Address of Pres. Taft at the banquet of the Swedish-American Republican League. 62d Cong. 2d. sess. Sen. doc. 542. Mar. 9, 1912.Address on the recall of judges and the recall of judicial decisions at the session of the annual meeting of the Ill. State Bar Assoc. Apr. 26, 1912.Election and recall of federal judges; speech of Hon. Robt. L. Owen. 62d Cong. 1st Sess. Sen. doc. 99. July 31, 1911.Federal recall and referendum. Springfield Republican. Dec. 5, 1912.How the "recall of decisions" would protect the weak from injustice. Chicago Tribune. Apr. 7, 1912.If recall ever comes, judges will cause it. Dallas News. June 8, 1912.Importance of an independent judiciary. Ind. Apr. 4, 1912.Judicial decisions and public feeling; address by Elihu Root. 62d Cong. 2d sess. Sen. doc. 271. Jan. 19, 1912.A judicial oligarchy. Century mag. Oct., 1911.The judicial recall. Century mag. May, 1912.The judicial recall a fallacy of constitutional government; speech by Rome G. Brown. 62d Cong. 2d sess. Sen. doc. 892. Aug. 3, 1912.Judicial recall is turned down. Baltimore American. July 4, 1912.Judicial tyranny and the remedy; speech by Isaac R. Sherwood. May 2, 1912.Life terms and the judicial recall. Chicago American. July 16, 1912.Nullifying the law by judicial interpretation. Atlantic. Apr., 1911.Oakland defeated recall nearly 2 to 1. San Francisco Chronicle. Apr. 6, 1912.Recall for all but judges urged. New York Sun. Jan. 6, 1913.Recall in Oregon. Washington Post. Sept. 2, 1912.Recall in Seattle. McClure's. Oct., 1911.Recall of judges. Ind. Aug. 17, 1911.Recall of judges. Editorial Rev. Nov., 1911.Recall of judges; address by James Manahan. July 19, 1911.Recall of judges; arguments in opposition by Mr. Rome G. Brown. July 19, 1911.Recall of judges a rash experiment. Century. August, 1911.Recall of judges and judicial decisions; speech by Hon. Augustus Gardner. Apr. 4, 1912.Recall of public servants; speech by Hon. Jonathan Bourne. Aug. 5, 1911.Restricting the judiciary. Chicago Daily News. June 16, 1913.Right of the people to rule; address of Theodore Roosevelt. Mar. 20, 1912.Seeks substitute for judicial recall. Indianapolis Star. Aug. 30, 1912.Study on the recall of presidents. Chicago Tribune. Sept. 23, 1912.Where the recall is justified. International. Dec., 1912.Wisconsin Assembly Bill; the interpellation or recall of commissions and other state officers. Jan. 29, 1913.Wilson explains recall. Springfield Republican. Sept. 26, 1912.
Address of Pres. Taft at the banquet of the Swedish-American Republican League. 62d Cong. 2d. sess. Sen. doc. 542. Mar. 9, 1912.
Address on the recall of judges and the recall of judicial decisions at the session of the annual meeting of the Ill. State Bar Assoc. Apr. 26, 1912.
Election and recall of federal judges; speech of Hon. Robt. L. Owen. 62d Cong. 1st Sess. Sen. doc. 99. July 31, 1911.
Federal recall and referendum. Springfield Republican. Dec. 5, 1912.
How the "recall of decisions" would protect the weak from injustice. Chicago Tribune. Apr. 7, 1912.
If recall ever comes, judges will cause it. Dallas News. June 8, 1912.
Importance of an independent judiciary. Ind. Apr. 4, 1912.
Judicial decisions and public feeling; address by Elihu Root. 62d Cong. 2d sess. Sen. doc. 271. Jan. 19, 1912.
A judicial oligarchy. Century mag. Oct., 1911.
The judicial recall. Century mag. May, 1912.
The judicial recall a fallacy of constitutional government; speech by Rome G. Brown. 62d Cong. 2d sess. Sen. doc. 892. Aug. 3, 1912.
Judicial recall is turned down. Baltimore American. July 4, 1912.
Judicial tyranny and the remedy; speech by Isaac R. Sherwood. May 2, 1912.
Life terms and the judicial recall. Chicago American. July 16, 1912.
Nullifying the law by judicial interpretation. Atlantic. Apr., 1911.
Oakland defeated recall nearly 2 to 1. San Francisco Chronicle. Apr. 6, 1912.
Recall for all but judges urged. New York Sun. Jan. 6, 1913.
Recall in Oregon. Washington Post. Sept. 2, 1912.
Recall in Seattle. McClure's. Oct., 1911.
Recall of judges. Ind. Aug. 17, 1911.
Recall of judges. Editorial Rev. Nov., 1911.
Recall of judges; address by James Manahan. July 19, 1911.
Recall of judges; arguments in opposition by Mr. Rome G. Brown. July 19, 1911.
Recall of judges a rash experiment. Century. August, 1911.
Recall of judges and judicial decisions; speech by Hon. Augustus Gardner. Apr. 4, 1912.
Recall of public servants; speech by Hon. Jonathan Bourne. Aug. 5, 1911.
Restricting the judiciary. Chicago Daily News. June 16, 1913.
Right of the people to rule; address of Theodore Roosevelt. Mar. 20, 1912.
Seeks substitute for judicial recall. Indianapolis Star. Aug. 30, 1912.
Study on the recall of presidents. Chicago Tribune. Sept. 23, 1912.
Where the recall is justified. International. Dec., 1912.
Wisconsin Assembly Bill; the interpellation or recall of commissions and other state officers. Jan. 29, 1913.
Wilson explains recall. Springfield Republican. Sept. 26, 1912.
We keep the public informed of what is taking place in the Illinois legislature by having a complete file of the house and senate bills and joint resolutions. These are carefully indexed so that if a patron asks for the bills relating to non-partisan elections, by turning to our index and looking under Municipalities—Non-partisan elections, the bills are easily found. Likewise the ordinances that are passed by the city council are treated in the same way.
We have found from our experience covering a year's work that the subjects that have been most used are as follows:
Some of the questions selected at random, show the demands made upon the room. A committee of the City Council is appointed to investigate the question of public service corporation commissions, and the library receives a call for material upon the question "Whether it is better to have public utilities regulated by state public service commissions, or to have them regulated by the City Council." When the investigation of the telephone rates is to be made the history of the telephone investigations carried on by previous councils is looked up. Upon investigating the advisability of electrifying the railway terminals, statistics are demanded showing the amount of damage that is done by the smoke of the railroads in the city limits. Only the live, up-to-date material can be of any value to these city officials, and a knowledge of what other cities have done relative to these questions is necessary.
Newspaper men who are doing such excellent work in keeping the people informed about what improvements are being made to better the conditions in the city, demand a great deal of a civics room. For example: A newspaper man writing a series of articles upon how to improve Chicago, wishing to write an article on housing, sends in a call for information regarding Schmidlapp houses, and it is our business to get him the material. Again he wishes to show how to reduce the cost of living, and sends in a request for information concerning the conveyance of produce from the farmer to the consumer by means of the interurban cars. Or again he wishes to inspire the public with the desire to beautify the city with window boxes and flowers and he wishes to know what European cities are doing along this line.
Civic associations and women's clubs are constantly making demands upon our resources. Such questions as:
What material have you from the budget exhibits of other cities?Statistics showing the death rate in garden cities as compared with the death rate in cities where the population is congested.The provision of giving the wages of prisoners to the support of the family.Public comfort stations.City planning and garden cities.The question of working women's wages in its relation to the social evil was studied, during the recent investigation of the Illinois Vice Commission, by students and women's clubs.
What material have you from the budget exhibits of other cities?
Statistics showing the death rate in garden cities as compared with the death rate in cities where the population is congested.
The provision of giving the wages of prisoners to the support of the family.
Public comfort stations.
City planning and garden cities.
The question of working women's wages in its relation to the social evil was studied, during the recent investigation of the Illinois Vice Commission, by students and women's clubs.
Students find our room a boon. They are able to get material there which they are not able to find anywhere else. This spring students at the University of Chicago were working upon a debate on Panama Canal tolls, and they were so eager to use our material that they would stay all day, leaving in relays to eat while a few were left behind to guard the material.
A civics room in a medium-sized town may be made one of the most important assets of the library if it can be arranged that the person in charge does not have to divide her attention with the main work of the other departments of the library. If the staff is limited it would be better to have the civics room situated in a centralized locality, such as the state library, with easy communication with the smaller libraries. These could have an index of what the state library has, and when the need would arise the librarian could communicate her wants to the state librarian and the material could be sent as a package library upon short notice.
And so we find that we can be of assistance to the members of the City Council, women's clubs, civic organizations, newspaper men and students. The future of the work is very bright; new lines of work open up; new opportunities for service present themselves. It is in this work that one can be alive; he can feel that he is a part of the great movement toward the betterment of his city and its people.
Dr. William H. Allen, director of the Bureau of Municipal Research, of New York, made the closing talk of the evening, taking as his subject, "What a city should expect and receive from a library." He made a plea that librarians as individuals should stand for something in the community, should take their place as persons in the affairs of the day as well as see to it that their institutions performed the work to be expected of a library. He also laid emphasis on the fact that the general public did not know of the work being done by libraries and the possibilities of further service and urged that discussions of such work should be given place in the general magazines and newspapers as well as library magazines. He strongly advocated individual thinking, the doing of that which the individual librarian felt to be the best for a given community whether it be in line with general library thought or not, claiming that individuality of action and thought made for a stronger and better administration even if such individuality led to criticism upon occasion.
The meeting was called to order Wednesday evening, June 25, by the chairman, Mr. Frank K. Walter.
The first paper was presented by Miss MARY W. PLUMMER on
Although it is twenty-five years since library schools began, one may say that in a sense they are still in the experimental stage. And to say this is really praise, for when schools cease to experiment they are running along safely in ruts and have lost much of their vitality. The same period has been one of great expansion in library affairs,—not only has the country been covered with library buildings where before, to use a Western expression, "there was nothing but sagebrush," but forms of library work and extension have sprung up that were undreamed of twenty-five years ago, new methods have had to be found to meet emergencies and new conditions, social, industrial, and educational, and the library or library commission without several new ideas and aspirations per month is not thought to be doing its full duty. Add to all this progress the reactions that are going on, in library practice, in library architecture, etc., each a faithful reflection of some new light or of some old light looked at a second time, and the scene is one of activity paralleled, so far as the present writer knows, in no other field of endeavor, unless it be that of general education.
Several of the schools carry on an exercise called "survey of the field," merely to keep their classes in sight of this movement, and once a fortnight is not too often for such a class to meet—there is always fresh material for discussion.
A school, however, must experiment within reason and along its own lines. Because some small libraries and new branches are taking down their partitions or building without them is not sufficient cause for the advocacy of the practice in the schools; the much mooted question of the use of the accessions-book must remain for some time a mooted question in the schools—as long, in fact, as the conservative and radical libraries so evenly balance each other on the subject. It is not for the schools to practice or to teach library innovations—their business is to watch innovations and their results and report to their students.
It is open to the school, however, not only to watch but to forecast, to some extent. By dint of observing and listening, one who is not in the actual game often sees what is really happening or going to happen before some, at least, of the participants are entirely aware of it. An instance lies at hand in the subject of cataloging. Up to the present, this has been one of the backbone courses in every school-schedule, though the schools report regularly to their students the progress making in co-operative cataloging and the use of printed cards. As this use extends, it becomes more and more evident that cataloging is to be concentrated in a few expert hands and that most librarians are not going to have to be catalogers any more than the head of a commercial concern has to know by heart the price of every article in his stock, or than a manufacturer has to be able to do at a moment's notice what his expert subordinates are doing.
For the present, libraries still exist which make their own cards, and they still call on the schools regularly for librarians who can catalog, and hope rather than expect to get them. For, in spite of the fact that the schools still teach every student to catalog, as far as the student material will admit, students of their own volition seldom choose to be catalogers. Whether they too have sensed the fact that a change is coming and that the librarianship of the future will have more to do with the inside of the book and its application to the individual, with the handling rather than the making of tools, or whether they simply do not like what seems to them the probable monotony of cataloging, I do not know; but I think the schools will bear me out in the statement that cataloging as a specialty is not the first choice of many students. In view of these facts, I am ready to hazard the prediction that within ten years cataloging will be given in the schools as an elective; and that instead of making catalogs the majority of students will be led to consider the few main principles of cataloging and then taught better how to use and how to criticise catalogs.
Every instructor in cataloging knows that there are students whom it is a waste of time and vitality to try to make into catalogers, and every year good people go out from the schools who should never be engaged as catalogers and whom the schools recommend only for their qualifications for other work. Suppose we concentrated our teaching ability in this line on the students whowouldmake good catalogers and who would elect the study—we should be working with the grain and not across it, the cataloging of the whole country would be uniformly well done instead of open to well-founded criticism in places, as it is now, and the time and strength of the instructor would be saved as well as those of the student whose forte lies in another direction. Another result would probably follow very quickly—more men would go into the library schools. I am told that the detail of cataloging seems to a man too much like making tatting, and one can easily understand that a person competent and eager to handle large matters or to fill an active administrative post would fret over anything involving as much minutiæ as the making of catalog cards.
However, while libraries in general are making their own cards, and while the smaller libraries have to have librarians who can turn their hands to anything, cataloging as well as the rest, it is unsafe for the schools to send out students without this part of the training. It is only as library conditions point overwhelmingly toward cataloging as a specializing study that the schools can change.
Librarians can help very greatly in the matter of specialization by encouraging it and employing specialists for special work wherever possible. Without depreciating in the least the value of an attractive face and an agreeable manner and of taste in dress, in library work as elsewhere, I may perhaps be allowed to put forward the opinion that the librarian who is choosing a cataloger should not be unduly swayed by these to the exclusion of the other requirements. Accuracy, legibility, knowledge of books, ability in research and a taste for it, all go to the making of a good cataloger, and it is discouraging for a school to see the graduate who possesses these qualifications passed over in favor of one who may have a pleasanter address but who can not do the work half so well. And women librarians are swayed by these considerations almost as much as men. The school can hardly be said to blame in such cases—it can only sorrowfully shake its head, knowing that if there is any discredit to be cast upon any one later, a great part of it will probably fall upon the school.
Setting aside cataloging as a specialty in the days to come, to what shall we devote the large place it has occupied in all the general curricula?
It is easy to see that with printed cards and expert service, catalog cards can be fuller in information, can be critically annotated, perhaps, can be made more often for analyticals, subject and author, and that the use of the catalog by the library assistant can be much more constant and more discriminating. Some time can be given in the curriculum to selecting from the catalog, securing from the shelves, examining and comparing the books on a given subject, with the result that the student can get a more thorough knowledge of its literature, greater facilityin the use of a valuable tool, and may become more generally intelligent for the purpose of the selection and buying of books, and for recommending or the contrary.
Classification and the study of subject-headings are in themselves so broadening, furnish so good an exercise of the reasoning powers, and afford such fine views of the inter-relations of fields of knowledge, that I doubt if they can ever or ought ever to be set aside as special studies. The study of works of reference, however, offers so large and comprehensive a field that it seems to need division; and this brings me to the other subject of my title, that of grading in the schools.
Probably no one thing has made teaching more difficult, than the wide range of age and experience among the students. In the same class may occur and do occur continually the girl of twenty without much reading beyond high school and college requirements and the summer novel (unless she has fortunately grown up in a cultivated family with the habit of good reading and of discussing books), and the man or woman of from thirty to forty with a knowledge of books, an experience of life and society, and of thoughtful mind, who may have been successful in teaching or in some other profession; and in between range students of all degrees of cultivation, varieties of experience, and types of education. The training fitted for the first class wastes much of the time of the student at the other extreme, and if it be adapted to that extreme may be too strong or too complicated a mixture for the youngest student.
Grading would be expensive, for it would mean more teachers or more specialized teachers. In some of the schools the classes are not large enough to admit of so costly a proceeding; yet without grading, under the conditions described, the school belongs where the ungraded school belongs in the scheme of general education—it is delivering a scattering fire that may or may not hit its object. The entrance examination has been the device employed for unifying student-material in some schools, and it is much better than any other means, it seems to me; but though it may show what is the greatest common divisor of the candidates in the way of education and offer a definite point of departure for instruction, those who examine the papers see such differences, quite apart from the mere answers to the questions, as warn them that they are about to deal with a very varied assortment of intellects, a wide range of cultivation, and with necessities ranging from those of the steady, plodding follower who will never go further than an average assistantship to those of the born administrator or scholar. There is, to be sure, in such a class great benefit for the younger and less experienced students from contact with the others, from discussions that are a little over their heads, but, all the same, teaching addressed to the maturer intellect leaves the other with gaps unfilled, while teaching brought down to the level required by youth and inexperience gets the older student nowhere for the time being. The process is a sort of hitching along that should not be necessary in professional or vocational schools.
Suppose that grading be practicable so far as money and teachers are concerned. Where should lines be drawn? Often the younger person has the more flexible as well as more open mind and the older student may be a little set and may have ceased to take in readily new ideas. How to distinguish the students who can receive and assimilate readily the best and most that can be given? I should say that perhaps a month might have to be spent in making the division by actual testing of the students in class together. With this secured, two curricula might be offered, one prepared for the needs of each class with appropriate methods of teaching, and offering varied proportions of the same subjects. And here I revert to the teaching of reference work. For the higher grade it would be more inclusive, more difficult, dealing more with books in foreign languages, with books on unusual and recondite subjects, such as would be found in large reference or college libraries, while the lower grade might be adapted to the more elementary work to be done in small libraries or in branches.
The "moral" of this plan lies largely in the application of it. If the large reference or college library could be deflected from its main object, the securing of a competent reference assistant, by a sunny smile on the part of a lower grade student, the school's work in preparing the better student would go for naught so far as that library was concerned, and if this happened several times it would result in a confusion of values in the minds of the students. A + a sunny smile - a knowledge of the books would seem to be more than equal to B + a thorough reference equipment - a sunny smile. We may paraphrase here a well-known saying by asserting that, taking all things together, a librarian who can make his own choice of assistants gets the assistants he deserves, with the further assertion that the word personality, as often used now, does not get its full meaning; we forget that it consists not only of what one looks like and sounds like and apparently feels like but of all that one has made one's own out of the realm of knowledge, and all that one has assimilated and made profitable from one's experience.
The charge that the one year's general course is too full would probably become less true if or when grading was adopted. Only those subjects would need be given to a grade and those amounts of a subject which the students were capable of profiting by and the time saved could be used in more effective ways.
There is a very general desire to study administration among both older and younger students. So far as this means covering the whole routine of a library, with lectures on library relationships, management, etc., a course can easily be given; the difficulty arises when students wish to go out as administrators on the strength of such preparation alone; and when library boards send to the schools for students to fill administrative positions and expect the training to ensure administrative ability which, under the circumstances, can not be guaranteed. No matter how friendly may be the attitude of the library connected with a school, it is hardly willing to turn over any of its administrative work to students, nor could it be expected to do so. The ideal thing, of course, would be for the school itself to own a small library as a laboratory in which students could be tested for administrative ability under supervision. But this, too, would take money. When one sees the splendid endowment of a School of Journalism, a School of Technology, etc., one cannot help hoping that some day a School of Librarianship may be endowed which may employ the best of teachers and plenty of them, have its own ample collections, adapted to its needs, and establish its own library as a laboratory in which it may try experiments.
I have not yet touched upon the kind of specialization of which we have heard most in late years—the kind to fit students to be librarians of special libraries. I do not believe that the most energetic critic of the library schools would require them to teach engineering, commercial methods, law and medicine. A demand there certainly is from business houses and manufactories for librarians, but that is not enough for the schools. There must be a corresponding demand from persons wishing to be trained for such places. This, so far as I can learn, has not made itself felt. When applicants begin to come to the schools saying, "I intend to go into an applied science library" (or "an insurance library") "and I want to be trained for that work and that only," then the schools will have to provide such training or declare definitely that that is not a part of their field. Until such a demand arises from would-be students, it would be foolish for a school which has plenty of demand for general training and certain well-defined extensions of it to go outside this province.
A committee of the Special Libraries Association, I learn, is investigating the matter of preparation for special library positions, and it is to be hoped that there may be a very thorough inquiry, and that the committee will state definitely just what the association wants and what it believes to be proper training for such positions. Then the existing schools can decide whether or not they can give such preparation.
Meantime, a suggestion that institutes of technology might take up this special technical work and commercial schools the business library courses, etc., may be worth considering.
It has been suggested that the schools specialize among themselves, and to some extent that has come about naturally; for the school with especially good resources and unusual facilities for teaching a given subject, such as legislative reference or work with children, if it makes known its advantages, is very likely to attract the student who wishes to follow that line of work. Other reasons, however, often weigh more heavily—the location of a school, the personnel of the faculty, a smaller tuition fee, the general reputation and advancement of its graduates, etc.; so that any school may be called upon to give some special work of which perhaps it is not the best exponent. It cannot send the student elsewhere willy-nilly, and it does its best to give him what is wanted. As schools increase in number, a classification of them according to curricula is likely to follow, and this difficulty may be lessened. Even so, there is always the danger to be guarded against that students trained along one line may, through force of circumstances, take positions requiring a kind of training which they have not had. It would be impossible for a mining engineer to do the work of a mechanical engineer and vice versa, but in the work of an average library the cataloger and reference assistant and children's librarian must often change places, and any one of them, rather than be without a position, would as a rule try to do the work of the others. If all have had general training, this would not matter so much, but without that there would be considerable loss of efficiency.
In bringing this heterogeneous paper to an end—a paper which claims to be nothing more than a sort of thinking aloud on some of the problems confronting the schools, I wish to state some conclusions that I feel myself coming to: 1. That we need more good schools. 2. That they need to send out a larger number of trained people. 3. That we need longer, more thorough, and more systematic courses. 4. That with the larger schools some effort at grading is desirable. 5. That the schools would do well to get together and make a comparative study of their curricula, and their resources and facilities for special subjects, and map out tentatively a division of the field. This, while not binding upon any school, might serve for guidance, but no school should monopolize any one subject unless it is the only school having proper facilities for giving it.
Miss CORINNE BACON read a paper entitled
Before beginning to talk of the ways in which libraries might co-operate to better advantage with library schools, it is but fair to acknowledge gratefully that many libraries are already co-operating with us in a way that often must tax severely their time and patience. In behalf of the Drexel Institute library school, I thank most heartily those libraries that, regardless of the inconvenience to themselves, allow our students to go to them for the practice work that is so valuable to half-fledged librarians. And in voicing the gratitude of Drexel, I feel that I am giving utterance to the feelings of every other school that sends out its students in the same way.
We can give our students but two weeks practice work outside of Philadelphia, because our school year is so short. Perhaps it would be well to lengthen the year by two weeks, in order that the term of work might be lengthened.
There are three things that it seems to me the schools may properly ask of the libraries: advance practice work; direct criticism; a living wage for assistants.
(1) Advance practice work—I mean by this work done in libraries prior to any study of library science. As a rule, the student with a little practical experience gets far more from a library course than one not so equipped. Directors of schools often advise work in advance, but, as far as I know, few schools require it. Pratt Institute begins with practical work in the Pratt library. The difficulties in the way of requiring this work are many. It would bear heavily upon the libraries; it would be an added expense to students living at a distance from good libraries; it would not necessarily prove the applicant's fitness or unfitness for library work, as she might fail at the kind of work she was set to do, and yet be capable of success on some other line.
Yet, on the whole, this would be a better test of fitness than all the questions we directors hurl at kindly and well-meaning friends or former instructors of our would-be students. Don't we ask too many questions as to personality from those whose answers often carry little weight? Why should we not accept all who measure up to a certain physical and mental standard, without troubling our heads so much as to whether they are ideally fit for library work? It would bring us more in line with the professional schools. Moreover, there are almost as many kinds of library work as there are of people!
The chance to work in a real library before beginning the course of study would often clarify the student's ideas about library work, even more than it would clarify the director's ideas about the would-be student. We would have, perhaps, fewer applicants who are not very strong but who "lovebooks."
Sometimes I have wondered whether it would not be well to abandon entrance examinations and require instead a health certificate from a physician, a certificate that six months' satisfactory work had been done in his library from a librarian, and a statement that the applicant had read the English Bible through at least three times (this last for its influence on English prose style!).
(2) Direct criticism.
"Indirect criticism" was perhaps the toughest thing in the advanced cataloging course in my honored Alma Mater, and indirect criticism is one of the most trying things that we teachers of library science have to undergo. Librarians can help us by giving us their criticism of our methods and of our students at first-hand.
We have had more or less direct criticism—we would like more.
We have been told (a) That our graduates are not so valuable to certain libraries as their own apprentices. Of course they are not, at first, but they should be more valuable later. (b) That they are wedded to library school methods. I believe there is less justice in this criticism than there was some years ago. (c) That our schools are not "laid out and conducted in accordance with recommendations from experts in pedagogy." We plead guilty. (d) That the schools "almost inevitably tend to exalt technique and routine." I do not think that we mean to do this. We know that culture and gumption are more important than any amount of knowledge of technique and routine, but we expect our students to finish their cultural studies (so far as such studiescanbe finished) before coming to us, and we can not teach gumption. It is heaven-born. We exist largely for the purpose of teaching technique and routine but never for one moment do we mean to exalt them over the weightier matters of the law.
I have gone a little out of the way to answer these few direct criticisms. Some of us have profited by them. Give us more.
We would like direct rather than indirect criticism of our graduates. Unfavorable comments on training in general, or on the training of a particular school, do not take the place of direct criticism of individuals. Librarians would be doing akindness by writing to the school from which they had a trained assistant who was lacking in ways that reflected on her training and stating plainly what the defects were, so that the school might profit by the knowledge.
Then, too, librarians would often save themselves trouble by co-operating with the schools to the extent of writing for the record of a graduate whom they think of engaging. Many do this, but not all. A librarian or trustee may select an assistant at a conference on account of her good looks and pleasant manners, and when he finds out (it is usually a "he" who makes this error of judgment) that she is not all his fancy painted her, he blames the school that trained her. The school could have told him perhaps, if asked, wherein she was lacking.
(3) A living wage. This is the most important of the three points in which we wish for co-operation. It is getting to be a serious question as to whether women of ability can afford to go into library work. We do not expect luxuries, but to do good work we must keep fit. We need rooms that admit plenty of fresh air and we need nourishing food. We are obliged to dress fairly well. We ought to go to library meetings, and trustees do not usually pay the way of the assistants with the smaller salaries. Recreation is a necessity if we are to keep sane. But how can we afford to travel, or even to see a play or to buy a book, on the salaries many of us get?
I was asked a few weeks ago to supply a college library with a cataloger who must be a library school graduate knowing French and German and the salary offered was $40 a month. If a woman ate poor food, she might be able to save enough out of $40 to pay for her washing—only she couldn't afford to buy any clothes to be washed. She could never see a play, hear an orchestra, or buy a book.
A good cook, on the other hand, would have no difficulty in getting $30 or $35 a monthand maintenance, which would be equivalent to a salary of at least $50 or $55 a month. Moreover, the cook would not be expected to dress as well as the cataloger (though, as a matter of fact, her Sunday clothes would probably be more costly) or to attend conventions.
The case I have mentioned is by no means an isolated one. A good-looking girl with pleasant manners, who could understand French, German, Spanish and Italian over the telephone, was asked for by a large city library that proposed to pay about $45 a month. Another college library recently wanted a college and library school graduate with experience and various other qualifications for $720 a year. Now if anexperiencedwoman with such an education can't get more than $720 a year in library work, the sooner she leaves it for something else the better. A special library belonging to a leading institution in a large city was looking for a woman to reclassify and catalog its collection, but seemed unwilling to pay even $50 a month.
This is not intended as a diatribe against the librarian employer. The trustees and the taxpayers need education along the line of library salaries. Libraries need larger appropriations for salaries. We have passed through a period where method was exalted, we seem to be passing through a period where a fine building is the prime necessity. But after all, a library means primarily plenty of books that are worth while and assistants that know enough to get them into the hands of the right people. And we can not cultivate efficient assistants on less than a living wage.
Do not misunderstand me. I do not mean to imply that a green library school graduate should leap at once into a high-salaried position. Yet the comparison sometimes made with the doctor or lawyer, who are so long in gaining a foot-hold, seems to me unfair. Lawyers and doctors who are good for much, make big money after a while. It is the exceptional librarian who ever gets a large salary. Therefore it is not fair to expect her to spendso many years earning little or nothing as does the doctor or lawyer.
I have spoken particularly of salaries for women. Salaries for men in library work are usually too low, but I have dwelt on the women's salaries because women are discriminated against, not alone in libraries, but in most kinds of work done by women.
The working-woman of today asks no favor because she is a woman. She does ask equal pay with men for equally good work.
I do not mean to over-emphasize the money side of library work, even though I think the "missionary" side of it has been over-emphasized. Why is a shelf-lister any more of a missionary than a bookkeeper in John Wanamaker's store? Why is any librarian any more of a missionary than the editor of a great daily, or than a busy surgeon, or many other folks that might be mentioned? We librarians serve those who know more than we, who are better than we—we are "just folks" like all the rest, equally worthy, if we give good measure in our work, of a living wage.
We of the schools ask of the libraries we try to serve that they send us criticisms of our graduates, that they try them out, and that they pay them, if found efficient, that living wage without which the best work is impossible.
Discussion of both papers followed, after which was read the
The Committee on Methods of Publicity respectfully reports to the Professional Training Section as follows:
At the time of the mid-winter meeting at Chicago the members of this Committee met and after consultation with the Secretary of the A. L. A. determined upon a procedure which was carried out as follows:
It was deemed wise to make an effort to reach the students in the colleges and universities through the publication of an article in each of the periodicals published in the various colleges. One form of letter was framed for co-educational institutions, one form for use at men's colleges and one form for use at women's colleges. These were mimeographed and Mr. Utley, who had already prepared a list of college publications, mailed the letter to over 180 publications.
The letter was in no sense an advertisement of library schools; it was rather an attempt to set forth facts relative to the opportunities within the library profession. It called attention to the existence of the various library schools and referred the interested student to the college librarian or to the Secretary of the A. L. A.
Although the Committee flattered itself it had produced a helpful and interesting letter, it cannot learn that it was reprinted to any considerable extent nor that it resulted in interesting many students in the profession.
The Committee is informed that in many, if not in most, of the educational institutions of the country there are groups of persons interested in vocational training. It is therefore recommended that this publicity work be continued, but that the approach for the publication of the article and for the local use of it be made through the persons or groups in each institution which are particularly interested in vocational training. In most cases these persons have an established channel of publicity and can reach the students and the publications better than they can be reached through the direct attack heretofore employed.
Respectfully submitted,
CARL H. MILAM,M. S. DUDGEON,JOSEPHINE A. RATHBONE,Committee on Methods of Publicity.
June 25, 1913.
The following "Account of the work of the library school round table for 1912 and 1913," by Mr. P. L. WINDSOR, was read by Miss Frances Simpson.
In January, 1911, 1912 and 1913, there were held in Chicago, meetings of library school directors and instructors for the discussion of topics connected with library school work. While at first thought it might seem that such discussions should form a part of the programs of this, the Professional Training Section, nevertheless, the meetings have evidently justified themselves and are likely to continue.
Members of the faculties of only the generally recognized library schools have attended these meetings; that is, the plans of the meetings do not contemplate the attendance of instructors in summer library schools or instructors in training classes conducted by public libraries. This limitation on the number of people taking part in these meetings was desired, first, because we who arranged the meetings wished to discuss problems belonging primarily to our own special work and not to attempt the larger field which properly belongs to the Professional Training Section; and second, because we wished the meetings to be sufficiently small in numbers and the participants to be sufficiently specialized in interest to insure informal and frank discussion.
Minutes of these meetings of library school faculties have included copies of reports presented and in some cases have included abstracts of discussions. Copies have been sent to each school.
Some of the topics discussed would be of no general interest to even the Professional Training Section, as they pertain so closely to school work. Others are of such a nature that we ourselves would not, with any freedom, discuss them before as large a meeting as a section meeting. Our frank, informal discussions have been characteristic.
Among the questions proposed for discussion and sent to the various faculties in advance of the meeting, are such as these:
1. Is it desirable, and if desirable, is it practicable to make the work of the first year of the two-year schools and the work of the one-year schools more nearly alike? Many junior students in a two-year school enter library work without taking the senior year's work; if the courses in one-year schools are better preparation for library work than the first year's work of the two-year schools, then these juniors are at a disadvantage as compared with students from a one-year school. Some students in the one-year schools may wish to go to a two-year school and take a second year of training; as the courses are at present arranged, this second year's work is almost impossible, because it does not fit on to the work that the student has had.
2. Do we use the most approved pedagogical methods in our class room work? Do we lecture too much, and give too few quizzes, conferences and reviews? Do we depend too much on the student's taking full notes, when the proper use of printed outlines, or carefully selected required readings supplemented by a few notes would yield better results? Shall the course in cataloging be put at the beginning of the course, or later? How much do we use the stereopticon?
3. Would it be practicable for several schools to secure a lecturer on some special subject in library economy who should give the regular work in that subject in each of these schools? An example of a beginning in this direction is Edna Lyman Scott's work in several schools.
4. Would it be possible for the several schools to combine in securing a lecturer each year to give a short series of lectures on some one subject, these lectures to be seriously worked up, and to be published after being delivered? The final publication of the lectures, and the combined remuneration from several schools, might be a sufficient incentive to capable persons to do their best work.
5. Are the subjects now in our curricula properly balanced? Is too much time given to learning cataloging and other routine, and consequently too little to aconsideration of methods of extending the use of the library by the public?
6. Is it as easy to secure transfer of credit from one school to another as it should be?
Information on the following subjects connected with library school work has been collected, reported on and discussed in our meetings.
1. The cost of library schools and a rough analysis of their expenditures.
2. Specialization among library schools.
3. Book selection as a course in library schools.
4. The method of revising students' work.
5. Efficiency of administration in library schools.
6. Non-essentials in our library school courses.
7. Certain pedagogical problems connected with our library school instruction.
The following officers were elected for the coming year: Chairman, Corinne Bacon; Secretary, Julia A. Hopkins; Program committee, Mary W. Plummer, Alice S. Tyler, Frank K. Walter.
The government documents round table was called together at 8:15 p. m., June 26th, by George S. Godard, state librarian of Connecticut, chairman of the committee on public documents. Mr. F. W. Schenk, law librarian of the University of Chicago, was asked to serve as secretary.
The chairman, after brief introductory remarks relating to the progress which had been made in the matter of printing, binding, labeling and distributing public documents, both national and state, introduced Miss Mary A. Hartwell, assistant chief cataloger in the office of the superintendent of documents, Washington, who read a paper prepared by Superintendent of Documents Frank C. Wallace, stating his position upon the many questions and resolutions suggested at previous conferences of the American Library Association relative to the distribution, indexing, assignment of volume numbers, and publication of daily bulletins by the document office.
Mr. Wallace's paper follows:
I regret the necessity of being compelled to adopt this means of addressing your Association, as I feel a better understanding could be had of what we are trying to do for the libraries if it were possible for this office to be represented at your conference. I have read with much interest the proceedings of your last conference, and a part of my paper will endeavor to explain some of the questions which were discussed and made the subject of resolutions.
Distribution of Bills and Other Publications Now Withheld From Distribution to the Libraries.
There is no doubt but that some libraries, even under the present liberal distribution of government publications, fail to receive everything they should, and I am thoroughly in accord with the opinion expressed during your discussion that means should be provided to enable the libraries to receive those publications of a public character that are now withheld from distribution. It is gratifying to note that in Senator Smoot's printing bill, which has been reintroduced in the present Congress, there are provisions intended to supply remedies for certain existing conditions.
Section 65, paragraph 1, to which I refer, provides that a sufficient number of copies of those publications of Congress which do not bear a congressional number, including the committee publications now withheld from distribution to depositories and thoseprinted elsewhere than at the government printing office, shall be supplied to the libraries. It is also worded so as to prevent the departments from withholding some of their publications from the depositories.
The printing committee no doubt had in mind when this provision was framed that, under the provisions of the existing law, too much discretion is given the departments, with the result that, contrary to the spirit of the printing law, libraries are being deprived of certain classes of publications that are really of a public character.
The question as to the best method to be employed in the distribution of bills is not so easy of solution. It would not be practicable for this office to attempt to carry even a limited supply, as the work involved in storing them in an accessible manner would involve an expenditure that I do not believe could be justified by the results.
During the 62d Congress there were introduced 28,870 House bills and 8,589 Senate bills, and you can readily see that to handle an adequate stock of all those bills would be considerable of an undertaking. At the present time the only distributing agencies for copies of bills are the House and Senate document rooms at the capitol, but, although they sometimes furnish bills on request, the copies they receive are not intended for general public distribution. It seems to me that the solution supplied in your suggestion, that the text of all public bills upon which committee reports are made should be printed with the reports, is the most logical one that has ever been presented, but it would not be practicable to include also the testimony taken at hearings held by the committees, for in many cases the testimony would fill several large volumes. Besides, section 65, already referred to, provides that the libraries shall receive such hearings. Of course this section is not yet law, but we are permitted to hope that it may become so.
This is desirable from more than one point of view. It is often the case that committee reports refer to sections of the bill under consideration by number without quoting the language. In such cases the report may be unintelligible to any reader who has not a copy of the bill before him. In fact, nearly all committee reports not accompanied by the bills to which they relate may properly be classed as incomplete and imperfect publications.
The question of cost involved in printing the text of bills as appendixes to the committee reports upon them is not serious. While the number of bills introduced in Congress and receiving a first print is prodigious, and the cost of printing them in 14-point type with as many white lines as type lines is tremendous, it must be remembered that only a very small percentage of the bills introduced ever get so far as a committee report, and of these a considerable number are already printed with the reports by order of the committees, and the cost of printing the remainder in solid 8-point is so very much less than the cost of printing them in the extended bill form that it is almost negligible.
I do not think it is too late for the Association to submit to the joint committee on printing an amendment providing for the printing of the text of bills and resolutions as appendixes to the committee reports upon them. The pending bill may not pass, or may be extensively amended before passage, or may not be acted upon at the present special session, but I consider it probable that a general printing law of some kind will be enacted at a comparatively early day, and that the American Library Association may, by proper effort, secure the incorporation in it of the desired provision for the printing of the text of bills with the committee reports.
The need for the prompt issue of the catalogs is thoroughly appreciated, as we understand they are the only means of information the general public have for knowing what the United States government is publishing.
The Monthly Catalog is required to show what documents have been published during a month. Evidently, therefore, its compilation cannot be completed until after the close of the month. The compilation, however, is always completed within three or four days after the month closes. Sometimes the printing does not follow as quickly as one would like. This may seem strange to libraries, to whom the Monthly Catalog is perhaps the most important of all the public documents. If, however, they were in Washington they would soon realize that there are several other government concerns, some of them larger and more exacting than the public documents office. There is one known as the Congress of the United States, which calls for thousands of pages of printing where the documents office calls for one, and which, when it calls for the right of way in the government printing office (or anywhere else), is able to get it. The printing of the document office receives every consideration in the government printing office which it is possible to give, but it cannot command the right of way over Congress, the White House, or the cabinet.
It has been a long time since the Monthly Catalog has failed to be mailed during the month following its date, often by the middle of the month. It is to be noted, also, that its information is quite different from that of "press notices." It enters only documents that have been actually received, and its descriptions are minute and accurate. In its preliminary pages it gives such advance information of forthcoming documents as can be officially secured and vouched for. There is a habit in some government offices of giving the newspaper reporters information of proposed publications before the copy is ready for the printer, and sometimes before pen has been put to paper. Plans thus prematurely announced are subject to change and the advance notice may thus mislead the reader. Readers of the Monthly Catalog are not thus misled.
The superintendent of documents is confident that those librarians who keep well informed recognize his purpose to do everything for the great library interests of the country that the limitations of the law and the executive pressure upon his and other administrative offices for economy make possible.
The main cause for delay in the preparation of the copy for the document catalogs and indexes is that publications are ordered printed as documents that do not materialize until long after the close of the Congress to which they have been assigned, thus making it necessary to delay publication of the catalog and indexes until sufficient information can be obtained for making the entry.
It is hardly necessary to explain why the document catalog is being issued in one volume to cover the entire Congress instead of at the close of each regular session, as provided by law, because a very complete and detailed explanation has been given in several of the annual reports. It is evident our explanation has been considered satisfactory by the printing committee, as the new printing bill provides for the document catalog to cover a whole Congress.
I will also refrain from a long discourse as to why the work on the catalogs has been behind, as I know the librarians are only interested as to the promptness in the printing of these bibliographical aids in the future. The copy for the 61st Congress catalog will be ready for the printer sometime during the coming summer and that for the 62d Congress before the adjournment of the 63d Congress, which will be as near as it will be possible to issue this catalog after the period covered.
This leaves it to the Monthly Catalog and the Document Index to bridge the gap and supply the current information from one Document Catalog to another, which, although not as complete and as comprehensive as the Document Catalog, serve as excellent substitutes during the interim.
There is probably no question concerning public documents to which this office has given more consideration than the devising of a plan by which it would be possible to assign the volume numbers to the congressional series as soon as the documents are printed.
There are two very material advantages to be gained, were it possible to solve this question; one that of eliminating the necessity for the public printer to supply storage room for these documents and reports prior to the preparation of the schedule; and the other that the work of the librarians in cataloging these documents and reports would be greatly facilitated by having all of the necessary information at the time the publication was cataloged. The greatest handicap to a solution of this problem is the lack of information concerning the publications which have not been printed and to which document numbers have been assigned. Even now, after the session is closed, we are compelled to hold up the schedule for weeks and sometimes months to learn the title, paging, and other necessary information regarding certain publications to which numbers have been assigned, but which are not printed.
At the present time in preparing the schedule, we endeavor to maintain a numerical arrangement in binding the Senate and House Reports after having classified them as public or private in accordance with the provisions of the printing law. The Senate documents are brought together first by subject and then by number, but, with the House documents, on account of the introduction in this series of all the annual and serial publications, an effort is made to preserve, as far as possible, a departmental and subject arrangement.
It might be well to explain at this point that, although the only volumes distributed to the libraries now as numbered congressional publications are those of which Congress is the author, and of these there are consequently no other editions, the schedules and index must of necessity, on account of the wording of the law at the present time, be made to cover a complete numbered set still provided for the exclusive use of Congress.
There is about only one way to accomplish the numbering of the volumes as soon as printed under the present law, and that is by disregarding entirely any sort of an arrangement and assigning the next open volume number as the documents and reports appear. Of course, the index would furnish the key to these miscellaneous volumes. Such a plan is now being considered by us, and it is hoped that before July 1 some plan can be devised which will permit of a more prompt shipment of the documents and reports to the libraries.
The resolution of the Association passed at Pasadena, May, 1911, favoring the publication of a daily or weekly bulletin of the document issues by the superintendent of documents, has not been forgotten or overlooked, but up to the present time the project appears no more feasible than it did at the beginning.
The documents office has not the authority of initiative except to a very limited extent. Its activities are all prescribed and defined by law. It is from the law that the superintendent of documents derives his authority to compile and publish the Monthly Catalog, the Document Index, the Document Catalog, and the series of price lists. It would hardly be proper or prudent for him to begin the issue of another periodical without first asking the permissive or directory action of Congress. Asking does not always mean getting. Legislation concerning the document service has been found heretofore somewhat slow and difficult in the securing. I do not feel that I could predict with any confidence that legislation authorizing a daily or weekly bulletin could be secured at all.
If it could, an appropriation to make it operative would be needed, because it isnot practicable for the members of the present cataloging force to undertake any new work. They are working under high pressure to bring the Document Catalog up to date and to keep the Document Index and the Monthly Catalog there.
The embarrassment caused librarians by calls for documents which have been noticed in the newspapers but not yet announced in the Monthly Catalog is not so much due to delay of the Monthly Catalog as to premature announcement in the newspapers. It is the practice of various government bureaus to pass along to the newspaper men information of new publications as soon as they are sent to press or even sooner. Of course readers of the newspapers assume that the documents noticed are already available for sale or distribution, whereas the fact is that various causes may tie up the documents in press for months or even years. The most prolific cause of such delays is changes—changes in "copy," changes in "proof," changes even to the substitution of entirely new matter after a first draft has been put in type. The number and extent of such changes in printing the public documents are almost unbelievable, and they are of course highly embarrassing to the libraries and to the public when premature announcement of the forthcoming issue of the delayed document has been made.
If the publishing bureaus could be induced to withhold information of new documents until such documents had been actually printed, bound, and delivered, the embarrassment experienced by librarians would be obviated. It is hardly practicable, however, for the superintendent of documents to make any suggestion in the matter to the publishing offices. Some of them at least would be likely to resent such a suggestion from him as being meddlesome and out of his sphere. As to whether such suggestion from the American Library Association would be welcomed or heeded, I do not venture to express an opinion.
Premature announcements are not always accurate. The announced publications are often changed in the making, and sometimes are not published at all.
Of course, the Monthly Catalog, being an official document and an accurate one, cannot take any chances on premature announcements. All of its entries stand for documents actually received, carefully examined, and their origin fully inquired into. This is not work to be hastily done. Sometimes a surprising amount of time and trouble are expended in finding out whether a document belongs in some series, whether it is the beginning or ending of that series; if the latter, then whether the same subject or subjects are to be pursued in some other series, and the variety of similar details which libraries and collectors should have, and for which they look to the documents office, because in too many cases such particulars cannot be ascertained by examination of the document itself.
A month is the shortest time in which such matters can be sifted out and brought into orderly catalog form. Lists issued at any shorter intervals must necessarily be memoranda rather than catalogs, and the work done on them must be performed again in a more orderly manner for the official monthly, annual, and biennial catalogs.
The long cherished hope for a central distributing office has been realized nominally, but the provisions of law creating it, I am sorry to say, correct only the evils that existed from a mechanical standpoint, in that they prevent the double hauling and wrapping that were necessary prior to the change. There remain as many distributing agencies as before, as the authority to distribute the publications consigned to this office continues with the issuing office. The libraries have been afforded no relief, because now, as before, if a dozen selected pamphlets are wanted, it may mean the writing to about as many different places. This is a rather difficultproceeding, as most persons are unfamiliar with the machinery of the government and are frequently in doubt whom to address to secure the desired publications. The departments have always been rather reluctant to relinquish control of the distribution of their documents, and the new printing bill, should it be enacted as it now reads, would give back to them even the mailing of the daily miscellaneous requests.
Instead of providing for such a step backward, it is the opinion of this office that a provision should be inserted that would discontinue entirely the free distribution by the departments (except to collaborators and sufficient copies for official use), and would permit the superintendent of documents to supply free copies to public libraries and sell copies to the public at a nominal cost.
At the present time the departments have only a limited supply, which results in a few applicants obtaining free what others have to pay for.
There is probably not a librarian who hasn't experienced the inconvenience of the present arrangement, as it is a daily occurrence for us to have to refer their requests to the issuing office or quote the prices.
The most striking example of the need for co-operation is that we are today fighting for certain reforms in the methods of publication that were asked for sixteen years ago.
The first superintendent of documents had hardly entered upon the duties of the office before he recognized the faulty methods of publication and distribution which he well knew served only to prevent the public document from occupying the position its general standard of efficiency warranted.
It is hard to understand why the untiring efforts of those interested in promoting the use of the public document have been practically ignored when you stop to think of the annual cost in compilation, printing, and distribution.
We all know that every conceivable subject is treated in the public documents, and when we think of their value to the historian, student, and public in general, it is hard to understand why any obstacles should be put in the way of making them readily accessible and encouraging the librarians to give them the proper place on their shelves.
Now, as to the faulty methods which obtain in the publication of the public documents, very little has been accomplished in the way of reform. That the present methods cause needless expense in mechanical production and needless difficulties in their use, there is no question. Chief of these faulty methods is that of reprinting the same book several times under different numbers and titles. I do not mention this as a new discovery, because every superintendent of documents has endeavored to have the law changed to eliminate from the congressional series those publications of which a departmental edition is printed.
One edition for one book is the only logical manner of issuing government publications, and the Smoot bill which has again been introduced goes a long way towards correcting the present evil.
Section 45 provides that all publications of which there is a department edition printed, except the annual reports of the executive departments, shall not be numbered in the congressional series, and section 65 provides that all copies additional to the original order of the department should be identical with those ordered by the department.
We are seriously opposed to the exception of the annual reports, and with the hopes of eliminating any exceptions we have just written the Senate committee on printing as follows: