Handbook of the new Library of Congress

by Unknown

The Smithsonian Institution issues each year a large number of scientific publications of the highest interest and importance. It distributes these throughout the world, receiving in exchange a body of scientific literature which comprehends practically everything of value issued by every scientific society of standing both in this country and abroad. With the exception of a small working library retained by the Smithsonian Institution for the immediate use of its officers, the splendid collection of material which has been gathered during the forty years in which this exchange system has been in operation is deposited in the Library of Congress, forming a scientific library unrivalled in this country.

By the operation of the copyright law, any publisher, author, or artist desiring to obtain an exclusive privilege of issuing any publication whatever, must send two copies of the publication on which a copyright is asked to the Librarian of Congress to be deposited in the Library. By this means, during the twenty-five years that the law has been in force, the Library has been enabled to accumulate approximately the entire current product of the American press, as well as an enormous number of photographs, engravings, and other works coming under the head of fine arts. The possession of this material would alone give the Library a special national character possible to no other library in the country.

HISTORY OF THE LIBRARY.

The Library of Congress was founded in the year 1800, about the time that the government was first established in Washington. Five thousand dollars was the first appropriation, made April 24, 1800, while Congress was still sitting in Philadelphia. Some of the Democratic Congressmen, as strict constructionists, opposed the idea of a governmental library, but their party leader, Thomas Jefferson, then President, warmly favored it. He called it, later in life, with a sort of prophetic instinct, the “Library of the United States,” and his support of it from the very beginning was so hearty and consistent that he may perhaps be regarded in the broad sense as the real founder of the institution.

The Library was shelved from the first in a portion of the Capitol building. The first catalogue was issued in April, 1802. It appears that there were then, in accordance with the old-fashioned method of dividing books according to size, not subject, 212 folios, 164 quartos, 581 octavos, 7 duodecimos, and 9 maps.

The Burning by the British Troops.—The War of 1812 wrecked the slender accumulations of the first dozen years of the Library’s existence. The collection was entirely destroyed by fire by the British troops which entered Washington August 24, 1814. The burning is described by a writer in an old magazine. “The British,” he says, “first occupied the Capitol, only the two wings of which were finished, and connected by a wooden passageway erected where the Rotunda now stands. The leading officers entered the House of Representatives, where Admiral Cockburn of the Royal Navy (who was co-operating with General Ross), seating himself in the Speaker’s chair, called the assemblage to order. ‘Gentlemen,’ shouted he, ‘the question is, Shall this harbor of Yankee democracy be burned? All in favor of burning it will say Aye!’ There was a general affirmative response. And when he added, ‘Those opposed will say Nay,’ silence reigned for a moment. ‘Light up!’ cried the bold Briton; and the order was soon repeated in all parts of the building, while soldiers and sailors vied with each other in collecting combustible material for their incendiary fires. The books on the shelves of the Library of Congress were used as kindling for the north wing; and the much admired full-length portraits of Louis XVI. and his queen, Marie Antoinette, which had been presented by that unfortunate monarch to Congress, were torn from their frames and trampled under foot. Patrick Magruder, then Clerk of the House of Representatives and Librarian of Congress, subsequently endeavored to excuse himself from not having even attempted to save the books; but it was shown that the books and papers in the departments were saved, and that the Library might have been removed to a place of safety before the arrival of the British.”

The Acquisition of Jefferson’s Library.—Jefferson was then living in retirement at Monticello. He was in some financial difficulty at the time, and he offered the Government the largest portion of his library, comprising some 6,700 volumes, for the price which he had originally paid for them—$23,700. The offer was accepted by Congress, although it met with much opposition. Among those who objected to the bill were Daniel Webster, then a Representative from New Hampshire; while Cyrus King, a Federalist member of the House from Massachusetts, “vainly endeavored to have provision made for the rejection of all books of an atheistical, irreligious, and immoral tendency”—a curious example of the many attacks of a similar nature made upon Jefferson by his political opponents.

With Jefferson’s books as a nucleus, the Library of Congress began to make substantial gains. In 1832, a law library was established as a distinct department of the collection. At present it numbers some 85,000 volumes, but for the greater convenience of the Supreme Court, which sits in the old Senate Chamber of the Capitol, it has not been removed from its former quarters in that building. It is always reckoned, however, as a portion of the collection of the Library of Congress.

In 1850, the Library contained about 55,000 volumes. December 24, 1851, a fire broke out in the rooms in which it was shelved, consuming three-fifths of the whole collection, or about 35,000 volumes. A liberal appropriation for the purchase of books in place of those destroyed was made by Congress, and from that time to the present day the growth of the Library has been unchecked.

Mr. Spofford’s Administration.—In December, 1864, the present Librarian, Mr. Ainsworth Rand Spofford, was appointed by President Lincoln[2]. The general management of the Library has always been in the hands of a joint committee of Congress; but the membership of the committee is constantly changing, so that the Librarian is practically the real head and director of the institution. During the time that Mr. Spofford has occupied his position, not only has the growth of the collection been little short of marvellous, but so many changes of system have been introduced as almost completely to transform the old Library of half a century ago. The year following Mr. Spofford’s appointment, the previous copyright law was modified so as to require the deposit in the Library of Congress of a copy of every publication on which copyright was desired, the second copy required being deposited elsewhere. The administration of the law was still divided, however, in that each State had its own office for copyright—some States more than one—with the result that the volumes due the Government were sometimes received and sometimes not. There was no way to call the negligent publisher or author to account, for no single office contained the complete information necessary. Such system as existed was often invalidated by the carelessness of the officials—the Clerks of the United States District Courts—in charge in the various States. In 1870, therefore, Congress still further amended the copyright law by consolidating the entire department in the hands of the Librarian of Congress, as Registrar of Copyrights, with the provision that both copies of the publication copyrighted should go to the Library. Since then, the law has worked with perfect smoothness, and with the result of enormous additions to the Library—numbering, in the year 1896, no less than 55,906 publications of all kinds.