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 those printed 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.