.) Public Library_.
In your presence, and in addressing you to-night as presiding officer, I
feel to a far greater extent than I can express in words the high honor
that has been conferred in each instance upon all who from time to time
have been chosen to serve as a president of this particular association.
There is in this present age, to be sure, no lack of those popular and
peculiar entities termed associations--associations of many kinds, and
for almost every conceivable purpose. Throughout the entire continent
there exist few, perhaps none, whose history, objects, and work, have
warranted a more justifiable pride in being a member thereof, than is
found in being a member of the American Library Association.
It may here be said that conditions and circumstances have been
favorable to the success of the A. L. A.; not the least of which has
been the faithful loyalty of its individual members. We realize, too,
that even time has dealt leniently with it, upon noting that of the 64
members who attended its first meeting, held at Philadelphia twenty-five
years ago, but 18 have died, and that 20 persons are yet included in its
membership list out of the 69 who joined the association in 1876, that
initial year. Some of that original number, much to our gratification,
are present with us at this 23d general meeting.
Considering its purely voluntary nature, the migratory holding of its
successive meetings in different parts of the land, and the notable
avoidance of fads, or any tendency towards selfish ends that might
otherwise mark its united efforts, it becomes almost a matter of
surprise that so many persons have unfalteringly kept up their
allegiance from year to year ever since the time of their joining the
association. But, as a matter of fact, the A. L. A. has at no time
fallen off in its total membership; and at this date it numbers nearly
one thousand contributing members paying dues for the current year.
The American Library Association has now attained a period of
twenty-five years in its history--a quarter of a century. During that
time, in the addresses given at its general meetings, as well as in the
multiplicity of noteworthy and valuable papers contributed to its
Proceedings, and the sundry publications devoted to library interests,
it would appear as if there must have been presented almost every
conceivable phase of library thought and sentiment. Can anything new be
said, or old ideas placed in a new light, so as to be worthy of hearing
and attention at this time? I fear not, except as some lessons may be
drawn from the experience of one's past work, perhaps, that shall serve
to aid yet others who are to tread like paths in life.
I beg, therefore, that you will bear with me for a short space of time
while I give expression to some thoughts drawn from the experience of
myself and others while Being a Librarian.
Without now restricting their application to particular phases of
librarianship, let us at the outset consider them as relating to any and
all conditions of it as a vocation. "Why did you take up library work?"
is a question not infrequently asked. To that query various answer may
be given, according to the individual views of the persons replying.
Perhaps one general reason, that in a certain way has had its
unconscious influence upon many of us, is best stated in the following
characteristic passage from the "Book-hunter:"
"To every man of our Saxon race endowed with full health and strength,
there is committed the custody of a restless demon, for which he is
doomed to find ceaseless excitement, either in honest work, or some less
profitable or more mischievous occupation. Countless have been the
projects of man to open up for this fiend fields of exertion great
enough for the absorption of its tireless energies, and none of them is
more hopeful than the great world of books, if the demon is docile
enough to be coaxed into it."
Since Burton's day the "great world of books" has taken on many phases
of which he never dreamed. And we, as librarians, may reasonably believe
that if not entirely a part and parcel of it, we are nevertheless called
upon to deal with that "world" in almost every form, and are ourselves
more or less important factors in it. We may not be called upon to adopt
the "strenuous life," or seek to impart it to the conduct and activities
of others. But necessarily we are and must be accustomed to "doing
things"; and, by that very doing, will in some degree, each in our own
field, inspire and influence others also.
Furthermore, do we not find _our_ "restless demon of work" more
agreeably inclined and contentedly occupied in the library field than in
other lines of life which we may have previously entered into? I, for
one, certainly think so, even though we may not have had that idea in
mind at the outset, or when making the change. And, too, that we derive
a certain feeling of encouragement akin to inspiration, that in itself
renders _us_ contented and happy, when responding to the varied demands
on our time and energy that are entailed by our positions as librarians.
That is half the battle, the rest being but a question of persistence in
the application of means and ability.
Therefore, in the consoling words of one of Elbert Hubbard's salient
sayings: "Blessed is that man who has found his work."
It is not the purpose of these present remarks to set forth particularly
the compensations in a librarian's work; neither the advantages or
disadvantages, the opportunities or drawbacks therein. Those factors
have all been frequently and well discussed in prior years, by some of
our well-known associates and various contributors to library
literature. I desire, rather, to suggest some features and relationships
connected with our work as a profession, from which an occasional lesson
may be taken, and possibly a word of encouragement, if such be needed.
First of all, is librarianship a profession? Does it possess the
characteristics that make it such; and is that work more nearly
professional than otherwise, which lies at its hands to be done? Some
such queries were propounded to me by the president of a state library
association one day last fall, as we were journeying together to an
annual meeting. He, himself, had been a teacher and an educational
administrator for a number of years before becoming a librarian; and of
the recognized professional standing of his _former_ occupation there
could be no doubt.
My first, and off-hand, answer was to the effect that librarianship
certainly has many professional features, even though its being a true
and undoubted profession in every respect might be disputed now and
then. Going further into this question of professional status, however,
it will be found that the literature of views and discussions thereon,
pro and con, is by no means small. For one of us to now express a doubt
that librarianship, as a whole, is a profession, would be almost
presumptuous; and I, for one, do not propose to do so. My thesis, so far
as it relates to the present remarks, is in affirmation of the claim;
not only that it is a profession--our profession--but really the
profession of professions!
All other professions now depend to a considerable extent upon that of
the librarian for the custodianship of their literature, without whose
care much of it might be lost. We may not be able to transmit to future
eras such enduring records of antiquity as has been done by the
librarian of old in his collection of clay tablets (which now serve to
tell us of the affairs of mankind as transacted thousands of years ago),
but it is certain that we are doing our part towards making modern
literature available in disseminating it, and in preserving it as far as
lies in our power.
Cotemporaneous with the organization of this association Melvil Dewey
made the following decided and well-supported assertion: "The time has
at last come when a librarian, may, without assumption, speak of his
occupation as a profession." I cite Mr. Dewey's words, not as
necessarily conclusive, but because he has ever been an active and
constant supporter of that doctrine in both his work as a librarian, as
a noted stimulator of the library movement, and as an originator of
professional instruction of other librarians. Similar enthusiastic and
persistent efforts on the part of librarians generally may do much
towards the furtherance of such features, and the consequent development
of librarianship as a profession in all its aspects.
Let us now consider for a few moments some features of resemblance and
diversity between the library profession and others quite as well or
better known. It has been said that the library exists chiefly for the
use of its patrons, and that the librarian is necessarily and
essentially a servant. Therefore the librarian must, of equal necessity,
earn a livelihood or receive compensation of some kind for his services.
All of which, in the main, is true of the professions generally, as will
be seen from a brief statement of circumstances.
Doctors, lawyers, accountants, engineers, artists, etc., are engaged by
and receive pay from their respective clients. The clergy are supported
by contributions of their church members or from denominational
resources. Teachers in the public schools are paid from public taxes,
while those of private schools, or endowed institutions, receive their
compensation from various sources.
The clergy and teachers, as a rule, like most librarians, no matter how
willing or how well qualified, are under the further necessity of
obtaining a "call," or position, as a prerequisite to the exercise of
their professional faculties. In that respect they are at a disadvantage
in comparison with those practitioners in the other professions, already
named, who can go to any locality, solicit clients and seek business
opportunities, with reasonable assurance of obtaining both according to
place and the circumstances of supply and demand.
In some of the professions, both the so-called "learned" and the
practical ones, there have been developed certain well recognized
differentiations and specializations of professional work. Those lines
have usually been taken up in response to what has seemed a reasonable
demand for them; and in their exercise have not unfrequently brought
both reputation and corresponding remuneration to the specialists.
Possibly the time has arrived for doing much more of that nature in the
library profession than has yet been customary. And there are those
among us, possessing a due amount of working experience coupled with
knowledge of other and allied affairs, who might now do well to devote
themselves to some special features of library enterprise as a matter of
desirable business opportunity. Some from the library schools, and a few
others, have gone out as "organizers," and found more or less of a field
for the exercise of their limited special qualifications. The field
ought to be a growing one, it would seem, if recourse to incompetent aid
is carefully avoided.
But the offices of "consulting librarianship," while possessing many
desirable and much needed features, do not appear to be practised as a
specific function. Something of the kind has been urged in past years,
to be sure, and several well-known librarians did undertake at different
times to supply such services. Sooner or later, however, each one was
persuaded into a more certain, or better compensated, and permanent,
position of local librarianship, and thereupon abandoned that special
line of work.
In this era of the establishment of so many new libraries, small and
great, and of the gift of hundreds of buildings for such purposes, there
is a decided need for the effective services which a consulting
librarian might render; and this to a greater extent than is yet fully
understood or appreciated. Lacking such, some librarians and more
library trustees work too often at a disadvantage. Many more, too, are
burdened with repeated calls for information which more properly ought
to be obtained from an independent expert; one so situated as to take an
unbiased view of circumstances and equally able to give advice best
suited to the particular case in hand. Serious mistakes are sometimes
made in the preliminary details of new library enterprises that might
be just as easily avoided by the employment of a competent and paid
professional adviser.
Turning now to another side of our subject, and considering the relation
of the individual librarians rather than of the profession as a class, a
few words upon personal actions may not be out of place. A librarian's
position is usually of a public or semi-public nature; ability for its
duties is implied; and the compensation received is for present services
as a rule, rather than as a reward of merit. In order that the library
shall perform all that is expected of it, not only in being to some
extent an ever-running machine but equally in respect to its recognized
higher functions, there must be the application of watchful care,
constant attention, foresight, and unremitting work. The direction of
all of which, and perhaps much of its actual execution, must depend upon
the person placed in charge of the institution as its librarian.
It is true that, having a well-trained body of assistants, a library may
be able to run on for a time in the prolonged absence of, or when
lacking, a chief; because impetus and the effects of past direction are
not lost at once, provided that no demoralization has taken place. But
it is not a safe policy to allow a library, or other working institution
that depends largely upon the work of trained employees for its
effectiveness, to go long at a time without the presence and oversight
of an actual and capable head.
Yet it does not follow that the working hours of chief librarians should
be absorbed in attending to innumerable and trivial items of detail
which might be delegated to and done quite as well, or better, by their
assistants. Not only is "genius a capacity for evading hard work," as
has been said, but one of the proper duties of the executive of a
library is to obtain the best results possible from the respective
capacities of those through whom the library does its work. All of which
should imply the exercise of a kindly and broad-minded disposition
towards one's assistants, just as truly as of respect and obedience to
one's superiors, or of courtesy and suavity in dealing with customers
and the public. It may be only human for one to desire to be that "king
of his world," of whom Carlyle speaks; but any policy which reduces the
assistants to mere machines is not a true professional one, since it
tends to rob the library world of talent which is needed and, except for
such repression, might be developed and brought forward.
On the other hand I might plead no less for corresponding loyalty and
fidelity on the part of all library workers, both to their respective
chiefs and the institutions that employ them. As a matter of fact,
however, action of that kind is the prevailing practice in this country,
with hardly an exception, and that phase needs no extended discussion. A
chief is, of course, entitled to credit for acts done by subordinates at
his direction and for which he is responsible. But chiefs, in turn, can
well afford to give recognition to the ability and deeds of their
assistants, and will seldom, if ever, lose by doing so.
There are one or two other features of librarianship which merit passing
mention. Among them are what may be termed library succession, or the
librarian's duty to his successor. Some few librarians "die in the
harness"; while quite as many more change from one place to another at
times. Occasionally they are succeeded by those who come new into the
work; and, gaining experience, become a credit to the profession.
Advancement of those trained in smaller libraries to places in larger
ones, or from the position of assistant in a library to the head
thereof, has also brought forward quite as many more of those whose
progress we watch with cordial interest.
Although conscious of those facts, and of the inevitable changes and
successions that must occur from year to year, do we recognize our duty
to our successor? I have asked the question, but its consideration must
be left to some future time and opportunity.
Impartiality in enforcing rules, and in dispensing the privileges of the
library to all comers, should be deemed an important feature of
librarianship, quite as essential to the welfare of the institution as
to the professional success of the librarian. And this suggests a query,
which has before now been raised, as to how far librarians should go in
aiding persons who expect to use information obtained at the library,
solely for the furtherance of personal interests or for purposes of
pecuniary profit. Impartial and confidential treatment of all readers
and seekers, who come to the library after information, would appear to
be the only safe practice and criterion, regardless of their particular
motives. Care should be taken, of course, to assist them in gaining the
desired information by means of their own study, and in their own way,
rather than through the efforts of library employees applied to
searching out the exact and final facts for them.
In conclusion, I would direct your attention very briefly to yet another
side of librarianship which ought to have an occasional bearing so far
as ethical principles may apply.
Since we regard librarianship as a profession it would seem that there
must needs be some recognized principles of an ethical nature relating
to it. Like many of our working methods, however, they must probably
exist chiefly as "unwritten laws." It is always a difficult matter to
put our ideals into words. They may be quite real to the sensibilities
and yet hardly admit of being formulated. And, too, the evident contrast
between the ideals aimed at, and the results attained, is often so great
that one hesitates to say in so many words just what is his ideal.
Still there have been developed in the other leading professions, those
that are regarded as the most reputable and noteworthy, certain
recognized principles which serve to guide their members in many ways.
The full comprehension of such principles as an authoritative guide
tends to a correct measurement of the real value of one's professional
work. Likewise, while supplying certain ideals at the outset, they may
aid in determining the lines of effort and action which will tend to
elevate the profession itself and to the attainment of individual
success in its pursuits.
Perhaps it is too soon in the history of so young a profession to expect
very much in the nature of such formulations. To properly enumerate and
determine the essential principles must call for the attention of many
minds, working each in their own channel but aimed in the same general
direction, until the final outcome shall be a fully developed and
rounded code of library ethics which will thus be entitled to and gain
well deserved recognition and observance.
If, in the views and various thoughts, which I have presumed to set
forth at this time, such ideas as have a bearing on this last named
topic shall serve as hints to spur on some abler and more
philosophically versed person or persons to undertake the task, or serve
as a ground upon which to build a foundation code, I shall be greatly
pleased.
WHAT MAY BE DONE FOR LIBRARIES BY THE CITY.
BY THOMAS L. MONTGOMERY, _Trustee Free Library of Philadelphia_.
When, in the course of human events, it became necessary for our people
to dissolve the political bonds which connected them with another,
pretty much everything was declared a free and an inalienable right with
the exception of the public library. Whether it would have escaped the
attention of that founder of circulating libraries and everything else
that is useful, had it not been a time of extraordinary pressure of
business, or whether he purposely neglected it in the belief that a
people that had expressed such lofty sentiments as to life, liberty and
the pursuit of happiness might well be trusted to consider such matters
in due time it is not our purpose to discuss. He does not hesitate to
give credit to the libraries in his autobiography for making the common
tradesmen and farmers as intelligent as most gentlemen in other
countries, and for contributing in some degree to the stand so generally
made throughout the colonies in defense of their privileges. It was not
until about 1850 that the desirability of a city library was suggested
to the City Council of Boston by Josiah Quincy, then mayor. The council
cautiously Resolved, "That it would accept any donation from citizens
or others for the purpose of commencing a public city library and that
whenever the library shall be of the value of $30,000 it will be
expedient for the city to provide a suitable place and arrangements to
enable it to be used by the citizens with as great a degree of freedom
as the security of the property will permit." In July, 1852, the
trustees made a report "that in their opinion the finances of the city
will not permit of the erecting of a building and the purchase of an
ample library." They suggest "a moderate expenditure on the part of the
city for the purchase of books and the compensation of a librarian." It
was soon after this that Mr. Bates made his famous gift of $50,000 worth
of books "on condition that the city provide an adequate building which
shall be an ornament to the city." A complete history of this
institution would seem to be the best possible answer which could be
made to the question before us. What can the city do for the free
library. With a magnificent collection of 700,000 books, selected under
the administration of some of the best men who have dignified our
profession, and housed in the most expensive building ever erected by a
city for such a purpose, it would appear that the citizen of Boston
might rightly exclaim "Si monumentum quaeris, circumspice."
The things that can be done by a city are innumerable; what it _ought_
to do and what it _will_ do are perhaps more easily dealt with. Thinking
I might obtain some information on the subject I asked the question of
the librarian of the Free Library of Philadelphia. He settled himself in
his chair and assuming the tone of an oracle said that there were three
things that the city should do for its library. 1. Provide an adequate
appropriation for its maintenance; 2. Provide an extra appropriation for
emergencies; and 3. Provide a special appropriation for some particular
work which the librarian might be particularly interested in at the
time. I asked several other prominent librarians the same question and
their answers were to the same purport--namely, if the city could
furnish sufficient money they felt themselves fully competent to build
up an ideal institution.
We all know as a matter of fact that the strong libraries of the country
have been built up by other means than the mere appropriation of money
by city councils, and it is not unreasonable to mention as the first of
these the librarian. The city should see to it that this individual is a
man (or woman) strong, intellectual and vigorous, without bumptiousness,
which is often mistaken for vigor, and with those qualities which will
procure for him respectful attention from even those who may be opposed
to him. I have often heard addresses made before this Association
bewailing the fact that the city librarian had to deal with certain
political elements which very much hampered him. I should regard this
state of affairs as belonging to the time when the college president was
necessarily a professor of moral philosophy whose duties consisted of
receiving the senior class for one hour a week to discuss Whewell's
"Elements." Such an officer must now be an active administrative power
as well as an intellectual entity to at all meet the modern
requirements, and in like manner the public librarian should deem it a
privilege to meet the representatives of the city government and to have
the opportunity of impressing the needs of his institution upon them.
There is no better test of the capacity of the man for the great work in
which he is engaged.
Speaking practically I would state that in the building up of the
Philadelphia Free Library in which I have taken an active interest, the
political elements have always responded most generously to our
requests, and that the library has been more inconvenienced by the
writings and personal influence of certain well-to-do-citizens upon whom
the word "paternalism" has acted as a nightmare than by any difficulty
with the city government.
While the city should provide means and a proper official to conduct the
institution it should take much more care in the selection of the board
of trustees than is usually the case. They should be representative men,
who not only should be able to assist the librarian in the formation of
an educational institution, but also be able to devote a considerable
amount of time to matters relating to its policy. If the librarian is
not a systematic business man, one of the board or a committee should be
delegated to attend to the financial affairs, as it is absolutely
necessary that the accounts shall be at all times in as good condition
as in the most punctilious business house.
I would also suggest that a certain modesty be observed in the carrying
out of such work by a municipality. It is hard to think of anything that
could be said for this proposition when the magnificent buildings of
Boston, Chicago and Pittsburgh are taken into consideration; but I would
respectfully submit that the feeling of unrest among the great army of
industrial workers throughout the civilized world is growing. With the
tremendous progress in science and industry these people are claiming
that they can see no gain in the position of the common people. This
discontent has manifested itself lately in the opposition of the labor
organizations of certain towns to the munificent proposition made by one
of the most conscientious men who has ever been numbered among the
multimillionaires of the world. While it is not always wise to consider
too seriously the socialistic murmurings of a few negative people, I
submit that it is our duty to consider the effect produced upon the
poorest and most scantily clad patron of our libraries.
It is necessary that the library should be housed in a fireproof
building as soon as possible, and the owners of valuable books will
always choose such an institution for such gifts as they may make. I
believe that the Boston Library has received donations equal to half the
cost of the building since it has been housed in Copley square.
Finally, the city should insist that the library be an educational
institution and not receive its appropriation for recreation mainly. The
extraordinary demand for light fiction in public libraries has led to a
very unsatisfactory condition of affairs, and it is not uncommon to find
300 copies of a new novel necessary to at all meet the demand. There is
every indication that the public library will be furnished with a happy
release from this call upon their resources by the institution of the
Book Lovers' Library which has now extended its branches to all the
important cities. If this system can be extended on good business
principles, the happiness of public libraries would be complete
notwithstanding the slight falling off in circulation that might follow.
The motto of every such institution should be: _Libri libere liberis_,
which being freely translated, means: "A free people should have open
shelves if possible."
WHAT MAY BE DONE FOR LIBRARIES BY THE STATE.[A]
BY E. A. BIRGE, _President Board of Directors, Madison (Wis.) Public
Library_.
The relation of the state to libraries may be considered from three
points of view. The first and oldest library function of the state has
been the maintenance of a state library, usually begun for the
convenience of the legislature and in many states enlarged into a
general library. With this function has also gone the indirect support
of libraries for historical and scientific societies, incorporated by
the state and in some degree representing it. Much might be said on
possible lines of work for the state in this direction, but as this
function is the oldest and best understood, it may be named and passed
without further discussion.
Second, the state holds a relation to the local libraries in communities
which are supporting free libraries without aid from the state. The
state aids these libraries by enacting proper laws for their
organization. In general, the statutes should be such as will give the
local library the best opportunity for organization, and will leave it
when organized the largest amount of freedom in doing its work. The
earlier library laws of the states have very generally contained the
provision that, in order to establish a library in a community, the
proposition must be accepted by a majority of the voters at an election.
This provision has been found disadvantageous in Wisconsin, and was
eliminated from our library law in 1897. Experience has shown that it
is better to leave the establishment of a library, like other public
works of necessity and utility, to the common council, or other
representatives of the people in the larger towns and cities, rather
than to commit the proposition to the chance of a general election.
The third function of the state with reference to libraries is that
which may be called library extension. Here the state acts directly to
aid in the establishment of libraries and the extension of library work
in the communities which would otherwise lack libraries. The necessity
for this work has become apparent to the more progressive states of the
Union within recent years. The justification of this work lies in two
main reasons. First, libraries continue for the older youth of the
community and for adults the education which the state requires for
children. It is neither fair nor right for the state to maintain a
system of education which develops a love of knowledge and of reading,
and then leave the community without the means for continuing in later
youth the development begun in childhood. Second, it is known that the
intellectual isolation of the rural communities is one of the main
reasons for the much-lamented drift from the country into the cities,
and it has been found that the establishment of libraries affords one of
the most important means of bringing these small communities into
intellectual touch with the world.
The states then which have undertaken this work of library extension
have usually done so by means of the library commission. The first
commission was established by Massachusetts in 1890. Seventeen states
had established such commissions by the end of 1900--more than half of
them in the two years preceding that date. I have no statistics
regarding the establishment of such commissions in 1901. The work of
these commissions may be either advisory or missionary, aiding in the
establishment of libraries in the smaller communities which are able to
establish and maintain them under the guidance and advice of the
commission, and directly furnishing library facilities to the smallest
and weakest communities. In certain states direct state aid is given to
the smaller libraries, notably in Massachusetts, where each town library
established under the rules of the commission receives books to the
amount of $100. In some states aid is given in the purchase of books.
The direct furnishing of libraries is done mainly by means of travelling
libraries. So far as I can learn, these are now distributed by six
states. The system has grown throughout the Union, in various
manifestations, and its influence in bringing books to the communities
that most lack and need them has been of the utmost value. This work is
one of the greatest importance, and yet I believe it is one which will
ultimately pass into the hands of the counties or smaller governmental
bodies than the state.
Lastly, the commissions are aiding in the library work by the
establishment of library schools. In Wisconsin a summer school for
library training has been held for the past seven years, and represents
a class of work which it seems important that each state should
undertake, namely: the training of librarians for the smaller libraries
in which the salaries paid are necessarily so small that the librarians
cannot afford the expense of a complete course in library training. This
instruction applies especially to persons already in charge of small
libraries throughout the state, who have not had the opportunity to
secure professional training for their work, and it is of great value in
bringing them in touch with library effort and setting higher standards
of purpose and efficiency. Experience has shown that in a two months'
summer session instruction can be given of the greatest value to those
who are to have charge of this class of libraries.
In this department of library extension which the states have been
entering upon during the past decade lies the most important work which
the state can undertake for libraries. The work of the library
commissions means a systematic employment of the library as an
educational and social factor in the progress of the people. This is the
true mission of the library, and the most important function of the
state lies in effectively aiding it to perform this work.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote A: Abstract.]
WHAT MAY BE DONE FOR LIBRARIES BY THE NATION.
BY HERBERT PUTNAM, _Librarian of Congress_.
You have had suggestions as to what may be done for libraries by the
city and what by the state. Whatever is left over--if there is anything
left over--I am to treat as something that may be done by the
nation--the nation not as an aggregate of its parts, but as a unit,
acting through its central authority. There is a disposition to contend
that _everything_ which may be more effectively or more economically
done by a central authority for the larger area should be undertaken by
that authority. I am not prepared to go so far. There may be a value in
local effort that will repay its greater cost. But in an educational
work which involves the accumulation of material some of which is
exceedingly costly, only part of which is constantly in use, and little
of which perishes by use; a work whose processes are capable of
organization on a large scale and the application of co-operative
effort: there must be certain undertakings which, relatively speaking,
are possible only if assumed by a central authority. It is such
undertakings, for the largest area, that I am asked to discover and set
forth.
To do so involves consequences which may be inconvenient. For a possible
service means a correlative duty. And as I myself to a degree represent
here the central authority in question, whatever I state as a service
appropriate for that authority, I shall have to admit as a duty in which
I must share. I shall try to be candid. But under the circumstances I
cannot be expected to be more than candid.
In some respects the Federal Government of the United States has already
influenced the constitution, resources and service of our public
libraries. It has enacted laws which, having for their primary purpose
the protection of authors and publishers, benefit libraries by
encouraging the manufacture of books soundly, substantially and honestly
made. It has favored public libraries by exempting from tariff duty
books imported for their use. It has encouraged the study of the
classics by laying a penalty upon the general importation of books less
than twenty years old. In its executive capacity it is itself
investigator, author, publisher, manufacturer, distributor,
statistician, bibliographer, and librarian. It maintains at Washington,
with a generosity not paralleled by any other government, bureaus for
scientific research; it compiles, publishes, and freely distributes the
results of this research. It is the greatest publisher in the world, and
the largest manufacturer of books. In a single publication, repeated
each year, it consumes over a million pounds of paper stock; and it
maintains a bureau whose purpose is to replenish the forests which as
publisher it thus depletes. It distributes gratuitously to the libraries
of the United States each year over 300,000 volumes, embodying the
results of its research, its legislative proceedings, and an account of
its administrative activities. It maintains a bureau for the
investigation of problems in education, for the accumulation and
dissemination of information concerning the work of educational
institutions; and it has included the public libraries of this country
among such educational institutions. This bureau has issued three
reports tabulating statistics concerning them, one also (in 1876)
summarizing their history and two (in 1876 and in 1893) containing
essays which embody the best contemporary opinion as to library
equipment and methods. It has published as a document the A. L. A. list
of best books to form the basis of a public library.
Through its bureau of documents it is seeking to index and adequately to
exhibit its own publications, to facilitate their distribution to
libraries and to afford to libraries as to federal documents a clearing
house for duplicates.
All such services are obviously appropriate for the national authority
and may doubtless be continued and extended. If the interchange of books
among libraries is to be facilitated by special postal regulations this
can be accomplished by the national authority alone.
But in the case of a state a service has been described which is to be
rendered to local libraries by the library which the state itself owns
and maintains. Now the federal government also owns and maintains
libraries. What may be demanded of these? Certain precedents have
already been established. The library of the Surgeon General's
office--the most comprehensive in the world within its special
field--sends its books to members of the medical profession throughout
the United States, relieving just so much the burden upon local
libraries; and it has issued a catalog which is not merely in form and
method efficient, but is so nearly an exhibit of the entire literature
of the medical sciences that it renders unnecessary duplication of
cataloging and analytical work within the field which it covers. This
catalog has conferred a general benefit not equalled by any
bibliographic work within any other department of literature. It is
perhaps the most eminent bibliographic work yet accomplished by any
government. The cost of its mere publication--which is the cost
chargeable to the general benefit--has already exceeded $250,000.
But this library is but one of several collections maintained by the
Federal Government; the aggregate of which is already nearly two million
volumes. In each federal department and bureau there is a library. And
there is a central collection which in itself is already the largest on
the western hemisphere. It was created as a legislative library--for the
use of both Houses of Congress. It is still called the Library of
Congress. But it is now being referred to as something more. The
government has erected for it a building which is the largest, most
elaborate, and most costly yet erected for library purposes. The seven
million dollars which it cost has been paid not by the District of
Columbia, but by the country at large. No such sum would have been
requisite for a building to serve Congress alone. It seems to intend a
library that shall serve the country at large, if there is any such
thing possible. In fact the library is already being referred to as the
National Library of the United States. What does this mean? or rather,
what _may_ this mean? One naturally looks abroad--to the foremost of
national libraries.
The British Museum is a huge repository of material. In scope it is
universal. Its purpose is accumulation, preservation, and the aid of
research by accredited persons, upon its own premises. Its service is
purely responsive. It has printed catalogs of its own collections, but
does not undertake bibliographic work general in nature, nor engage in
co-operative bibliographic undertakings. It lends no books.
But I fear you will hardly be satisfied with the analogy. The British
Museum, you will say, is placed in a city which is not merely the
capital of the British Empire, but the metropolis; the literary
metropolis also of the Anglo-Saxon race. The Library of Congress is at
the capital of the United States. But this capital is not itself a
metropolis. No student in Great Britain has to travel over 500 miles to
reach the British Museum. A student in the United States may have to
travel as much as 3000 miles to reach the Library of Congress. The area
which supports the national library of Great Britain is but 100,000
square miles; that which supports the National Library of the United
States is ever 3,000,000 square miles. The conditions differ, and
therefore, you will say, the obligation. If there is any way in which
our National Library may "reach out" from Washington it should reach
out. Its first duty is no doubt as a legislative library--to Congress.
Its next is as a federal library to aid the executive and judicial
departments of the government and the scientific undertakings under
governmental auspices. Its next is to that general research which may be
carried on at Washington by resident and visiting students and scholars:
which in American history, political and social science, public
administration, jurisprudence and international law is likely to make
Washington its center, and which, under the auspices of the Washington
Memorial Institution--that new project for post graduate study involving
the use of the scientific collections and scientific experts at
Washington--is likely to be organized in various branches of the natural
and physical sciences as well. But this should not be the limit. There
should be possible also a service to the country at large: a service to
be extended through the libraries which are the local centers of
research involving the use of books. That claim may be made. Now what at
Washington might be useful to these libraries?
(A lively imagination is not requisite.) Suppose there could be a
collection of books universal in scope, as no local library with limited
funds and limited space can hope to be: a collection that shall contain
also particularly (1) original sources, (2) works of high importance for
occasional reference, but whose cost to procure and maintain precludes
their acquisition by a local library pressed to secure the material of
ordinary and constant need, and (3) the "useless" books; books not
costly to acquire, but of so little general concern as not to justify
cataloging, space and care in each local library if only they are known
to be preserved and accessible somewhere.
Such a collection must include also the general mass of books sought and
held by local libraries--the books for the ordinary reader; the daily
tools of research. Its maintenance will involve processes--of
classification and cataloging--highly costly. Suppose the results of
these processes could be made generally available, so as to save
duplication of such expenditure upon identical material held by local
libraries?
A collection universal in scope will afford opportunity for
bibliographic work not equalled elsewhere. Such work centered there
might advance the general interest with the least aggregate effort. The
adequate interpretation of such a collection will involve the
maintenance of a corps of specialists. Suppose these specialists could
be available to answer inquiries from all parts of the country as to
what material exists on any particular subject, where it is, how it may
be had, how most effectively it may be used?
There are special collections already existent in various localities in
the United States and likely to come into being through special local
advantage or incentive, or the interest of private collectors, or
private endowment--which cannot be duplicated at Washington. Suppose
there could be at Washington a bibliographic statement of that which is
peculiar to each of these collections; in brief, a catalog of the books
in the United States--not of every library, not of every copy of every
book, but of every _book_ available for an investigator?
There are various bibliographic undertakings which may be co-operative.
Suppose there could be at Washington a central bureau--with approved
methods, standard forms, adequate editorial capacity, and liberal
facilities for publication--which could organize and co-ordinate this
work among the libraries of the United States and represent them in such
of it as--like the new Royal Society index--is to be international?
There is the exchange of material duplicated in one library, needed by
another. Suppose there could be at Washington a bureau which would serve
as a clearing house for miscellaneous duplicates as the Bureau of
Documents serves for documents? It might accomplish much without
handling a single article; it might, like a clearing house proper as it
were, set debit against credit, _i. e._, compare the deficiencies in one
library with the surplus in another and communicate the results to the
institutions interested. It might do this upon slip lists sent in by
each--of duplicates and of particular deficiencies--in sets, for
instance. One of my associates has been guilty of this very suggestion.
It is likely to bring something upon his head. He may have his choice
between live coals and the ashes of repentance.
Now those are some of the things which might be asserted as the duty of
Washington to the country at large. I have touched them as lightly as
possible: but there they are. And we may not be able to avoid them. Nay,
we seem to be drifting toward them. To some of them we are apparently
already committed.
There is the building: that in itself seems to commit us. There is
equipment. There are books. As regards any national service the federal
libraries should be one library. They contain nearly two million
volumes. The Library of Congress contains net some 700,000 books and a
half million other items. It has for increase (1) deposits under the
copyright law, (2) documents acquired through distribution of the
federal documents placed at its disposal for exchange--formerly 50
copies of each, now 100, (3) books and society publications acquired by
the Smithsonian through its exchanges, (4) miscellaneous gifts and
exchanges, and, (5) purchases from appropriations. These have increased
from $10,000 a year prior to 1897 to $70,000 for the year 1901-2.
Such resources are by no means omnipotent. _No_ resources can make
absolutely comprehensive a library starting its deliberate accumulations
at the end of the 19th century. Too much material has already been
absorbed into collections from which it will never emerge.
But universality in scope does not mean absolute comprehensiveness in
detail. With its purchasing funds and other resources the Library of
Congress bids fair to become the strongest collection in the United
States in bibliography, in Americana (omitting the earliest), in
political and social science, public administration, jurisprudence. If
any American library can secure the documents which will exhibit
completely legislation proposed and legislation enacted it should be
able to. As depository of the library of the Smithsonian it will have
the most important collection--perhaps in the world--of the transactions
and proceedings of learned societies; and, adding its own exchanges and
subscriptions, of serials in general. With theology it may not
especially concern itself nor with philology to the degree appropriate
to a university library. Medicine it will leave as a specialty to the
library of the Surgeon-General's office, already pre-eminent, Geology to
the library of the Geological Survey. Two extremes it may have to
abstain from--so far as deliberate purchase is concerned: (1) the books
merely popular, (2) the books merely curious. Of the first many will
come to it through copyright; of the second many should come through
gift. (Perhaps in time the public spirit of American collectors and
donors may turn to it as the public spirit of the British turns to the
National Library of Great Britain.) Original sources must come to it, if
at all, chiefly by gift. Manuscript material relating to American
history it has, however, bought, and will buy.
Otherwise, chiefly printed books. Of these, the useful books; of these
again, the books useful rather for the establishment of the fact than
for the mere presentation of it--the books for the advancement of
learning, rather than those for the mere diffusion of knowledge.
Lastly there is an organization. Instead of 42 persons, for all manner
of service, there are now 261, irrespective of printers, binders, and
the force attending to the care of the building itself.
The copyright work is set off and interferes no longer with the energies
of the library proper. There is a separate division having to do with
the acquisition of material, another--of 67 persons--to classify and
catalog it. There are 42 persons attending to the ordinary service of
the reading room as supplied from the stacks, and there are eight
special divisions handling severally the current newspapers and
periodicals, the documents, manuscripts, maps, music, prints, the
scientific publications forming the Smithsonian deposit, and the books
for the blind. There is a Division of Bibliography whose function is to
assist in research too elaborate for the routine service of the reading
room, to edit the library publications, and to represent the library in
co-operative bibliographic undertakings. There is now within the
building, besides a bindery, with a force of 45 employees, a printing
office, with a force of 21. The allotment for printing and binding, in
1896 only $15,000, is for the coming year $90,000.
The immediate duty of this organization is near at hand. There is a huge
arrear of work upon the existing collection--necessary for its effective
use, and its intelligent growth. It must be newly classified throughout;
and shelf listed. The old author slip catalog must be revised and
reduced to print. There must be compiled a subject catalog, of which
none now exists. Innumerable gaps--that which is crooked can be made
straight, but that which is wanting cannot be numbered--innumerable gaps
are to be ascertained and filled. A collection of reference books must
be placed back at the Capitol, with suitable apparatus, to bring the
library once more into touch with Congress and enable it to render the
service to Congress which is its first duty. The other libraries of the
District must be brought into association--not by gathering their
collections into the Library of Congress, but by co-ordinating processes
and service. The Library of Congress as the center of the system can aid
in this. It can strengthen each departmental library by relieving it of
material not necessary to its special work. It can aid toward
specialization in these departmental libraries by exhibiting present
unnecessary duplication. (It is just issuing a union list of serials
currently taken by the libraries of the District which has this very
purpose.) It can very likely print the catalog cards for all the
government libraries--incidentally securing uniformity, and a copy for
its own use of each card--which in time will result in a complete
statement within its own walls of the resources of every departmental
library in Washington. It will supply to each such library a copy of
every card which it prints of a book in its own collections relating to
the work of the bureau which such library serves.
To reduce to order the present collection, incorporating the current
accessions, to fill the most inconvenient gaps, to supply the most
necessary apparatus in catalogs and to bring about a relation among the
libraries of Washington which shall form them into an organic _system_:
this work will of itself be a huge one. I have spoken of the equipment
of the Library of Congress as elaborate, the force as large, and the
appropriations as generous. All are so in contrast to antecedent
conditions. In proportion to the work to be done, however, they are not
merely not excessive, but in some respects far short of the need. To
proceed beyond those immediate undertakings to projects of general
service will require certain equipment, service, and funds not yet
secured, and which can be secured only by a general effort. But the
question is not what can be done, but what _may_ be done--in due time,
eventually.
A general distribution of the printed cards: That has been suggested. It
was suggested a half century ago by the Federal Government through the
Smithsonian Institution. Professor Jewett's proposal then was a central
bureau to compile, print and distribute cards which might serve to local
libraries as a catalog of their own collections. Such a project is now
before this Association. It may not be feasible: that is, it might not
result in the economy which it suggests. It assumes a large number of
books to be acquired, in the same editions, by many libraries, at the
same time. In fact, the enthusiasm for the proposal at the Montreal
meeting last year has resulted in but sixty subscriptions to the actual
project.
It may not be feasible. But if such a scheme can be operated at all it
may perhaps be operated most effectively through the library which for
its own uses is cataloging and printing a card for every book currently
copyrighted in the United States, and for a larger number of others than
any other single institution. Such must be confessed of the Library of
Congress. It is printing a card for every book currently copyrighted,
for every other book currently added--for every book reached in
re-classification--and thus in the end for every book in its collection.
It is now printing, at the rate of over 200 titles a day--60,000 titles
a year. The entry is an author entry, in form and type accepted by the
committee on cataloging of the A. L. A. The cards are of the standard
size--3 × 5 inches--of the best linen ledger stock. From 15 to 100
copies of each are now printed. It would be uncandid to say that such a
number is necessary for the use of the library itself, or of the
combined libraries at Washington. The usefulness of copies of them to
any other library for incorporation in its catalogs must depend upon
local conditions: the style, form, and size of its own cards, the number
of books which it adds yearly, the proportion of these which are
current, and other related matters. On these points we have sought
statistics from 254 libraries. We have them from 202. With them we have
samples of the cards in use by each, with a complete author entry.
Having them we are in a position really to estimate the chances. I will
not enter into details. Summarily, it appears that our cards might
effect a great saving to certain libraries and some saving to others,
and would entail a mere expense without benefit to the remainder--all of
which is as might have been guessed.
The distribution suggested by Professor Jewett and proposed by the A. L.
A. had in view a saving to the recipient library of cataloging and
printing on its own account. It assumed a subscription by each
recipient to cover the cost of the extra stock and presswork. There is
conceivable a distribution more limited in range, having another
purpose. The national library wishes to get into touch with the local
libraries which are centers for important research. It wishes the
fullest information as to their contents; it may justifiably supply them
with the fullest information as to its own contents. Suppose it should
supply them with a copy of every card which it prints, getting in return
a copy of every card which they print? I am obliged to disclose this
suggestion: for such an exchange has already been begun. A copy of every
card printed by the Library of Congress goes out to the New York Public
Library: a copy of every card printed by the New York Public Library
comes to the Library of Congress. In the new building of the New York
Public Library there will be a section of the public card catalog
designated The Catalog of the Library of Congress. It will contain at
least every title in the Library of Congress not to be found in any
library of the metropolis. In the Library of Congress a section of the
great card catalog of American libraries outside the District will be a
catalog of the New York Public Library.
I have here a letter from the librarian of Cornell University forwarding
a resolution of the Library Council (composed in part of faculty
members) which requests for the university library a set of these cards.
Mr. Harris states that the purpose would be to fit up cases of drawers
in the catalog room, which is freely accessible to any one desiring to
consult bibliographical aids, and arrange the cards in alphabetical
order by authors, thus making an author catalog of the set. He adds "The
whole question has been rather carefully considered and the unanimous
sense of the council was that the usefulness of the catalog to us would
be well worth the cost of the cases, the space they would occupy, and
the time it would take to arrange and keep in order the cards."
There is a limit to such a distribution. But I suspect that it will not
stop with New York and Ithaca.
There is some expense attendant on it. There is the extra stock, the
presswork, the labor of sorting and despatching. No postage, however,
for the Library of Congress has the franking privilege, in and out. The
results however: one cannot deny them to be attractive. At Washington a
statement of at least the distinctive contents of every great local
collection. At each local center of research a statement of the
distinctive contents of the national collection. An inquirer in
Wisconsin writes to Washington: is such a book to be had in the United
States; must he come to Washington for it, or to New York?--No, he will
find it in Chicago at the Newberry or the Crerar.
If there can be such a thing as a bibliographic bureau for the United
States, the Library of Congress is in a way to become one; to a degree,
in fact, a bureau of information for the United States. Besides routine
workers efficient as a body, it has already some expert bibliographers
and within certain lines specialists. It has not a complete corps of
these. It cannot have until Congress can be made to understand the need
of them. Besides its own employees, however, it has within reach by
telephone a multitude of experts. They are maintained by the very
government which maintains it. They are learned men, efficient men,
specially trained, willing to give freely of their special knowledge.
They enter the government employ and remain there, not for the pecuniary
compensation, which is shamefully meagre, but for the love of the work
itself and for the opportunity for public service which it affords. Of
these men, in the scientific bureaus at Washington, the National Library
can take counsel: it can secure their aid to develop its collections and
to answer inquiries of moment. This will be within the field of the
natural and physical sciences. Meantime within its walls it possesses
already excellent capacity for miscellaneous research, and special
capacity for meeting inquiries in history and topography, in general
literature, and in the special literature of economics, mathematics and
physics. It has still Ainsworth Spofford and the other men, who with
him, under extraordinary disadvantages, for thirty-five years made the
library useful at the Capitol.
The library is already issuing publications in book form. In part these
are catalogs of its own contents; in part an exhibit of the more
important material in existence on some subject of current interest,
particularly, of course, in connection with national affairs. Even
during the period of organization fifteen such lists have already been
issued. They are distributed freely to libraries and even to individual
inquirers.
But there may be something further. The distribution of cards which
exhibit its own contents or save duplication of expense elsewhere, the
publication of bibliographies which aid to research, expert service
which in answer to inquiry points out the best sources and the most
effective methods of research: all these may have their use. But how
about the books themselves? Must the use of this great collection be
limited to Washington? How many of the students who need some book in
the Library of Congress--perhaps there alone--can come to Washington to
consult it at the moment of need? A case is conceivable: a university
professor at Madison or Berkeley or San Antonio, in connection with
research important to scholarship, requires some volume in an unusual
set. The set is not in the university library. It is too costly for that
library to acquire for the infrequent need. The volume is in the
National Library. It is not at the moment in use at Washington. The
university library requests the loan of it. If the National Library is
to _be_ the national library----?
There might result some inconvenience. There would be also the peril of
transit. Some volumes might be lost to posterity. But after all we are
ourselves a posterity. Some respect is due to the ancestors who have
saved for _our_ use. And if one copy of a book possessed by the federal
government and within reasonable limits subject to call by different
institutions, might suffice for the entire United States--what does
logic seem to require--and expediency--and the good of the greater
number?
The Library of Congress is now primarily a reference library. But if
there be any citizen who thinks that it should never lend a book--to
another library--in aid of the higher research--when the book can be
spared from Washington and is not a book within the proper duty of the
local library to supply--if there be any citizen who thinks that for the
National Library to lend under these circumstances would be a misuse of
its resources and, therefore, an abuse of trust--he had better speak
quickly, or he may be too late. Precedents may be created which it would
be awkward to ignore.
Really I have been speaking of the Library of Congress as if it were the
only activity of the federal government of interest to libraries. That,
however, is the fault of the topic. It was not what might be done for
science, for literature, for the advance of learning, for the diffusion
of knowledge. It was merely what might be done for _libraries_; as it
were, not for the glory of God, but for the advancement of the church.
We have confidence in the mission of libraries and consider anything in
aid of it as good in itself.
Their most stimulating, most fruitful service must be the direct
service. The service of the national authority must in large part be
merely indirect. It can meet the reader at large only through the local
authority. It can serve the great body of readers chiefly through the
local libraries which meet them face to face, know their needs, supply
their most ordinary needs. Its natural agent--we librarians at least
must think this--is its own library--the library which if there is to be
a national library not merely of, but _for_ the United States--must be
that library.
_Must become_ such, I should have said. For we are not yet arrived. We
cannot arrive until much preliminary work has been done, and much
additional resource secured from Congress. We shall arrive the sooner in
proportion as you who have in charge the municipal and collegiate
libraries of the United States will urge upon Congress the advantage to
the interests you represent, of undertakings such as I have described.
To this point we have not asked your aid. In the equipment of the
library, in the reconstruction of its service, in the addition of more
expert service, in the improvement of immediate facilities, our appeal
to Congress has been based on the work to be done near at hand. I have
admitted to you the possibility of these other undertakings of more
general concern. If they commend themselves to you as proper and
useful--the appeal for them must be primarily your appeal.
THE TRUSTEESHIP OF LITERATURE--I.
BY GEORGE ILES, _New York City_.
Six months ago the curtain descended upon what is likely to be accounted
the most memorable century in the annals of mankind. So salient are
three of its characteristics that they challenge the eye of the most
casual retrospection. First of all, we see that knowledge was increased
at a pace beyond precedent, to be diffused throughout the world with a
new thoroughness and fidelity. Next we must observe how republican
government passed from the slender ties spun in the times of Washington,
Jefferson and Adams, to the intimate and pervasive cords of to-day,
when, as never before, the good of the bee is bound up with the welfare
of the hive. Parallel with this political union of each and all there
was a growth of free organization which, in every phase of life, has
secured uncounted benefits which only joined hands may receive. Fresh
torches of light fraternally borne from the centers of civilization to
its circumference have tended to bring the arts and ideals of life
everywhere to the level of the best. These distinctive features of the
nineteenth century were in little evidence at its dawn, but they became
more and more manifest with each succeeding decade. In American
librarianship, as in many another sphere of labor, more was accomplished
in the last quarter of the century than in the seventy-five preceding
years.
It is as recently as 1852 that Boston opened the doors of the first free
public library established in an American city. Its founders were
convinced that what was good for the students at Harvard, the
subscribers to the Athenæum, was good for everybody else. Literature,
they felt, was a trust to be administered not for a few, but for the
many, to be, indeed, hospitably proffered to all. To this hour, by a
wise and generous responsiveness to its ever-growing duties, the Boston
foundation remains a model of what a metropolitan library should be. As
with the capital, so with the state; to-day Massachusetts is better
provided with free public libraries than any other commonwealth on the
globe; only one in two hundred of her people are unserved by them, while
within her borders the civic piety of her sons and daughters has reared
more than six score library buildings. The library commission of the
state is another model in its kind; its powers are in the main advisory,
but when a struggling community desires to establish a library, and
contributes to that end, the commission tenders judicious aid. The
population of Massachusetts is chiefly urban, an exceptional case, for
taking the Union as a whole, notwithstanding the constant drift to the
cities, much more than half the people are still to be found in the
country. For their behoof village libraries have appeared in thousands.
Still more effective, because linked with one another, are the
travelling libraries, inaugurated by Mr. Melvil Dewey in New York in
1893, and since adopted in many other states of the Union, and several
provinces of Canada. All this registers how the democracy of letters has
come to its own. Schools public and free ensure to the American child
its birthright of instruction; libraries, also public and free, are
rising to supplement that instruction, to yield the light and lift, the
entertainment and stimulus that literature stands ready to bestow. The
old-time librarian, who was content to be a mere custodian of books, has
passed from the stage forever; in his stead we find an officer anxious
that his store shall do all the people the utmost possible good. To that
end he combines the zeal of the missionary with the address of a
consummate man of business. Little children are invited to cheery rooms
with kind and intelligent hospitality; teachers and pupils from the
public schools are welcomed to classrooms where everything is gathered
that the library can offer for their use; helpful bulletins and
consecutive reading lists are issued for the home circle; every book,
magazine and newspaper is bought, as far as feasible, with an eye to the
special wants and interests of the community; information desks are set
up; and partnerships are formed with expositors of acknowledged merit,
with museums of industry, of natural history, of the fine arts. Not the
borrowers only, but the buyers of books are remembered. The Standard
Library, brought together by Mr. W. E. Foster, in Providence, is a
shining example in this regard.
The sense of trusteeship thus variously displayed has had a good many
sources; let us confine our attention to one of them. During the past
hundred years the treasure committed to the keeping of librarians has
undergone enrichment without parallel in any preceding age. We have more
and better books than ever before; they mean more than in any former
time for right living and sound thinking. A rough and ready
classification of literature, true enough in substance, divides it into
books of power, of information, and of entertainment. Let us look at
these three departments a little in detail. Restricting our purview to
the English tongue, we find the honor roll of its literature lengthened
by the names of Wordsworth, Tennyson and Matthew Arnold, Carlyle and
Ruskin, Emerson and Lowell. And not only to authors such as these must
our debt be acknowledged. We owe scholarly editors nearly as much. In
Spedding's Bacon, the Shakesperean studies of Mr. Furniss, and the
Chaucer of Professor Skeat, we have typical examples of services not
enjoyed by any former age. To-day the supreme poets, seers and sages of
all time are set before us in the clearest sunshine; their gold, refined
from all admixture, is minted for a currency impossible before. In their
original, unedited forms, the masterpieces of our language are now cheap
enough to find their way to the lowliest cottage of the cross-roads.
It is not, however, in the field of literature pure and simple that the
manna fell most abundantly during the past hundred years. Mr. Alfred
Russel Wallace, the last of the great students who took all natural
history for their province, declares that the advances in discovery,
invention and generalization during the nineteenth century outweigh
those of all preceding time. Admit this judgment, and at once is
explained why the records and the spirit of science dominate the
literature of the last ten decades. And let us note that while books of
knowledge have increased beyond measure, they have appeared with a
helpfulness and with merits wholly new. For the first time in the
history of letters, men and women of successful experience, of practised
and skilful pens, write books which, placed in the hands of the people,
enlighten their toil, diminish their drudgery, and sweeten their lives.
Cross the threshold of the home and there is not a task, from choosing a
carpet to rearing a baby, that has not been illuminated by at least one
good woman of authority in her theme. On the heights of the literature
of science we have a quality and distinction unknown before these later
days. The modern war on evil and pain displays weapons of an edge and
force of which our forefathers never dared to dream; its armies march
forward not in ignorant hope, but with the assured expectation of
victory. All this inspires leaders like Huxley, Spencer and Fiske with
an eloquence, a power to convince and persuade, new in the annals of
human expression and as characteristic of the nineteenth century as the
English poetry of the sixteenth, in the glorious era of Elizabeth. The
literature of knowledge is not only fuller and better than of old, it is
more wisely employed. In the classroom, and when school days are done,
we now understand how the printed page may best direct and piece out the
work of the hand, the eye and the ear; not for a moment deluding
ourselves with the notion that we have grasped truth merely because we
can spell the word. To-day we first consider the lilies of the field,
not the lilies of the printer; that done it is time enough to take up a
formal treatise which will clarify and frame our knowledge. If a boy is
by nature a mechanic, a book of the right sort shows him how to
construct a simple steam engine or an electric motor. Is he an amateur
photographer, other books, excellently illustrated, give him capital
hints for work with his camera. It is in thus rounding out the circle
which springs from the school desk that the public library justifies its
equal claim to support from the public treasury.
In the third and last domain of letters, that of fiction, there is a
veritable embarrassment of riches. During the three generations past
the art of story-telling culminated in works of all but Shakesperean
depth and charm. We have only to recall Scott and Thackeray, Hawthorne,
George Eliot and Thomas Hardy, to be reminded that an age of science may
justly boast of novelists and romancers such as the world never knew
before. No phase of life but has been limned with photographic fidelity,
no realm of imagination but has been bodied forth as if by experience on
fire, so that many a book which bears the name of fiction might well be
labelled as essential truth. Within the past decade, however, the old
veins have approached their bounds, while new lodes do not as yet
appear. Of this the tokens are the eager sifting of the rubbish heap,
the elaborate picturing of the abnormal and the gross. Pens unable to
afford either delight or cheer have abundant capacity, often with
evident malice, to strike the nerves of horror and of pain. If at the
present hour high achievement in fiction is rare, if we hear more echoes
than ever and fewer voices, quantity abounds to the point of surfeit.
With an output in America alone of 616 works for 1900, all fears of
famine may well be allayed.
The main fact of the situation then is that the librarian's trust has of
late years undergone stupendous increase; this at once broadens his
opportunities and adds to his burdens. Gold and silver, iron and lead,
together with much dross, are commingled in a heap which rises every
hour. Before a trust can be rightly and gainfully administered, its
trustees must know in detail what it is that they guard, what its
several items are worth, what they are good for. And let us remember
that literature consists in but small part of metals which declare
themselves to all men as gold or lead; much commoner are alloys of every
conceivable degree of worth or worthlessness. There is plainly nothing
for it but to have recourse to the crucibles of the professional
assayer, it becomes necessary to add to the titles of our catalogs some
responsible word as to what books are and what rank they occupy in an
order of just precedence.
This task of a competent and candid appraisal of literature, as a
necessity of its trusteeship, has been before the minds of this
Association for a good many years. A notable Step toward its
accomplishment was taken when Mr. Samuel S. Green, in 1879, allied
himself with the teachers of Worcester, Massachusetts, that they and he
together might select books for the public schools of that city. The
work began and has proceeded upon comprehensive lines. Such literature
has been chosen as may usefully and acceptably form part of the daily
instruction, there is a liberal choice of books of entertainment and
inspiration worthily to buttress and relieve the formal lessons. The
whole work goes forward with intent to cultivate the taste, to widen the
horizons, to elevate the impulses of the young reader. Mr. Green's
methods, with the modifications needful in transplanting, have been
adopted far and wide throughout the Union. Already they have borne fruit
in heightening the standards of free choice when readers have passed
from the school bench to the work-a-day world.
Thus thoughtfully to lay the foundation of the reading habit is a task
beyond praise; upon a basis so sound it falls to our lot to rear, if we
can, a worthy and durable superstructure. It is time that we passed from
books for boys and girls to books for the youth, the man and the woman.
And how amid the volume and variety of the accumulated literature of the
ages shall we proceed? For light and comfort let us go back a little in
the history of education, we shall there find a method substantially
that of our friend, Mr. Green. Long before there were any free libraries
at all, we had in America a small band of readers and learners who
enjoyed unfailing pilotage in the sea of literature. These readers and
learners were in the colleges, where the teachers from examination and
comparison in the study, the class-room and the laboratory were able to
say that such an author was the best in his field, that such another had
useful chapters, and that a third was unreliable or superseded. While
literature has been growing from much to more, this bench of judicature
has been so enlarged as to keep steadily abreast of it. At Harvard there
are twenty-six sub-libraries of astronomy, zoology, political economy,
and so on; at hand are the teachers who can tell how the books may be
used with most profit. Of the best critics of books in America the
larger part are to be found at Harvard, at its sister universities and
colleges, at the technological institutes and art schools of our great
cities. We see their signed reviews in such periodicals as the
_Political Science Quarterly_ and the _Physical Review_; or unsigned in
journals of the stamp of the _Nation_. Fortunately, we can call upon
reinforcements of this vanguard of criticism. It would be difficult to
name a branch of learning, an art, a science, an exploration, from
folk-lore to forestry, from psychical research to geological surveys,
whose votaries are not to-day banded to promote the cause they have at
heart. These organizations include not only the foremost teachers in the
Union, but also their peers, outside the teaching profession, of equal
authority in bringing literature to the balances. And the point for us
is that these societies, through their publications and discussions,
enable these laymen to be known for what they are. Because the American
Historical Association is thus comprehensive, its membership has opened
the door for an initial task of appraisal, important in itself and
significant for the future.
Drawing his two score contributors almost wholly from that Association,
Mr. J. N. Larned, of Buffalo, an honored leader of ours, has, without
fee or reward, acted as chief editor of an annotated Bibliography of
American History. The work is now passing through the composing room of
Houghton, Mifflin & Co., of Boston; its contributors include professors
of history at Bowdoin, Bryn Mawr, Columbia, Harvard, McGill, Toronto,
Tulane and Yale, as well as the Universities of Michigan, Wisconsin and
Chicago; our own Association is worthily represented by Messrs. James
Bain, Clarence S. Brigham, V. L. Collins, W. E. Foster, J. K. Hosmer, E.
C. Richardson and R. G. Thwaites. As a rule the notes are signed. Where
for any reason a book demanding notice could not be allotted to a
contributor, Mr. Larned has quoted the fairest review he could find in
print. He has included not only good books, but such other works as have
found an acceptance they do not deserve. All told his pages will offer
us about 3400 titles; a syllabus of the sources of American history is
prefixed by Mr. Paul Leicester Ford; as an appendix will appear a
feature also of great value. In their "Guide to American history,"
published in 1896, Professors Channing and Hart, of Harvard University,
recommended such collections of books as may be had for $5, $10, $20,
$50 or $100. Professor Channing is kind enough to say that he will
revise these lists and bring them down to date as a contribution to Mr.
Larned's work. Professor Channing may, we trust, name the books in each
collection in the order in which they may be most gainfully read.
In times past our bibliographies have begun to need enlargement the
moment they left the bindery; in the present case that need is for the
first time to be supplied. Mr. Larned's titles come to the close of
1899; beyond that period current literature is to be chosen from and
appraised with the editorship of Philip P. Wells, librarian of the Yale
Law Library, who will issue his series in card form. We hope that he may
be ready with his cards for 1900 at the time that Mr. Larned's book
appears. Thereafter Mr. Wells' series will probably be published quarter
by quarter. Beginning with 1897, Mr. W. Dawson Johnston, now of the
Library of Congress, has edited for us a series of annotated cards
dealing with the contemporary literature of English history. Both the
form and substance of his series are capital. In so far as his cards go
directly into catalog cases, where readers and students must of
necessity see them, they render the utmost possible aid. If subscribers
in sufficient array come forward, Mr. Larned's book may be remolded for
issue in similar card form, with a like opportunity for service in
catalog cases. In the Cleveland Public Library and its branches useful
notes are pasted within the lids of a good many volumes. It is well thus
to put immediately under the reader's eye the word which points him
directly to his goal, or prevents him wasting time in wanderings of
little value or no value at all.
With Mr. Larned's achievement a new chapter is opened in American
librarianship; he breaks a path which should be followed up with a
discernment and patience emulous of his example. If the whole working
round of our literature were sifted and labelled after his method, the
worth of that literature, because clearly brought into evidence, might
well be doubled at least. Every increase in the availability of our
books, every removal of fences, every setting-up of guide-posts, has had
a heartening public response. So it will be if we proceed with this
effort to bring together the seekers and the knowers, to obtain the best
available judgments for the behoof of readers and students everywhere.
Economics and politics, so closely interwoven with American history,
might well afford the second field for appraisal. A good many libraries
still find aid in the "Reader's guide" in this department, although it
appeared as long ago as 1891. Next might follow the literature of the
sciences pure and applied, together with the useful arts. Among useful
arts those of the household might well have the lead, for we must not be
academic, or ever lose sight of the duties nearest at hand to the great
body of the plain people. Mr. Sturgis and Mr. Krehbiel, in 1897, did an
excellent piece of work for us in their "Bibliography of the fine arts";
their guide might profitably be revised and enlarged in its several
divisions, not omitting the introductory paragraphs which make the book
unique in its class. These tasks well in hand, we might come to such
accessions of strength and insight as to nerve us for labors of wider
range and greater difficulty, where personal equations may baffle even
the highest court of appeal, where it is opinion rather than fact that
is brought to the scales. I refer to the debatable ground of ethics,
philosophy and theology; and, at the other pole of letters, to the vast
stretches of fiction and belles lettres in our own and foreign tongues.
With regard to fiction and belles lettres, one of Mr. Larned's methods
has a hint for us. In some cases he has found it best to quote Mr.
Francis Parkman, Mr. Justin Winsor, or the pages of the _Nation_, the
_Dial_, the _American Historical Review_, and similar trustworthy
sources. With respect to novels and romances, essays and literary
interpretation, it does not seem feasible to engage a special corps of
reviewers. It may be a good plan to appoint judicious editors to give us
composite photographs of what the critics best worth heeding have said
in the responsible press.
It is in the preponderant circulation of fiction, and fiction for the
most part of poor quality, that the critics of public libraries find
most warrant for attack. They point to the fact that many readers of
this fiction are comparatively well-to-do, and are exempted by public
taxation from supporting the subscription library and the bookseller.
The difficulty has been met chiefly in two ways; by curtailing the
supply of mediocre and trashy fiction; by exacting a small fee on
issuing the novels brought for a season to a huge demand by advertising
of a new address and prodigality. Appraisal, just and thorough, may be
expected to render aid more important because radical instead of
superficial. In the first place, the best books of recreation, now
overlaid by new and inferior writing, can be brought into prominence;
secondly, an emphasis, as persuasive as it can be made, ought to be
placed upon the more solid stores of our literature. "Business," said
Bagehot long ago, "is really more agreeable than pleasure; it interests
the whole mind, the aggregate nature of man more continuously and
deeply, but it does not look as if it did." Let it be our purpose to
reveal what admirable substance underlies appearances not always
seductive to the casual glance. Lowell and Matthew Arnold, Huxley and
John Fiske, Lecky and Goldwin Smith are solid enough, yet with no lack
of wit or humor to relieve their argument and elucidation. A New York
publisher of wide experience estimates that the average American family,
apart from school purchases, buys less than two books a year. Newspapers
and magazines form the staple of the popular literary diet. What fills
the newspapers is mainly news; their other departments of information
are often extensive and admirable, but within the limits of the hastily
penned paragraph or column they cannot rise to the completeness and
quality of a book carefully written and faithfully revised. The plain
fact is, and it behooves us to reckon with it, the average man, to whom
we bear our credentials as missionaries, looks upon a book as having
something biblical about it. To sit down deliberately and surrender
himself to its chapters is a task he waves away with strangely mingled
awe and dislike. So he misses the consecutive instruction, as delightful
as profitable to an educated taste, which authors, publishers and
librarians are ready and even anxious to impart.
We hear a good deal in these days about the need of recreation, and not
a word more than is true, but let us remember that the best recreation
may consist in a simple change of work. Behold the arduous toil of the
city lawyer, or banker, as on a holiday tour he climbs a peak of the
Alps or the Adirondacks, or wades the chilly streams of Scotland or
Canada a salmon rod in his hands. Why does he undergo fatigues so
severe? Partly because they are freely chosen, partly because they are
fatigues of an unwonted and therefore refreshing kind. So in the field
before us to-day. Truth is not only stranger than fiction, it is more
fascinating when once its charms are recognized and entertained. Our
public schools throughout the land prove that a true story of
exploration, of invention or discovery, of heroism or adventure, has
only to be well told to rivet a boy's attention as firmly as ever did
Robinson Crusoe or Treasure Island. When readers take up from
instinctive appetite, or wise incitement, the best books about flowers
or birds, minerals or trees, an art, a science, a research, they come to
joys in new knowledge, in judgments informed and corrected, unknown to
the tipplers and topers whose staple is the novel, good, bad and
indifferent. And why, if we can help it, should public money ever be
spent for aught but the public good?
With a new sense of what is implied in the trusteeship of literature, if
we endeavor in the future to ally ourselves with the worthiest critics
of books, we must bid good-bye to the temporary expedients which have
cramped and burdened our initial labors. The work of the appraisal of
literature requires a home, a Central Bureau, with a permanent and
adequately paid staff of editors and assistants. The training of such a
staff has already begun; in addition to the experience acquired by those
enlisted in our present bibliographical tasks, instruction is now given
in advanced bibliography at the New York State Library School at Albany,
and doubtless also at other library schools. And at the Central Bureau,
which we are bold enough to figure to ourselves, much more should be
done than to bring books to the balances. At such a home, in New York,
Washington, or elsewhere, every other task should proceed which aims at
furthering the good that literature can do all the people. There might
be conducted the co-operative cataloging now fast taking form; there
should be extended the series of useful tracts begun by that of Dr. G.
E. Wire on "How to start a library," by Mr. F. A. Hutchins on
"Travelling libraries." At such a center should be exhibited everything
to inform the founder of a public library; everything to direct the
legislator who would create a library commission on the soundest lines
or recast library laws in the light of national experience; there,
moreover, should be gathered everything to arouse and instruct the
librarian who would bring his methods to the highest plane. Thence, too,
should go forth the speakers and organizers intent upon awakening torpid
communities to a sense of what they miss so long as they stand outside
our ranks, or lag at the rear of our movement. In the fulness of time
such a bureau might copy the Franklin Society, of Paris, and call into
existence a needed book, to find within this Association a sale which,
though small, would be adequate, because free from the advertising taxes
of ordinary publishing. To found and endow such a bureau would
undoubtedly cost a great deal, and where is the money to come from? We
may, I think, expect it from the sources which have given us thousands
of public libraries, great and small. Here is an opportunity for our
friends, whether their surpluses be large or little. When a gift can be
accompanied by personal aid and counsel, it comes enriched. It is much
when a goodly gift provides a city with a library, it would be yet more
if the donation were to establish and maintain an agency to lift
libraries everywhere to the highest efficiency possible, to give
literature for the first time its fullest acceptance, its utmost
fruitage.
In a retrospective glance at nineteenth century science, Professor
Haeckel has said that the hundred years before us are not likely to
witness such victories as those which have signalized the era just at an
end. Assume for a moment that his forecast is sound, and that it applies
beyond the immediate bounds of science, what does it mean for
librarianship? It simply reinforces what in any case is clear, namely,
that it is high time that the truth and beauty of literature known to
the few made its way to all the people, for their enlightenment,
consolation and delight. If the future battles of science are to be
waged less strenuously than of yore, if scholarship has measurably
exhausted its richest mines, let us give the broadest diffusion to the
fruits of their triumphs past. In thus diffusing the leaven of culture
the public library should take a leading, not a subordinate part. Its
treasure is vaster and more precious than ever before. The world's
literature grows much like the world's stock of gold, every year's
winning is added to the mass already heaped together at the year's first
day. In the instruction, entertainment and inspiration of every man and
woman there is a three-fold ministry, that of art, of science, and of
letters. Because letters bring to public appreciation, to popular
sympathy, both art and science, and this in addition to their own
priceless argosies, may we not say that of art, science and letters, the
greatest of these is letters?
THE TRUSTEESHIP OF LITERATURE--II.
BY RICHARD T. ELY, _Director School of Economics, University of
Wisconsin_.
It is my purpose to speak plainly and, if possible, forcibly, concerning
what seems to me a grave menace to the progress of science, but in all
that I shall say, I would have it understood that I have only the
friendliest feelings personally for the gentleman who has brought
forward what seem to me dangerous proposals. I appreciate his zeal for
progress and his self-sacrificing efforts for human advancement in
various directions, but I think that in this particular case--namely,
the evaluation of literature, or the establishment of a judicature of
letters, my friend is working against his own ideals.
I admit freely that the readers in our public libraries very generally
need help in the selection of books, and that great assistance may be
rendered them by judicious advice. Much time is wasted by those who read
scientific and serious works which do not present the results of recent
investigations: furthermore, as another consequence effort is
misdirected and instead of producing beneficial results may do positive
damage. The question may be asked: "Shall I read Adam Smith's 'Wealth of
nations?' I hear it mentioned as one of the great works in the world's
history." Probably many a librarian has had this precise question asked
him. In giving an affirmative answer it will be most helpful to offer a
few words explaining the circumstances under which it appeared one
hundred and twenty-five years ago, and its relation to the subsequent
development of economic schools and tendencies. Doubtless this work is
frequently perused as if it were fresh from the press and were to be
judged as a work appearing in 1901.
I further admit the harm which has come to individuals from the study of
the so-called "crank" literature in economics and sociology, as well as
in other branches of learning. Doubtless many a man is working
vigorously in a wrong way and attempting to force society into false
channels who might be doing a good work had his reading been well
directed in a formative period.
But the magnitude of the interests involved in the proposal which greets
us requires caution and conservatism in action. We must take a long, not
a short, view of the matter, inquiring into remote and permanent
results.
It is proposed, as I understand it, to have so-called expert opinions
expressed concerning books, new and old; to secure as precise and
definite estimates of their value as possible, and then by means of
printed guides, and even card catalogs, to bring these opinions and
evaluations before the readers in our libraries.
Let us reflect for a moment on what this implies. It means, first of all
a judicial body of men from whom these estimates are to proceed. Have we
such a body? Is it in the nature of things possible that we should have
such a body? I say that so far as contemporary literature is concerned,
the history of knowledge gives us a positive and conclusive negative
answer--a most emphatic "No." Let anyone who knows the circumstances and
conditions under which reviews are prepared and published reflect on
what the attempt to secure this evaluation of literature implies. Many
of us know a great deal about these circumstances and conditions. We
have written reviews, we have asked others to write reviews, and we have
for years been in contact with a host of reviewers. We may in this
connection first direct out attention to the general character of the
periodicals from which quotations are frequently made in the evaluation
of literature. I say nothing about my own view, but I simply express an
opinion of many men whose judgment should have great weight when I say
that one of the most brilliant of these periodicals has been marked by a
narrow policy, having severe tests of orthodoxy along economic, social
and political lines, and displaying a bitterness and vindictiveness
reaching beyond the grave. I mention no names, and the opinion may or
may not be a just one; but it should be carefully weighed whether or
not, or to what extent, the evaluations of such a periodical ought to be
crystallized as it were: that is, taken from the periodical press and
made part of a working library apparatus, to last for years.
Another periodical, an able magazine, which makes much of reviews is
under the control of a strong body of men, but they stand for scarcely
more than one line of thought among many lines. And sometimes very sharp
and very hard things are said about those who believe that scientific
truth is moving along one of these other lines. Indeed, the discreet
person, knowing personally the reviewer and the reviewed, will not be
convinced that there is always in the reviews, here as elsewhere, an
absence of personal animosity. Let us for a moment reflect on this
personal element in reviews, as it has surely fallen under the notice of
every man with wide experience in these matters. As a rule, the
reviewers are comparatively young and inexperienced men, frequently
zealous for some sect or faction. Sometimes great leaders of thought
write reviews, but generally they are unable to find the time to do so.
As a result in our reviews in the best periodicals it will frequently be
found that an inferior is passing judgment on a superior, and
furthermore, reviewers share in our common human nature, and the amount
of personal bias and even at times personal malignity found in reviews
and estimates of books is something sad to contemplate. An unsuccessful
candidate for a position held by an author has been known to initiate a
scandalous and altogether malicious attack in a review.
In the next place, I would call your attention to the absence of
objective standards. Necessarily are the standards personal and
subjective; particularly and above all in economics, but in high degree
in sociology, ethics and philosophy in general, and religion. Biological
reviews have displayed in marked degree the subjective personal element.
Chemistry, physics, astronomy and mathematics probably are best of all
fitted for evaluations free from personal bias.
It may be asked what damage will result from evaluation. Passing over
grave injustice to individuals, we observe that they must lead to the
formation of what Bagehot aptly called a crust, preventing the free
development of science. We have been laboring for years to obtain
scientific freedom, freedom in teaching, freedom in learning, freedom in
expression. For this end many a battle has been fought by noble leaders
of thought. Indeed, every new movement of thought has to struggle to
make itself felt, and to struggle precisely against those who control
the most respectable avenues of publication; against the very ones who
would be selected to give expert opinions and make evaluations of
literature. Call to mind the opposition to Darwin and Huxley--although
they were especially and particularly fortunate in early gaining the
adherence of scientific men--also the opposition to Adam Smith, Malthus,
Ricardo and John Stuart Mill--and to the last named, even now, some
would on a scale of 100 give an evaluation perhaps of 50, others of
65--still others 80 and 90. Recently an economic book appeared of which
one widely quoted periodical said that it illustrated a _reductio ad
absurdum_ of false tendencies, while another expert opinion inclined to
place it among the great works of the age. It would seem to me that if
we are to have formal evaluations, they should at least be restricted to
works which have been before the public for a period of fifty years.
We have in this proposal, as I take it, an attack on liberty, proceeding
from one who would not willingly attack it, but illustrating the truth
of the saying "Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty." It is
proposed to publish virtually an _index librorum prohibitorum_ and an
_index expurgatorius_. And of all efforts ever conceived along this
line, this is precisely the worst because of its apparently impersonal
character. Let the ordinary reader go to a guide and find a book
described as unscientific and superficial, and what weight can it have
for him. The authority has spoken. It is well enough for librarians
personally to guide and direct their constituencies, and one review may
be weighed against another review. The old methods even must be used by
librarians cautiously, and they are ample for the purpose to be
attained. The great point is that there should be a fluid current of
opinion, and every facility for a revision of judgment should be
maintained. Reviewers themselves change their views. I, myself, remember
reviews which I wrote of works by two distinguished American authors,
which I now regret, as my estimates were, I believe, not altogether
sound and did an injustice to the authors, namely John Fiske and Lester
F. Ward. But after all, I suppose no special harm was done, but if
extracts from these reviews had been made part of a system of evaluation
it would have been different.
Librarians as librarians must watch with impartiality the struggles
among tendencies and schools of thought, and above all things, endeavor
to keep open a free way for new truth.
BOOK COPYRIGHT.
BY THORVALD SOLBERG, _Register of Copyright, Washington. D. C._
In order to keep within the time limit provided in the program I have
been obliged to refrain from even touching upon many points, but have
endeavored to present certain general principles governing copyright in
books. I shall, therefore, only attempt to make clear, as briefly as
possible:
1. What is copyrighted, _i.e._, what can properly be designated as a
"book" in order to secure copyright protection thereon;
2. What is the nature of the protection secured under the copyright law;
3. The limitation in time during which the protection applies, and its
territorial limitations;
4. Who may obtain protection--the difference between an "author" and a
"proprietor";
5. International copyright;
6. What conditions and formalities are required to be complied with in
order to secure copyright;
7. The functions of the Copyright Office; and
8. Possible copyright law amendment.
1. _What is copyrighted?_
The copyright statutes enumerate the articles or classes of articles
subject-matter of copyright, and first in the list stands "book." The
first consideration is, therefore, What is to be understood by the term
"book" as thus used? or, in other words, What is a "book," as that
designation is employed in the copyright law?
The answer is indicated in the provision of the federal constitution
upon which our copyright legislation is founded. This paragraph of the
constitution (section 8 of article 1) grants to Congress--"in order to
promote the progress of science and useful arts"--the right to enact
laws to secure "to authors ... the exclusive right to their ...
writings...." This provision is, of course, to be broadly interpreted,
but, using the exact wording of the law, it is the _writing_ of an
author--his literary composition--the prose or poetical expression of
his thought--which makes his "book," as the term is used in the
copyright law. In order to be a "book," subject to protection under the
copyright law, the author's production must have this literary
characteristic. The _quality_ of the literary ingredient is not tested,
but its presence is requisite. Hence not everything which may ordinarily
be called a book is fitly so nominated, in order to indicate the
subject-matter of copyright; while some productions not ordinarily
designated as "books" may properly be thus classified in order to be
registered as a preliminary to copyright protection.
That an article possesses the corporeal characteristics of a book is of
little consequence. The _literary_ substance, not the material form,
primarily determines the matter. An article contributed to a newspaper
or a periodical--although but a few paragraphs in length--is a "book"
under the copyright law, while a bookkeeper's ledger, to all outward
appearance answering the description, is not a "book" so far as
registering its title to secure copyright is concerned. A calendar whose
main features are literary may doubtless be properly registered as a
"book," but a pack of playing cards with pictures on the backs, even
though each card may be furnished with a linen guard and all bound up,
with a plausible title-page, so as to resemble a book, is not a "book"
in the meaning of the copyright law.
Orderly arranged information produced in a form which would commonly be
termed a chart cannot be registered under that designation which in the
copyright law is applicable only to a chartographical work, but may
properly be called a "book"; while a so-called book of coupons, or
railway tickets, or of blank forms, cannot be thus entitled.
In brief, it should be a book in the ordinary understanding of a work of
_literature_ or art, and may not include a production whose main feature
is some original idea, however ingenious or fanciful its form may be, or
is of the character of something invented. Invention must look for
protection to the patent law.
2. _The nature of the protection secured._
What is the nature of the protection secured? Copy-right, _i. e._, the
right of copy--the right to make copies. According to the words of our
own statute, the author of a book "shall have the _sole_ liberty of
printing, reprinting, publishing, completing, copying, executing,
finishing and vending the same." The _exclusive_ liberty of reproducing
his work, and the restriction of the liberty of every one except the
author to multiply copies constitute the literary property. It is a
much-discussed question whether the author's privilege of copyright is a
natural right or was created by legislation. Granting the production a
proper one, it would seem that the author of a literary creation has a
natural right to the unrestricted use and enjoyment of it. As Professor
Langdell recently put it: "he has the right of use and enjoyment,
because he can exercise such right without committing any wrong against
any other person, and because no other person can prevent his exercising
such right without committing a wrong against him." The author's
creation is his own, and he has a natural right to the use of it without
interference. The state does not create this right, but recognizes it
and protects it. Protection is secured by restricting the liberty of
other people in the use of the author's creation. Just how far this
restriction should go is still a moot question. The law says, however,
that you may not reproduce in whole or in part an author's book without
his written consent, signed in the presence of two witnesses. It does
not say that you may not read the book, nor are you forbidden to read it
in public, even for profit, although in the case of musical and dramatic
compositions public performance or representation for profit without the
author's special--not implied--consent is not only directly prohibited,
but is punishable by imprisonment. The International Publishers'
Congress, which met in Paris in June, 1896, passed a resolution to the
effect that the reproduction of a literary work by means of public
readings, in case such readings were held for purposes of profit, ought
not to be permitted without the consent of the copyright proprietor. By
the Act of March 3, 1891, the exclusive right to translate or dramatize
his book is reserved to the author. In this unrestricted and unlimited
exclusive right of translation and dramatization our law has exceeded
the usual trend of legislation in regard to the author's control over
his work in these directions. Foreign legislation usually only reserves
to the author the exclusive right to translate or dramatize for a
limited fixed period of time, and if he has not himself produced a
translation or dramatization within that period, another person may.
It has occasionally been intimated that the efforts made by the public
libraries to secure the constant circulation of the same book is a
trespass upon the rights of the author, as he is presumably thus
subjected to the loss of readers who would otherwise also become
purchasers of his book. A case has just been decided to test an author's
right to object to having copies of his own copyright editions of his
books sold in a manner not indicated by himself as volumes of a
so-called collected edition of his works. The decision, on first
hearing, was adverse to the author's contention.
It is the _literary expression_ of the author's thoughts and ideas which
is the subject-matter of the protection, and not primarily the thoughts
and ideas themselves. These last may or may not be original with the
author, but once he has made public a thought or an idea he has given it
away; he cannot control its use or application. The author of a
translation of a book--the original work being in the public domain--may
obtain a copyright upon his own translation, but doing so will not debar
another from producing an original translation of his own of the same
work and obtaining copyright registration for the same.
Copyright does not give to any one monopoly in the use of the _title_ of
a book, nor can a title _per se_ be subject-matter of copyright. It is
the book itself, the literary substance which is protected, the title
being recorded for the identification of the work.
3. _Time and territorial limitations of copyright._
A few countries still grant copyright in perpetuity, but usually the
term of protection is limited either to a certain number of years, or to
a term of years beyond the date of the author's death. This last
provision is the more general, and the term varies from seven years
after the author's death in England, for instance, to eighty years after
the author's death in Spain. The two most common terms are thirty years
to fifty years beyond the life of the author. Our own legislation
provides for two possible terms of protection. The first being for
twenty-eight years from the date of the recording of the title in the
Copyright Office, and the second, an extension of fourteen years from
the expiration of the first term.
Besides the time limit, copyright--especially as far as the authors of
the United States are concerned--is limited territorially, not extending
beyond the boundaries of the United States. Whether the protection which
follows registration and deposit shall extend so as to include Porto
Rico, Hawaii and the Philippines is a matter of some question. Probably
as regards the Philippines the answer would be in the negative, but as
concerns Porto Rico, since the passage of the "Act temporarily to
provide revenue and a civil government for Porto Rico" (April 12, 1900)
and Hawaii, since the taking effect (June 14, 1900) of the "Act to
provide a government for the territory of Hawaii," the response would be
in the affirmative.
The obtaining of copyright protection by a compliance with the United
States statutory requirements as to registration of title, deposit of
copies, and printing of notice of copyright, does not secure extension
of this protection in the territory of any foreign country, the United
States not being a member of the International Copyright Union. An
American author must comply with the requirements of the copyright laws
of a foreign country, just as if he were a citizen or subject of that
country, in order to obtain copyright protection within its borders.
Presumably, however, the obtaining of valid copyright protection in one
of the countries of the International Copyright Union, England for
example, would secure protection throughout the various countries of
that Union.
4. _Who may obtain copyright._
It is the _author_ of the work who is privileged to obtain copyright
protection for it. As I have already pointed out, the constitutional
provision enacts that Congress is to legislate to secure to _authors_
the exclusive right to their _writings_. When, therefore, the law states
that the author "or proprietor" of any book may obtain a copyright for
it, the term "proprietor" must be construed to mean the author's
assignee, _i.e._, the person to whom he has legally transferred his
copyright privilege. It is not necessarily transferred by the sale of
the book, _i.e._, the manuscript of the author's work, as the purchase
alone of an author's manuscript does not secure to the proprietor of the
manuscript copyright privileges. Prior to July 1, 1891, no foreign
author could obtain copyright protection in the United States, hence the
purchase by a publisher of one of Dickens's novels in manuscript, for
example, would not enable the buyer to obtain copyright on the book in
this country. No author who has not the privilege of copyright in the
United States can transfer to another either a copyright or the right to
obtain one. He cannot sell what he does not himself possess. Under the
United States law copyright comes through _authorship_ only. It is not a
right attaching to the thing--the book--but is a right vested in the
creator of the literary production, hence does not pass to a second
person by the transference of the material thing, the book, and evidence
must be offered showing that the transference of the book carried with
it the author's consent to a conveyance of the privilege of copyright.
This same principle is embodied in the provisions of the law as to
renewal of the copyright. The second term of protection must also start
with the author, or if he be dead, with his natural heirs, his widow or
children, but not with his assigns, the "proprietors." The right to the
extension term is in the author if he be living at the period during
which registration for the second term may take place, _viz._, within
six months prior to the expiration of the first term of twenty-eight
years. If the author be dead, the privilege of renewal rests with his
widow or children. Whether the author may dispose of his right of
renewal so that the transference may be effective for the second term,
even though the author should have died before the date of the beginning
of that term, is a question upon which the authorities differ. The
language of the statute would seem to give to the author an inchoate
right which reverts to his widow or children should he be married and
die before the expiration of the first term of the copyright.
5. _International copyright._
The idea of nationality or citizenship governed our copyright
legislation for more than a century, from the earliest American
copyright statute of 1783 to July 1, 1891, so that until the latter date
copyright protection in the United States was limited to the works of
authors who were citizens or residents. By the Act of March 3, 1891,
commonly called the international-copyright law, which went into effect
on July 1 of that year, the privileges of copyright in this country were
extended to the productions of authors who were citizens or subjects of
other countries which by their laws permitted American citizens to
obtain copyright upon substantially the same basis as their own
subjects. The existence of these conditions is made known by
presidential proclamation, and up to this time ten such proclamations
have been issued extending copyright in the United States to the citizen
authors of Belgium, Chile, Costa Rica, Denmark, France, Germany, Great
Britain and her possessions (including India, Canada, the Australias,
etc.), Italy, Mexico, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and Switzerland.
The privilege of copyright in the United States is extended only to
authors who are subjects of some country in whose behalf a presidential
proclamation as to copyright has been issued.
It is well to point out, perhaps, that these copyright proclamations are
not equivalent to copyright treaties, but are only notices that certain
conditions exist. Only in the case of one country, _viz._, Germany, has
anything been entered into approaching a convention or treaty. Under
date of Jan. 15, 1892, an "agreement" was signed with that country to
issue a proclamation extending copyright in the United States to German
subjects upon an assurance that "Citizens of the United States of
America shall enjoy, in the German Empire, the protection of copyright
as regards works of literature and art, as well as photographs, against
illegal reproduction, on the same basis on which such protection is
granted to subjects of the empire."
In order to obtain copyright abroad, therefore, an American citizen must
ascertain the requirements of the law of each country in which he
desires to protect his book or other production and comply explicitly
with such requirements. He can, of course, only avail himself of the
legal protection accorded, so far as it is within his power to thus
comply, and therein lies the difference between the privileges secured
under the present international-copyright arrangements, and such as
would be obtainable under copyright conventions or treaties. A citizen
of the United States may find himself unable to meet the obligations or
conditions of the statutes, just as a foreign author may find it
practically impossible to comply with the requirements of the United
States law, and in either case there would be a failure to secure the
protection desired. In the case of a photograph, for example, the
English law requires that the "author" of the photograph must be a
British subject or actually "resident within the Dominions of the
Crown," and the United States law requires that the two copies of the
photograph to be deposited in the Copyright Office "shall be printed
from _negatives made within the limits_ of the United States," two sets
of conditions difficult of fulfilment. By means of a copyright
convention exemption could be obtained in either case from these onerous
conditions.
6. _Conditions and formalities required by the copyright law._
Two steps are made prerequisites to valid copyright by the laws now in
force in the United States. The first of these is the recording of the
title in the Copyright Office. For this purpose the statute requires the
deposit of "a _printed_ copy" of the title-page, "on or before the day
of publication in this or any foreign country." For a number of years it
has been the practice of the Copyright Office to accept a typewritten
title in lieu of the _printed_ title-page, but in this, as with all
other requirements of the law regarding copyright, the preferable course
is a strict compliance with the letter as well as the spirit of the law.
The clerical service for thus recording the title requires the payment
of a fee, which should accompany the title-page when transmitted to the
Copyright Office. The fee for this, as fixed by law, is 50 cents in the
case of the title of a book whose author is a citizen of the United
States, and $1 in the case of a book whose author is not an American but
is a citizen or subject of some country to whose citizens the privilege
of copyright in the United States has been extended, under the
provisions of the Act of March 3, 1891. If a copy of the record thus
made of the title (commonly called a certificate) is desired, an
additional fee of 50 cents is required in all cases.
In order to have this essential record of title properly made, in the
form exactly prescribed by the statute, it is necessary to furnish the
Copyright Office with certain information, namely:
_a._ The name of the claimant of the copyright. (This should be the real
name of the person, not a _nom de plume_ or pseudonym.) _b._ Whether
copyright is claimed by applicant as the "author" or the "proprietor" of
the book. _c._ The nationality or citizenship of the _author_ of the
book. (This is required to determine whether the book is by an author
who is privileged to copyright protection in this country, and, also,
the amount of the fee to be charged for recording the title.) _d._ The
application should state that the title-page is the title of a "book."
_e._ A statement should be made that the book is or will be "printed
from type set within the limits of the United States."
The second prerequisite to copyright protection is the deposit in the
Copyright Office of two copies of the book whose title-page has been
recorded. These copies must be printed from "type set within the limits
of the United States," and the deposit must be made "not later than the
day of publication thereof, in this or any foreign country." The
stipulation as to American typesetting applies to works by American
authors as well as to those written by foreign authors.
The statute provides, as regards both the printed title and the printed
copies, that the articles are to be delivered at the office of the
Librarian of Congress, or "deposited in the mail, within the United
States, addressed to the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C."
Just what would be held to have been secured under the latter provision
in case the deposit in the mail were made and the book failed to reach
the Copyright Office has not been determined by judicial decision. The
law provides for the giving of a receipt by the postmaster in the case
of the title and the copies, if such receipt is requested.
The third step required for obtaining a defendable copyright is to print
upon the title-page or the page immediately following it in each copy of
the book the statutory notice of copyright. The form of this notice must
be either "Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year ----, by A.
B., in the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington;" or,
"Copyright, 19----, by A. B." The name printed in this notice must be
the real, legal name of the proprietor of the copyright, and must be the
same as that in which the entry of title has been made; the date, also,
must be the year date of the record of the filing of the title-page. A
judicial decision is on record to the effect that printing the year date
in this notice one year later than the date of actual recording of title
barred the defence of the copyright. A penalty of $100 is imposed on
"every person who shall insert or impress such notice, _or words of the
same purport_ in or upon any book ... whether subject to copyright or
otherwise, for which he has not obtained a copyright."
An American author may obtain for his book copyright protection in Great
Britain, by a compliance with the official instructions as to
publication, deposit of copies and registration. The protection, under
English law, dates from the day of _first_ publication, but such first
publication must be on English territory, and registration may follow,
but cannot precede publication. The term of protection in the United
States, on the contrary, dates from the day of registration of title in
our Copyright Office, which must precede publication, and be followed by
deposit of copies made "not later than the day of publication thereof in
this or any foreign country." The point to guard, therefore, is
_simultaneous publication_ in this country and in Great Britain.
Registration in England is a secondary matter. As stated in the official
circulars of instructions issued by the English Copyright Office,
"Copyright is created by the statute, and does not depend upon
registration, which is permissive only, and not compulsory, but no
proprietor of copyright in any book can take any proceedings in respect
of any infringement of his copyright unless he has, before commencing
his proceedings, registered his book."
Under existing legal conditions, in order to secure valid copyright on a
book in this country and in England, the following steps should be
taken, and in the order stated. 1. Record title in the United States
Copyright Office. 2. Print book from type set within the limits of the
United States. 3. Deposit two copies of such book in the United States
Copyright Office. 4. Send sufficient copies to London to
_a._ Place copies on sale and take such usual steps as are understood,
under English law, to constitute "publication" on a prearranged day,
on which same day the book is published in the United States.
_b._ Deposit copies: one copy of the best edition at the British
Museum, and four copies of the usual edition at Stationers' Hall for
distribution to the Bodleian Library at Oxford, the University
Library at Cambridge, the Faculty of Advocates Library at Edinburgh,
and the Trinity College Library at Dublin.
_c._ Register title of book and day of first publication at Stationers'
Hall, London.
7. _The United States Copyright Office._
One frequently hears the expressions "has obtained a copyright," "issued
a copyright," etc., giving the impression that copyrights can be granted
somewhat after the manner in which the Patent Office issues
letters-patent. But Congress has established no office authorized to
furnish any such guarantee of _literary_ property as is done in the case
of patent monopoly. The Copyright Office is purely an office of record
and simply registers _claims_ to copyright. The form of record
prescribed by law being the effect that A. B. "hath deposited the title
of a book the right whereof he _claims_ as author or proprietor in
conformity with the laws of the United States respecting copyrights."
The Copyright Office has no authority to question any claim as to
authorship or proprietorship, nor can it determine between conflicting
claims. It registers the claim presented in the prescribed form for a
proper subject of copyright by any person legally entitled to such
registration without investigation as to the truthfulness of the
representations, and would be obliged to record, not only the same title
for different books, but the same title for the same work on behalf of
two or more different persons, even against the protest of either one,
were such registrations asked for. No examination is therefore made when
a title reaches the office as to whether the same or a similar title has
been used before. As I have already stated, the title _per se_ is not
subject to copyright, and no one can secure a monopoly of the use of a
title by merely having it recorded at a nominal fee at the Copyright
Office.
If any one, wishing to use a given form of title but desiring to avoid
possible duplication of one previously used, writes to the Copyright
Office asking whether such a title has already been recorded, an answer
is made stating what is disclosed by the indexes of the office. It must
be frankly explained, however, that an absolutely conclusive statement
as to whether a given title has been previously used cannot always be
given. The copyright records of entries of title previous to July 10,
1870, are but indifferently indexed and rarely by title, usually only
under names of proprietors of the copyright. The copyright entries since
July 10, 1870, to May 31, 1901, number 1,217,075. The index to these
entries consists of more than 600,000 cards, many of which contain a
number of entries. These cards index the entries primarily under the
names of the proprietors of the copyright, and this proprietor's index
is understood to have been kept up continuously and to be complete, so
that under the name of each copyright proprietor there is a card or
cards showing the titles of all articles upon which copyright is
claimed. In addition to the proprietor's index there are cards under the
titles of periodicals and under the leading catchwords of the titles of
other articles, besides cards under the authors' names for books.
Unhappily there are periods of time when what may be called the
subsidiary index cards were not kept up.
In addition to cards under the proprietors' names, cards are now made:
for _books_, under the names of their authors; for _anonymous books_,
_periodicals_ and _dramatic compositions_, under the first words of the
titles (not a, an, or the), and for _maps_, under the leading subject
words of the titles, _i.e._, the names of the localities mapped. It is
doubtful if an absolutely complete index of all copyright entries by the
_title_ of the book and other article--in addition to the cards at
present made--could be justified by even a possibly legitimate use of
such an index. When it is remembered that the copyright entries last
year numbered 97,967, the magnitude of the task of making several cards
for each entry is easily conceived, and it is a question whether it
could be rightfully imposed upon the Copyright Office under the present
provisions of the law and so long as the registration of a title does
not secure the use of that title to some one person to the exclusion of
all others.
8. _Amendment of the copyright law._
The possible amendment of the copyright laws is a subject which my time
does not permit me to consider in detail, even were that deemed
desirable. The law now in force consists of the Act of July 8, 1870, as
edited to become title 60, chapter 3 of the Revised Statutes, and ten
amendatory acts passed subsequently. Naturally there is lacking the
consistency and homogeneousness of a single well-considered copyright
statute. It is possible that Congress will presently be willing to take
under consideration, if not the re-codification of the copyright laws,
then, at least, some amendment of them. An increase in the period of
protection has frequently been urged, with some advocacy of perpetual
copyright. As the Federal constitution, however, distinctly provides
that the protection granted the writings of an author is to be for a
_limited time_, an amendment of the constitution would be necessary
before Congress could enact perpetual copyright, and such alteration of
the fundamental law of the land is not probable.
Much might be said for an increase in the period of protection. It is
for a shorter term of years than that provided by most modern copyright
legislation, and the trend of such lawmaking has been in the direction
of an increase in the length of time during which the author or his
heirs could control the reproduction of his work. It should be borne in
mind that for books of little value the length of the term of protection
is of no great consequence. "Dead" books are not affected by the length
of the term of copyright. In the case also of popular new books, the
great sales and consequent disproportionate remuneration comes within a
short period of time after publication, and are not likely to continue
during a long term of copyright. On the other hand, many books of great
and permanent value not unfrequently make their way slowly into popular
favor, and are not fully appreciated until many years after publication.
For such books--the results, perhaps, of long years of study and
labor--an equitable return cannot be secured except by a long term of
protection.
Perhaps the most urgently desirable forward step in respect to copyright
is the adhesion of the United States to the Berne convention, thus
securing the inclusion in the International Copyright Union of our
country, the leading one of the three great states not yet members of
this admirable association of nations. Were the United States a member
of the Berne Union a compliance with the statutory provisions of our own
laws alone would secure copyright protection not only within the limits
of the United States, but practically throughout the whole book-reading
world--Great Britain, all Europe (except temporarily Russia, Austria,
and Scandinavia), Canada and Australia, India, Japan and South
Africa--thus increasing the possible reading public of American authors
many fold. It would seem that considerations of justice to our large and
constantly increasing national contingent of literary and artistic
producers requires this advance of such great practical importance. It
is the easier of accomplishment because it involves the adoption of no
new principle, but only the extension of the principle embodied in the
Act of March 3, 1891, namely, reciprocal international exchange of
copyright privileges, and in return for the advantages which would
accrue to our own citizens, only obligates the extension of copyright in
the United States to the subjects of such countries as are members of
the Union. Of the members of the International Copyright Union, all the
great nations already enjoy copyright in the United States, and it would
only remain to extend this privilege to the citizen authors of the six
minor states that are members of the Union, namely, Hayti, Japan,
Luxembourg, Monaco, Norway and Tunis.
THE RELATIONSHIP OF PUBLISHERS, BOOKSELLERS AND LIBRARIANS.
BY W. MILLARD PALMER, _Grand Rapids, Mich._
In accepting the president's suggestion to give "expression of the
_business_ side of the subject rather than the theoretical or
sentimental," I wish at the outset to recall certain functions performed
by publishers, booksellers and librarians, and to acknowledge my
indebtedness to Mr. J. W. Nichols, secretary of the American
Booksellers' Association, for material along this line.
Casual observers have come to regard publishers as bookmakers or
manufacturers, who merely put the product of authors into merchantable
form, and distribute it to dealers, for sale to the reading public. If
this were the only function of the publisher, his task would be an easy
one; indeed we might soon expect to see all publishers supplanted by one
great co-operative factory, to which authors might take their
manuscripts, and have them transformed into books and distributed
through the ordinary channels of commerce, like any other commodities.
Some superficial observers have recently made bold to conjecture that
this will be the final outcome of the present troubled state of the
general trade of publishing and selling books. But, alas! the actual
making of the book--giving to it an appropriate, artistic and really
attractive form--is perhaps the least of the publishers' trials, though
this, in itself, is a difficult task, requiring an artistic taste, well
trained and skilful judgment, and much technical knowledge.
To one who has had an insight into the publishing business, the enormous
mass of manuscript that is annually submitted to each of the great
publishers is simply appalling. They are compelled to employ a corps of
"readers" to cull out that which is worthy of consideration by an
intelligent and skilled publisher. Much that come to hand has been
hastily prepared by persons who lacked the time, experience or special
training necessary to enable an author to prepare an acceptable
manuscript, while the great majority of young authors have really no
message to tell that is worth recording. Here comes the most difficult
and trying task of the successful publisher--_the selection of proper
material for publication_. It often happens that a rejected manuscript
contains some good work--a promise of something better to come. Then the
publisher points out the best features and encourages the incipient
author to try again.
Thus books are made, not after a given pattern, like certain fabrics,
but each is a creation in itself. The responsibility of the publisher,
for the character of the creation, is by no means unimportant. He acts
as arbiter of the standard of excellence that must be attained by an
author before he is introduced to the public. The publishers' criterion
is simply a question of cash. "Will the public buy the book and pay for
it?" Nor can any other standard be adopted with safety. The whole
question of supply must always depend upon public demand.
But the publisher is not infallible. He often makes mistakes. Between
him and the readers is the dealer. The retail bookseller stands closest
to the reading public. He acquaints himself with the essential character
of the new book, points out to his customer enough of interest to cause
him to glance through it, and finally sells it to him; for the
intelligent bookseller knows the taste and reading habits of his
customers. He has his leading customers in mind from the time he orders
a new book till he has shown it and sold it to them. If they are pleased
with it, and recommend it to their friends, who call at the store for
it, the bookseller re-orders it, and, if he is so fortunate as not to be
restrained by unfair local competition, he advertises the book and
pushes its sale with energy, so long as interest in it can be kept
alive.
Thus the retail booksellers in every city and hamlet throughout the
country, standing close to the reading public, knowing what their
customers will buy, are the real monitors of the publishers.
When the publisher considers the advisability of bringing out a new
book, he cannot undertake to look beyond a few hundred booksellers. It
is through them, and only through them, that he has learned to gauge the
taste of the reading public. The paramount question for him to decide
is, "How many copies of this particular book can I sell to dealer A,
dealer B and dealer C; how many copies of this book can I hope with
certainty to sell to all of my customers in the trade?" The publisher
well knows that the dealer is governed by the same criterion as himself:
"Will it pay; will this book be a ready seller, or will it cost me all
of the profit I make on it to sell it?"
Thus the product of the author is subject to the immutable laws of
supply and demand from the time he submits his first immature manuscript
until he makes two, three, four or more trials, and finally has a
manuscript accepted. But even then the publishers prepares only a small
edition for a new author, and the dealers are very conservative in
ordering a new book--especially by an unknown author. The conscientious
bookseller awaits the verdict of certain patrons, knowing that, if the
book is commended by one whose judgment is respected by local readers,
he can safely re-order a goodly number.
Thus the author is dependent upon the publisher for the standard of
excellence he must attain in order to achieve success; the publisher is
dependent upon the dealer, not only in forming his judgment of the
character of books that will sell, but also for the number that he may
safely print; while the dealer is dependent upon his best and most
critical patrons. Hence the relation of author, publisher and dealer is
so close--indeed they are so mutually interdependent--that one factor
could not be removed without vitally crippling the other.
A distinguished librarian, who has been a pioneer of progress in the
library movement, has recently suggested the propriety of abolishing
book stores (_see Publishers' Weekly_, May 11, '01, p. 1149) and
allowing public librarians to receive orders and forward them to the
publishers. If the distinguished gentleman did not have in view visions
of personal gain for public librarians, he should have carried his
philanthropic suggestion farther, and proposed to abolish both
booksellers and librarians, and to allow the public to procure their
books directly from the publishers, thus saving that moiety of gain that
would be made by either in return for the service rendered. It cannot be
supposed that so able and conscientious an administrative officer ever
contemplated maintaining an extra corps of assistants, at an extra
expense to the municipality or to those liberal benefactors who have
endowed public libraries, in order that opulent citizens may still
further indulge their tastes by purchasing larger private libraries,
without paying the small commission or profit that is usually allowed to
retail booksellers. On the other hand, if this proposal was made for the
purpose of allowing libraries maintained by taxing the municipality, to
engage in gainful occupation, this is carrying the socialistic idea
farther than even our populistic friends have ever yet proposed.
However, inasmuch as this question has been raised, we are bound to
treat it from an economic point of view. The question is, "Shall the
bookseller be abolished and his office merged into that of the
librarian, and can the librarian perform the offices of the bookseller?"
No one has ever questioned the value of the public library from the
burning of the Alexandrian Library to the present day. The value of a
library, as a _librarium_, or storehouse for the permanent preservation
of books, has always been manifest.
Again, the public library gives a larger opportunity and a wider range
than is possible in the private collection; and scholars, historians and
students of all classes are daily made grateful to the trained,
professional librarian, who has so classified the contents of the
library as to make the whole available at a moment's notice.
Still another inestimable feature of the public library is that it
maintains a public reading room for children as well as adults.
Finally, the library furnishes reading at home to those who are not yet
in a position to become owners of books. The benefit derived from
reading of this character is often of questionable value. The _habitué_
of the circulating library makes his selections from misleading or
sensational titles. Little care and less intelligence is exercised in
choosing either title or author. As a result librarians are constantly
complaining that only the trashiest and most worthless books are read.
The circulating department of the public library is now supplemented by
others that are conducted for cash profit. These have sprung up in many
cities. And now we have the "Book-Lovers' Library," a corporation with
capital stock, engaging in business for profit. It has the advantage of
certain trust features. It proposes to organize branches in all of the
principal cities and towns in the country. For five dollars a year it
proposes to supply fifty dollars' worth of reading to each subscriber.
An automobile is employed, with an attendant to deliver the books to
subscribers each week and take up those that have been read. Having paid
five, ten or more dollars, at the beginning of the year, the subscriber
can read from morning till night, while the new books come and go with
the lightning speed of the automobile.
As in many other circulating libraries, new copyrighted fiction is the
chief staple supplied by the "Book-Lovers' Library"--the sweetest
pabulum automatically administered.
After a season of such dissipation call in a neurologist to diagnose
your patient, and he will advise you that by continuing the treatment
the mind will be reduced to a sieve, if not ultimately to absolute
imbecility. Having abandoned the more serious literature that calls into
use all the faculties of the mind, the reader of nothing but fiction
converts what would otherwise be a healthful recreation into
dissipation, that is enervating and permanently debilitating to all the
faculties of the mind, when carried to an extreme. Had the reader been
denied the use of this automatic machine, and been compelled, as
formerly, to browse through the book store in search of something to
read, more serious books would have been selected--history, travel,
descriptive writing or popular science, with an occasional novel by way
of recreation.
But to continue the argument, suppose we abolish the bookseller, as has
been proposed. This would not be a difficult matter. Most of them would
gladly be "abolished" if they could sell out their stock for anything
near what it cost them. Their profits have been so reduced by unfair
competition that they are not sufficient to pay the cost of doing
business. They have been compelled to carry side lines, as stationery,
newspapers, periodicals, sporting goods, _bric-a-brac_, wall paper,
etc., in order to make a living. By this means they have learned that
other lines of merchandise yield a better profit than books. As a result
most of them have greatly reduced their book stock, or entirely
abandoned the sale of books, and put in more profitable lines of
merchandise.
The causes that have led up to this result are manifold: 1st. They were
strenuously urged, and they finally consented to allow discounts:
(_a_) To ministers of the gospel, since they are public benefactors.
(_b_) To school teachers, since they are public educators and
benefactors.
(_c_) To public libraries, since they are for the most part
eleemosynary institutions, and hence entitled to charity.
Indeed, when I recount the charitable benefactions that have been
exacted and received at the hands of the retail bookseller, he seems to
me to have been the most saintly character that has lived in my day and
generation. And right here it is of interest to note that these
ministers, these teachers, these physicians, these public librarians
were actually receiving out of the hands of the public stated salaries
that exceeded by far the annual net profit of the average bookseller.
2d. Having secured from the local dealer a discount equal to the best
part of his profit, many librarians have gone behind him and appealed
directly to the publishers for a larger discount. This has been granted
in most cases, so that most librarians have recently been receiving as
large a discount as local dealers.
3d. Commission agents have purchased complete editions of
popular-selling books from the publishers, and re-sold them at a slight
advance:
(_a_) To dry-goods stores, where they have been put on "bargain
counters" and sold at less than cost, to attract customers to their
stores.
(_b_) To publishers of local newspapers, who give the books away as
premiums or sell them at cost prices, to increase the local
circulation of their papers.
(_c_) To mail-order agencies, who advertise the books at less than they
are usually sold for by dealers.
4th. Many publishers have been advertising and mailing their books
directly to retail customers at reduced prices, or at the same price
they recommended local dealers to ask for them, and they have prepaid
the postage, thus _competing directly with their distributing agents,
the booksellers, in their own field_.
5th. Finally, some local librarians, who a few years ago were appealing
to local booksellers for a discount, having been granted the discount,
have recently been supplying books "at cost prices" to other patrons of
the local booksellers. Thus our friends, the librarians, having inverted
the good old practice of returning good for evil, having helped to rob
the local bookseller of his livelihood, now propose to abolish his
office.
To carry the proposition to its conclusions, suppose we abolish the
bookseller. Can the librarian take his place and send the orders in to
the publishers? If so, if this is all there is to the bookselling
business, why should the publisher pay a commission to the librarian for
doing what the people could as readily do for themselves? But a general
business cannot be carried on in this way. Publishers have tried it for
years, yet only comparatively few people are willing to order books that
they have not had an opportunity to examine, and of this class
librarians are the most conservative. They, too, want to know what they
are buying before they place their orders. Hence, this postulate: If the
librarian is to succeed the bookseller, he must become a merchant; he
must order stocks of books and take the speculative chance of selling
them. But the librarian has had no experience or training in
merchandising. Can he afford to hazard his own capital in an untried
field; can he induce his friends to supply him with capital to invest in
a business of which he confessedly has no knowledge? It would manifestly
be a perversion of the funds of the institution in charge of the
librarian, to invest them in a gainful occupation.
From what I have said, it must be apparent that booksellers, as well as
librarians, have a province of their own, and perform a service that
cannot be delegated to another. And hence it is desirable that we live
and dwell together in peace and amity.
But in these days of combinations, reorganizations and revolutions in
the conduct of business, the publishers have looked farther, in their
quest for more economical purveying agents. For the past ten years they
have been trying to induce the dry-goods merchants to carry books. But,
after all this time, not more than half a dozen department stores carry
fairly representative stocks of books. They confine themselves, for the
most part, to new copyrighted fiction, and of this they handle only that
which is widely advertised.
Of late, department stores and dry-goods stores have met severe
competition in clothing stores, that make no pretext of carrying a book
stock. They simply buy an edition of a popular-selling book and
advertise it for less money than it actually cost. They do this simply
as an advertising dodge, to attract customers to their stores. Then,
too, the mail-order agencies have cut the price of the most popular
books so low that it is no longer profitable to handle them. The result
of this has been that many of the most promising new novels have been
killed before they were fairly put on the market; for _as soon as they
ceased to be profitable no one could afford to re-order them_.
The effect of this recent drift of the trade has been to stimulate the
frothy side of literature to an extreme degree. The more serious
literature is being neglected. The latest novel is the fad. Its average
life is reduced to little more than one year, though the copyright lasts
for twenty-eight years, and with a renewal it may be extended to
forty-two years.
This shortening of the life of books has had a baneful effect:
(_a_) Baneful to the bookseller, since it frequently leaves him with a
dead stock of books on hand that cannot be turned without loss.
(_b_) Baneful to the publisher, since the book stops selling and the
plates become valueless before he has had time fairly to recoup
himself for the expense of bringing it out, advertising it, and
putting it on the market.
(_c_) Baneful to the author, since by shortening the life of his books
the value of his property in them is reduced.
But perhaps the most baneful effect of this craze for ephemeral
literature is upon the people themselves. As the standard or degree of
civilization for a given age is marked by the character of the
literature the people produce and read, we cannot hope for a golden age
in American letters, unless the present system is reversed. Work of real
merit is never done by accident, nor is it the product of mediocre
talents. If we are to develop a national literature that shall fitly
characterize the sterling qualities of the American people in this, the
full strength of the early manhood of the nation; at the time when the
nation has taken its place in the vanguard of civilization; at the time
when the consumptive power of the nation is equal to one-third of that
of the entire civilized world; at the time when men of talents and
genius are annually earning and expending, for their comfort and
pleasure, more munificent sums than were ever lavished on the most
opulent princes; I say, if we are to produce a literature that shall
fitly characterize this age of our nation, we must hold forth such
rewards for the pursuits of literature as will attract men of genius,
men of the most lustrous talents, men who are the peers of their
co-workers in other walks of life. But this will not be possible so long
as the present strife to furnish cheap literature to the people
continues.
It should be observed that the bookseller has not suffered alone in this
cheapening process. The publisher has suffered. Within the past few
months two names that for half a century were household words, synonyms
of all that is excellent in the publishing world, have met with
disaster, and others were approaching a crisis.
Fortunately one firm stood out so prominently, as a bulwark of financial
strength and security, that its president, Mr. Charles Scribner, of
Charles Scribner's Sons, could afford to take the initiative in calling
for reform. He invited the co-operation of other publishers, and a year
ago this month they met in New York and organized the American
Publishers' Association. Their organization now includes practically all
of the general publishers who contribute anything of real value to
current literature.
The publishers canvassed thoroughly the causes that had led to the
decline of the trade, and they appointed a committee to draft reform
measures.
In reviewing the decline of the trade, two facts stood out so
prominently that it was impossible to disassociate them as cause and
effect. The three thousand booksellers, upon whom, as purveying agents,
the publishers had depended a generation ago, had shrunk in number until
only about five hundred could be counted who were worthy to be called
booksellers. The other fact, which doubtless made quite as deep an
impression upon the minds of the publishers, was that the long line of
books, on each of their published catalogs, was practically dead. Those
books of high standard character, by eminent authors, books that for
years had had a good annual sale, no longer moved. These standard books
have been a large source of revenue to publishers and their authors for
many years. But now so few of them are sold that it hardly pays the
publishers to send their travellers over the road.
Few dry-goods merchants, druggists, newsdealers and stationers, that
have recently been induced to carry a small number of books, feel
sufficiently well acquainted with salable literature to warrant their
carrying anything more than the most popular-selling new copyrighted
novels and cheap reprints of non-copyrighted books that sell for
twenty-five cents or less. As stated above, there are a few large
department stores that carry a more general stock, but they are so few
that the support received from them is not sufficient to compensate, in
any measure, the loss sustained through the sacrifice of the regular
booksellers. Moreover, the regular booksellers that still remain in the
business have not been buying many standard books of late. Seeing their
profit in fiction sacrificed by unfair competition, many of them have
ordered only enough of the new copyrighted novels to keep alive their
accumulated stocks of standard books, until they can sell them out or
reduce them to a point where they can afford to abandon the book
business.
From the character of the reform measures adopted by the American
Publishers' Association, which went into effect on the first of May, it
is evident that the publishers have determined to restore the old-time
bookseller. This can be done only by the publishers enforcing the
maintenance of retail prices, the same as is done by the proprietors of
the Earl & Wilson collar, the Waterman fountain pen, the Eastman kodak,
and many other special lines of which the retail price is listed.
When dry-goods stores and clothing stores bought these special lines and
retailed them at or below the cost price, in _contrast to the list
price_ asked in the special furnishing stores, in order to attract
customers to their stores because of their wonderful "bargain counters,"
the manufacturers realized that the dry-goods stores were simply using
up these wares to advertise their other business. They cut off the
supply of their goods to these price-cutting dry-goods stores, and
refused to supply any more goods, except under a substantial undertaking
on the part of the dry-goods stores to maintain the full list price.
This, in a word, is the substance of the publishers' plan. They have
agreed to cut off absolutely the supply of all of their books, net,
copyrighted and otherwise, to any dealer who cuts the retail price of a
book published under the net-price system.
On the other hand, the nearly eight hundred members of the American
Booksellers' Association have entered into a mutual agreement to push
with energy the sale of the books of all publishers who co-operate with
them for the maintenance of retail prices, and not to buy, nor put in
stock, nor offer for sale, the books of any publisher who fails to
co-operate with them. This is substantially the same system that was
adopted in Germany in 1887, in France a few years later, and in England
in 1900.
The effect of this system in Germany has been to lift up the trade from
a condition even more deplorable, if possible, than that into which it
has fallen in this country, and to make it a prosperous and profitable
business. It has proved beneficent and satisfactory, not only to dealers
and publishers, but also to authors and to the reading public, for every
city, town and village in Germany now sustains a book shop that carries
a fairly representative stock of books, so that the people are able to
examine promptly every book as soon as it comes from the press, and the
authors are sure of having their books promptly submitted to the
examination of every possible purchaser.
The results in France and England are equally encouraging, and it is
believed that as soon as the American system is fully understood, and as
soon as enough books are included under the net-price system, so that a
bookseller can once more make a living on the sale of books, many of the
old-time booksellers will again put in a stock of books and help to
re-establish the book trade in America.
Having tried to define the present relation of publishers and
booksellers, I beg leave to say frankly that I know of no reason why
publishers and booksellers should maintain any different relations with
librarians than they maintain with any other retail customers.
For example, let us take the new "Book-Lovers' Library," so called.
Their plan is to sell memberships, and to deliver to each member one
book a week for five dollars a year, or three books a week for ten
dollars a year. They take up the books at the end of each week and
supply new ones.
If this plan could be carried out successfully, it would result in
making one book do the service now performed by ten or fifteen books. In
other words, this circulating library proposes to furnish its members
with ten or fifteen books for the same amount of money they now pay for
one book by simply passing the book around from one to another.
The effect of this scheme, if carried into all cities and towns as
proposed, would be to reduce the number of books manufactured and sold
to about _one-tenth_ of its present magnitude. From a business point of
view, publishers and dealers cannot be called upon to make special
discounts to encourage such an enterprise.
The encouragement and support given to authors, by patrons of
literature, would be reduced by this scheme to about one-tenth of the
present amount. The effect of this withdrawal of support to American
authors can easily be imagined.
But I do not believe that real book-lovers, intelligent and conservative
readers, will be carried away by this passing craze. On the contrary,
they have studiously avoided forming that careless, slip-shod habit of
reading that characterizes patrons of circulating libraries. The real
book-lover selects his books like his friends, with caution, and with
discriminating and painstaking care.
From a bookseller's point of view, the "Book-Lovers' Library" is not
founded on practical lines. However, as the plan also includes the
selling of capital stocks to its patrons, it is probable that the money
received from subscriptions, together with the annual membership fees,
will be sufficient to keep the enterprise going for some time. But since
this is a corporation organized for the purpose of making money, a
failure to earn money and to pay dividends will discourage its patrons,
cause them to feel that they have been deceived, and finally to withdraw
from membership. When the members realize that they are paying five or
ten dollars a year for privileges that can be had free at the local
library, in most cases they will withdraw their support.
Thus, while in some respects I regard this enterprise as an evil factor,
it contains, I think, inherent weaknesses that will finally compass its
own end.
But what is said of the relation of publishers and dealers to the
Book-Lovers' Library is true in a measure of all circulating and other
public libraries. They do not increase, but they positively contract the
number of sales that are made in the interest of authors, publishers and
dealers.
Under the German system, of which I have spoken, public libraries were
at first allowed ten per cent. discount; but recently this has been
reduced to five per cent.
Under the English system, profiting by the experience of German
publishers, no discount is allowed to public libraries, schools or
institutions.
The American system, however, is modelled largely after the German, and
it permits the dealers to allow a discount of ten per cent. to local
libraries. In doing this local dealers are protected from competition by
the publishers, in that the publishers have agreed to add to the net
price the cost of transportation on all books sold at retail outside of
the cities in which they are doing business. Thus public libraries can
buy net books cheaper of the local booksellers than they can buy them of
the publishers by just the cost of transportation.
LIBRARY BUILDINGS.
BY W. R. EASTMAN, _New York State Library, Albany, N. Y._
A building is not the first requisite of a public library. A good
collection of books with a capable librarian will be of great service in
a hired room or in one corner of a store. First the librarian, then the
books and after that the building.
But when the building is occupied the value of the library is doubled.
The item of rent is dropped. The library is no longer dependent on the
favor of some other institution and is not cramped by the effort to
include two or three departments in a single room. It will not only give
far better service to the community, but will command their respect,
interest and support to a greater degree than before.
The following hints are intended as a reply to many library boards who
are asking for building plans.
The vital point in successful building is to group all the parts of a
modern library in their true relations. To understand a particular case
it will be necessary to ask some preliminary questions.
1. _Books._
Number of volumes in library?
Average yearly increase?
Number of volumes in 20 years?
Number of volumes to go in reference room?
Number of volumes to go in children's room?
Number of volumes to go in other departments?
Number of volumes to go in main book room?
If the library is large will there be an open shelf room separate from
the main book room?
Is a stack needed?
Will public access to the shelves be allowed?
By answers to such questions a fair idea of the character and size of
the book room may be obtained.
_Rules for calculation._ In a popular library, outside the reference
room, for each foot of wall space available 80 books can be placed on
eight shelves. Floor cases having two sides will hold 160 books for each
running foot, and in a close stack 25 books, approximately, can be
shelved for each square foot of floor space. But the latter rule will be
materially modified by ledges, varying width of passages, stairs, etc.
The above figures give full capacity. In practical work, to provide for
convenient classification, expansion, oversized books and working
facilities, the shelves of a library should be sufficient for twice the
actual number of books and the lines of future enlargement should be
fully determined.
2. _Departments._
Is the library for free circulation?
Is the library for free reference?
Are special rooms needed for
high school students?
children?
ladies?
magazine readers?
newspaper readers?
How many square feet for each of the above rooms?
Are class rooms needed as in a college library?
Club rooms?
Lecture rooms?
Museum?
Art gallery?
Other departments?
3. _Community._
In city or country?
Population?
By what class will library be chiefly used?
School children?
Students?
Mechanics?
Reading circles?
Ladies?
4. _Resources and conditions._
Money available?
Money annually for maintenance?
Size of building lot?
Location and surroundings?
How many stories?
Elevators?
Heat?
Light?
Ventilation?
5. _Administration._
Is library to be in charge of one person?
How many assistants?
Is a work room needed?
unpacking room?
bindery?
librarian's office?
trustees' room?
By careful study of these points a clear conception of the problem is
gained and the building committee is prepared to draw an outline sketch
indicating in a general way their needs and views. They are not likely
to secure what they want by copying or even by competition. The best
architects have not the time nor the disposition to compete with each
other. A better way is to choose an architect, one who has succeeded in
library work if possible, who will faithfully study the special
problems, consult freely with the library board, propose plans and
change them freely till they are right. And if such plans are also
submitted for revision to some librarian of experience or to the library
commission of the state, whose business and pleasure it is to give
disinterested advice, so much the better.
The following outlines taken from actual library buildings are offered
by way of suggestion.
_Square plan._
An inexpensive building for a small country neighborhood may have one
square room with book shelves on the side and rear walls. A convenient
entrance is from a square porch on one side of the front corner and a
librarian's alcove is at the opposite corner leaving the entire front
like a store window which may be filled with plants or picture
bulletins. With a stone foundation the wooden frame may be finished with
stained shingles.
_Oblong plan._
A somewhat larger building may have a wider front with entrance at the
center.
Book shelves under high windows may cover the side and rear walls and
tables may stand in the open space.
It will be convenient to bring together the books most in demand for
circulation on one side of the room and those needed most for study on
the opposite side. One corner may contain juvenile books. In this way
confusion between readers, borrowers and children will be avoided. Each
class of patrons will go by a direct line to its own quarter. This is
the beginning of the plan of departments which will be of great
importance in the larger building.
The number of books for circulation will increase rapidly and it may
soon be necessary to provide double faced floor cases. These will be
placed with passages running from the center of the room towards the end
and that end will become the book or delivery room and the opposite side
will be the study or reference room.
_T-shape plan._
The next step is to add space to the rear giving a third department to
the still open room. If the book room is at the back the student readers
may be at tables in the right hand space and the children in the space
on the left. The librarian at a desk in the center is equally near to
all departments and may exercise full supervision.
The presence of a considerable number of other busy persons has a
sobering and quieting effect on all and the impression of such a library
having all its departments in one is dignified and wholesome. It may be
well to separate the departments by light open hand rails, screens,
cords or low book cases. It is a mistake to divide a small building into
three or four small rooms.
_Separate rooms._
For a larger library these rails must be made into partitions, giving to
each department a separate room. Partitions of glass set in wooden
frames and possibly only eight feet high may answer an excellent
purpose, adding to the impression of extent, admitting light to the
interior of the building and allowing some supervision from the center.
With partitions on each side, the entrance becomes a central hallway
with a department at each side and the book room at the end. This is
the best position for the book room for two special reasons. Overlapping
the departments in both wings it is equally accessible from either, and
at the back of the house a plainer and cheaper wall can be built
admitting of easy removal when the growth of the library requires
enlargement.
Sometimes the angles between the book room and the main building may be
filled to advantage by work room and office. These working rooms though
not large and not conspicuous are of vital consequence and should be
carefully planned.
We have now reached a type of building which, for lack of a better word,
I may call the "butterfly plan," having two spread wings and a body
extending to the back. Others call it the "trefoil." This general type
is being substantially followed in most new libraries of moderate size.
From one entrance hall direct access is given to three distinct
departments, or perhaps to five, by placing two rooms in each wing.
_Modifications required by limited space._
If we have an open park to build in we shall be tempted to expand the
hallway to a great central court or rotunda. Perhaps the importance of
the library may justify it, but we should be on our guard against
separating departments by spaces so great as to make supervision
difficult or passing from one to another inconvenient. We should aim to
concentrate rather than scatter.
More frequently the lot will be too narrow. We must draw in the wings
and make the narrower rooms longer from front to back. With a corner lot
we can enter on the side street, leaving a grand reading room on the
main front and turning at right angles as we enter the house pass
between other rooms to the book room at the extreme end of the lot. Or
again, we shall be obliged to dispense entirely with one wing of our
plan, and have but two department rooms instead of three on the floor.
Every location must be studied by itself.
_Other stories._
Basement rooms are of great service for work rooms and storage. A
basement directly under the main book room is specially valuable to
receive the overflow of books not in great demand.
A second and even a third story will be useful for special collections,
class and lecture rooms or a large audience hall. In a library of
moderate size it will often be found convenient to build a book room
about 16 feet high to cover two stories of bookcases and wholly
independent of the level of the second floor of the main building.
_Extension._
To meet the needs of a rapidly growing library it is important at the
beginning to fix the lines of extension.
A building with a front of two rooms and a passage between may add a
third room at the rear, and at a later stage, add a second building as
large as the first and parallel to it, the two being connected by the
room first added.
This is the architect's plan for the Omaha Public Library.
_Open court._
When a library is so large that one book room is not enough, two such
rooms may be built to the rear, one from each end of the building with
open space between, and these two wings may be carried back equally and
joined at the back by another building, thus completing the square
around an open court.
This gives wide interior space for light and air, or grass and flowers.
Such is the plan of the Boston Public and Princeton University
libraries. It will be the same in Minneapolis when that library is
complete. In the plan of the new library at Newark, N. J., the central
court is roofed over with glass becoming a stairway court with
surrounding galleries opening on all rooms. In Columbia University, New
York, as in the British Museum, the center is a great reading room
capped by a dome high above the surrounding roofs and lighted by great
clerestory windows.
If the street front is very long there may be three extensions to the
rear, one opposite the center and one from each end, leaving two open
courts as in the plan for the New York Public or the Utica Public; and
this general scheme may be repeated and carried still farther back
leaving four open courts as in the Library of Congress. This plan can
be extended as far as space can be provided.
When the general plan of the large building is fixed, passages will be
introduced, parallel to the front and sides, and departments will be
located as may be judged most convenient, always having regard to the
convenience of the patrons of each department in finding ready access to
the books they need and providing for supervision and attendance at
least cost of time, effort and money. Extravagance in library building
is not so often found in lavish ornament as in that unfortunate
arrangement of departments which requires three attendants to do the
work of one or two.
_Light._
Natural light should be secured if possible for every room. Windows
should be frequent and extend well up toward the ceiling terminating in
a straight line so as to afford large supply of light from the top.
Windows like those in an ordinary house or office building, coming
within two or three feet of the floor are more satisfactory both for
inside and outside appearance than those which leave a high blank wall
beneath them. From the street a blank wall has a prison-like effect; on
the inside it cuts off communication with the rest of the world and the
impression is unpleasant. The proper object of library windows six or
eight feet above the floor is to allow unbroken wall space for book
shelves beneath them. There is no serious objection to this at the back
of the room or sometimes at the sides of the house where the windows are
not conspicuous from the street, but every room of any size, if it is
next to the outer wall, should have windows to look out of on at least
one side.
A book room at the back of a building may secure excellent light from
side windows eight feet above the floor with lower windows at the back.
The lighting of large interior rooms is often a difficult problem. Light
will not penetrate to advantage more than 30 feet. Skylights, domes and
clerestory windows are used. In the case of the dome or clerestory the
room to be lighted must be higher than those immediately surrounding it.
The clerestory plan with upright windows is most satisfactory when
available, being cheaper and giving better security against the weather
than the skylight. In a large building with interior courts, the lower
story of the court is sometimes covered with a skylight and used as a
room.
This appears in the plans for the New York Public and the Utica Public
libraries. Skylights must be constructed with special care to protect
rooms against the weather.
The problem of light is peculiarly difficult in the crowded blocks of
cities. A library front may sometimes touch the walls of adjoining
buildings so that light can enter only from the front and rear. If
extending more than 40 feet back from the street, it will be necessary
to narrow the rest of the building so as to leave open spaces on each
side, or to introduce a little light by the device of light wells.
Occasionally a large city library is found on the upper floors of an
office building, where light and air are better than below, and the cost
of accommodation is less. The use of elevators makes this feasible.
_Shelving._
The general scheme of book shelves should be fixed before the plan of
the building is drawn. Otherwise the space for books can not be
determined and serious mistakes may be made. Between the two extremes of
open wall shelves and the close stack a compromise is necessary. The
large library will put the bulk of its books in a stack and bring a
considerable selection of the best books into an open room. The small
library will begin with books along the walls and provide cases for
additions from time to time as needed. Its patrons will enjoy at first
the generous spaces of the open room without an array of empty cases to
offend the eye and cumber the floor. When walls are covered with books a
floor case will be introduced and others when needed will be placed
according to plan, till at last the floor is as full as it was meant to
be, and the basement beneath having served for a time to hold the
overflow, a second story of cases is put on the top of the first. This
process should be planned in advance for a term of 20 years.
For public access passages between cases should be five feet wide. Cases
have sometimes been set on radial lines so as to bring all parts under
supervision from the center. This arrangement, specially if bounded by a
semi-circular wall, is expensive, wasteful of space and of doubtful
value, except in peculiar conditions. It is not adapted to further
extension of the building.
_Size of shelf._
For ordinary books in a popular library the shelf should not be more
than eight inches wide with an upright space of ten inches. Eight
shelves of this height with a base of four inches and crown finish of
five inches will fill eight feet from the floor and the upper shelf may
be reached at a height of 81 inches or six feet nine inches. Ordinary
shelves should not exceed three feet in length. A length of two and a
half feet is preferred by many. A shelf more than three feet long is apt
to bend under the weight of books. For books of larger size a limited
number of shelves with 12 inches upright space and a few still larger
should be provided. The proportion of oversize books will vary greatly
according to the kind of library, a college or scientific collection
having many more than the circulating library. Any reference room will
contain a large number of such books and its shelves should correspond.
_Movable shelves._
Much attention has been given to devices for adjustment of shelves. Some
of these are quite ingenious and a few are satisfactory. No device
should be introduced that will seriously break the smooth surface at the
side. Notches, cross bars, iron horns or hooks or ornamental brackets
expose the last book to damage. If pins are used they should be so held
to their places that they cannot fall out. Heads of pins or bars should
be sunk in the wood and the place for books left, as near as possible,
absolutely smooth on all sides. It is at least a question whether the
importance of making shelves adjustable and absolutely adjustable has
not been greatly overrated. As a fact the shelves of the circulating
library are very seldom adjusted. They may have all the usual appliances
gained at large expense but there is no occasion to adjust them outside
the reference room. They remain as they were put up. It is probably well
to have the second and third shelf movable so that one can be dropped to
the bottom and two spaces left where there were three at first. But all
other shelves might as well be fixed at intervals of 10 inches without
the least real inconvenience and the cases be stronger for it and far
cheaper. A perfectly adjustable shelf is interesting as a study in
mechanics, but is practically disappointing. Its very perfection is a
snare because it is so impossible to set it true without a spirit level
and a machinist. All shelves in a reference room should be adjustable.
Bound magazines might have special cases.
_Wood or iron shelves._
Iron shelf construction has the advantage of lightness and strength,
filling the least space and admitting light and air. Where three or more
stories of cases are stacked one upon another iron is a necessity. It
also offers the best facilities for adjustment of shelves and is most
durable.
On the other hand it is more difficult to get, can be had only of the
manufacturers in fixed patterns, and costs at least twice as much as any
wood, even oak, unless carved for ornament, and four or five times as
much as some very good wooden shelves. This great cost raises the
question whether the advantages named are really important. Few village
libraries need more than two stories of shelves in a stack. If iron is
more durable we can buy two sets of wooden shelves for the cost of one
of iron--and when we buy the second set will know better what we want.
The importance of shelf adjustment has been exaggerated.
A more important consideration, to my mind, is that iron is not so well
adapted to the changing conditions of a growing library. It is made at a
factory and to be ordered complete. It is bolted to the floor and wall
at fixed intervals. But we have seen that a gradual accumulation of
bookcases is better than to put all shelving in position at first.
Wooden cases are movable. You begin with those you need and add others
as you have more books, you can change and alter them at any time with
only the aid of the village carpenter, and enjoy the wide open spaces
till the time for filling them comes.
Iron with all its ornaments belongs in the shop. It is not the furniture
you prefer in your home. The item of cost will usually decide the
question. For libraries of less than 30,000 volumes, where close storage
is not imperative, wood has the advantage.
_Miscellaneous notes._
A floor of hard wood is good enough for most libraries. Wood covered
with corticene or linoleum tends to insure the needed quiet. Floors of
tile, marble or concrete are very noisy and should have strips of carpet
laid in the passages.
On the walls of reading rooms it is neither necessary nor desirable to
have an ornamental wainscot, nor indeed any wainscot at all, not even a
base board. Book cases will cover the lower walls and books are the best
ornament.
Small tables for four are preferred in a reading room to long common
tables. They give the reader an agreeable feeling of privacy.
Do not make tables too high. 30 inches are enough.
Light bent wood chairs are easy to handle.
Steam or hot water give the best heat and incandescent electric lamps
give the best light.
Be sure that you have sufficient ventilation.
Windows should be made to slide up and down, not to swing on hinges or
pivots.
Without dwelling further on details let us be sure 1, That we have room
within the walls for all the books we now have or are likely to have in
20 years; provide the first outfit of shelves for twice the number of
books expected at the end of one year and add bookcases as we need them,
leaving always a liberal margin of empty space on every shelf. We must
plan for the location of additional cases for 20 years with due
consideration of the question of public access.
2, That all needed departments are provided in harmonious relation with
each other and so located as to serve the public to the best advantage
and at least cost of time, strength and money.
3, That the best use of the location is made and the building suited to
the constituency and local conditions.
4, That the estimated cost is well within the limit named, for new
objects of expense are certain to appear during the process of building
and debt must not be thought of.
5, That the building is convenient for work and supervision, a point at
which many an elegant and costly building has conspicuously failed.
Make it also neat and beautiful, for it is to be the abiding place of
all that is best in human thought and experience and is to be a home in
which all inquiring souls are to be welcomed. Since the people are to be
our guests let us make the place of their reception worthy of its
purpose.
THE RELATION OF THE ARCHITECT TO THE LIBRARIAN.
BY JOHN LAWRENCE MAURAN, _Architect, St. Louis, Mo._
The public library, as we understand the name to-day, has had but a
brief existence compared with the mere housing of collections of books
which has gone on through countless ages.
With the change from the old ideas of safeguarding the precious books
themselves to the advanced theory of placing their priceless contents
within the easy reach of all, has come an equally important change in
the character of the custodian of the books. The duties of the modern
librarian are such that he must be not only something of a scholar, in
the best sense of the word, but he must be capable also of properly
directing others in the pursuit of learning, and, withal, combine
executive ability with a highly specialized professional facility. The
result of carefully conceived courses of training is apparent in the
wonderful results achieved through the devoted and untiring efforts of
the members of this Association towards a constant betterment of their
charges, and a closer bonding, through affection, between the masses of
the people and that portion of the books which lies between the covers.
My purpose in recalling to your memory the wonderful advance made by
training in your profession in a comparatively short time, is to give
point to an analogy I wish to draw, showing a corresponding advance in
the profession of architecture. Not so very many years ago there were
ample grounds for the recalling by Mr. David P. Todd of Lord Bacon's
warning against the sacrifice of utility to mere artistic composition in
the following words: "Houses are built to Live in, and not to Looke on:
Therefore let Use bee preferred before Uniformitie; Except where both
may be had Leave the Goodly Fabrickes of Houses, for Beautie only, to
the Enchanted Pallaces of the Poets; Who build them with small Cost":
but to-day, thanks to the munificence of the French government and the
untiring energy of some of those who have profited by it, in fostering
the growth of our own architectural schools, there are few sections of
this broad land which have not one or more worthy followers of Palladio
and Michael Angelo. Hunt, Richardson and Post were among the first to
receive the training of the Ecole des Beaux Arts, and they, moreover,
had the rare judgment to take the training only, adapting their designs
to the climatic and other local conditions rather than attempting the
importation of French forms as well as method of design. Their example
and the impetus they were able to impart to the technical schools have
been potent factors in the development of the talent of American
architects. While it is true, and more the pity, that some students
return from Paris with the idea that because Paris is a beautiful city
architecturally, the simple injection of some of their own masterpieces
into our diverse city street fronts, is going to reincarnate our
municipalities, the major portion are sufficiently discriminating to
realize that Paris owes much of its charm to a symmetry under
governmental control which we, free born Americans, can never hope to
attain, and leave behind them the mere forms and symbols of their alma
mater to use that which is best and most profitable in their training;
that is, a breadth of conception of the problem and a logical method of
sequential study of it which ensures a creditable if not an ideal
solution. The modern architect, to be successful, must be conversant
with a vast amount of information which is apparently outside his chosen
profession--such as the minutiae of hospitals, churches, libraries,
railroad stations and the like. As a case in point I recall the address
of a certain railroad president at the dedication of a large terminal
depot, in which he said: "while we have had the co-operation of
engineers and specialists in every branch of the work, I must give great
credit to our architect who is responsible for the conception of the
entire system of the handling of passengers, although he was employed
solely to enclose the space designated by our engineers." It is not my
purpose to laud the profession of architecture, but rather to show its
preparedness to _co-operate_ with you in achieving the best in library
construction and design.
May I add to Mr. Todd's advice to library boards about to build, "first
appoint your librarian," the suggestion that second, in consultation
with him, _appoint_ your architect. It is not disbelief in competition
which has led the American Institute of Architects to advise against
competitions, for the former is a constant condition, while the latter
they believe to result in more evil than good. It is a popular notion
among laymen that a competition will bring out _ideas_ and mayhap
develop some hidden genius, but in answer to the first I can say, I know
of but one building erected from successful competitive plans without
modification, and for the second, the major portion of American
originality in building designs is unworthy the name of architecture.
Aside from the needless expense and loss of time entailed on library
board, as well as architect, by the holding of competitions a greater
evil lies in the well proven fact, that in their desire to win approval
for their design, most architects endeavor to find out the librarian's
predilections and follow them in their plans rather than to submit a
scholarly solution of the problem studied from an unprejudiced
standpoint. It is not often the good fortune of competitors to have
their submitted work judged with such unbiased intelligence as that
which permitted the best conceived plan to win in the competition for
the new library in New York City. Few men would have dared in
competition to remove that imposing architectural feature, the reading
room, from their main façade and put it frankly where it belongs, in
direct touch with the stacks which serve it, as Carrere & Hastings did.
Not long ago a member of a certain library board of trustees wrote to us
that we were being considered, among others, as architects for their new
building, and he suggested that we send to them as many water colors as
we could collect and _as large as possible_, to impress the board; for,
as he added, "some of us appreciate your plans, but most laymen are
caught by the colored pictures, the larger the better."
As a rule librarians have very decided ideas as to the plan desired in
so far as it relates to the correlation of rooms and department
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