This committee has been requested to report on two topics—"a plan for the League to follow in giving aid in the organization of commissions in states now without them," and also a draft of "tentative provisions for a model library law to be used with the model commission law."
An A. L. A. committee of which Dr. Arthur E. Bostwick is chairman, has made a valuable report on points to be covered by a model law relating library to municipality, printed in the 1912 proceedings. The same committee has under consideration the drafting of the points covered into a model charter, and the League committee decided that action on its own part was unnecessary at present.
The other topic assigned this committee cannot be disposed of in so brief a manner. It is a question of theory and of insight, of sympathetic understanding and action.
There are eleven states without library commissions: West Virginia, South Carolina, Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, Montana and Wyoming. These states contain one-eighth of the population of the country, and have only one-twentieth of the libraries.
The first step toward aid is to learn how library commissions have been established in other states. Letters sent to 36 states elicited 22 replies. Perhaps a distinction should be made between library commissions and state libraries, or boards of education, such as New York, California and Oregon. But there have been included in this report all states doing extension work, regardless of name or title of organization.
The questions asked were:
1. How did the demand for a commission arise?
The answers received are practically unanimous. There was a need felt and provided for by a few far-sighted library workers. Eight give the credit of the initiative to library workers or associations. Seven give it to women's clubs or the state federation. Five say librarians and women's clubs were co-partners in the work, and three, Maryland, Wisconsin and Nebraska, include teachers in this partnership.
2. Who drew the law?
The law has usually been drawn by or under the supervision of a few interested workers, such as president of state library association, superintendent of public instruction, president of university, or legislative committee of state federation. In Kentucky use was made of the model commission law.