Monthly Catalogue

United States Public Documents

No. 159

March, 1908

ISSUED BY THE

SUPERINTENDENT OF DOCUMENTS

WASHINGTON

GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

1908

Common abbreviations for names of States and months are also used.

* indicates document for sale by Superintendent of Documents.

† indicates distribution by office issuing document.

When size is not given, octavo is to be understood. Size of maps is measured from outer edge of border, excluding margin.

By the time this catalogue is distributed the librarians of designated depository libraries will have received copies of the long deferred 13th annual report of the Superintendent of Documents for the fiscal year ended June 30, 1907, the keynote of which is contained in the following excerpt:

Were I asked to write a motto for this office it would consist of the words "Public documents—Our specialty," and were I to define our interests the definition would embrace the subject of public documents from the inception of each publication as a publication to its final delivery after completion. In other words, we are interested in public documents as to their uniform make-up and mechanical perfection, comprehensive cataloguing, logical distribution, and proper appreciation by the public at large. To these ends we are endeavoring systematically to arrange them and editorially supervise their production, in the hope of eliminating many of the unexplainable eccentricities heretofore complained of; to expend our best efforts in consistently cataloguing them, as a sure means of promoting their use: to quickly distribute them, that they may be available contemporaneously with the interest in their contents, and to advertise them so extensively that their existence and value will be known to all who contribute the means for their production.

The report contains an historical resume and complete statement of the present organization and work of the office, as also outlines of the plans for its future development. A studious perusal of this report will give a clear understanding of the duties of the Superintendent of Documents and his ideas regarding the necessary improvements affecting matters of cataloguing, indexing, and distribution of Government publications.

A correct estimate of these matters will contribute greatly to the harmonious intercourse between the libraries and the Documents Office.

Will all the librarians who intend to send in "want" slips for publications contained in Free list no. 1, do so at once, as we are desirous of getting in all requests for these surplus books in order to determine what portion of them can be disposed of otherwise than by distribution. The lack of storage space and the continued returns from the libraries make immediate action in this direction necessary.

The orders already on hand are being filled as rapidly as possible. Much clerical labor has been expended on the slips on account of lack of attention to instructions, and many carelessly drawn slips have been returned as "improperly drawn." Considerable labor and wasted time could have been avoided and shipments made more promptly if the entries on the slips had been made according to instructions.

Librarians should provide themselves with these slips and always use them in requesting books, following instructions carefully in filling them out.

The use, in correspondence, of the "library numbers" which were assigned when Circular 18 was sent out last fall, would greatly facilitate the work of this office.

Hereafter in addressing communications to libraries the name will be immediately followed by its number, in curves. In addressing this office it is requested that this same form be followed by the libraries instead of stating their number in the body of their letters or in a corner of the sheet, far removed from the name of the library.

Many librarians, following their established custom, forward postal acknowledgments for books or other printed matter sent them by this office. This trouble and expense is entirely unnecessary, and but helps to swell our already bulky daily mail. Will the librarians please discontinue this practice? It would be saving to them as well as to us.

Bulletin 41 of the Hygienic Laboratory of the Public Health and Marine-Hospital Service is somewhat obscured by the magnitude of the series title under which it staggers, but it has in addition a proper title of its own, revealing instead of concealing its real subject matter. It is Milk and its relation to the public health. This is a topic of first-class importance, and it is fully treated in a generously illustrated book of 758 pages. It is one of the most notable publications in the March list.

Another March publication of imposing size and fundamental value is The data of geochemistry, officially described as Bulletin 330 of the United States Geological Survey. It informs us (among many other things) that the known chemical elements are now held to be about 80 in number, and it is probable that all which have any large importance in the economy of nature are known.

Forest Service Circular 143, The relation of the southern Appalachian Mountains to inland water navigation, is a most timely publication, in view of the great convention of Governors and other dignitaries which is to be held in Washington, May 13-15, 1908, to consider the conservation of the natural resources of the United States.

Forest Service Bulletin 77 was produced by the collaboration of the Forest Service and the Census Bureau. It is an exhibit of the forest products of the United States for 1906, by species and by States, in lumber, shingles, laths, crossties, slack cooperage, tight cooperage, pulpwood, tanbark, poles, distillation, veneer, firewood, and "other products," in which term are included such unspecified items as spools, matches, buttons, etc., that seem like trifles but eat up wood at an amazing rate. The returns as to firewood are not exact, and the return of its use in 1906, given at 100,000,000 cords, is admitted to be an estimate. As to the other items, however, an approach to accuracy is claimed, and the grand total value of forest products for the year thus arrived at is $1,200,000,000. It is the belief of the Service that this great sum marks the climax of forest production, and that this total not only has not been exceeded, but it is improbable that it will be.

The Interstate Commerce Commission issues a brief pamphlet giving administrative rulings on the act to promote the safety of employees and travelers by limiting the hours of service. Pains and penalties do not attach to employees who work beyond the prohibited limit, but to those who direct that such work be done.

Secretary Taft's special report on his latest visit to the Philippines, including his address to the Philippine Legislative Assembly on the opening of its interesting and really momentous experiment in self government, is a publication of more than ephemeral consequence.

Geological Survey Bulletin 340 will be the issue for 1907 of the annual entitled Contributions to economic geology. Pending the issue of the complete volume, the chapters on Phosphates, Sulphur and pyrite, Building stones, and Miscellaneous nonmetallic products have been separately issued.

Other March titles are Report of the Assay Commission, 1908; the annual navy register; the annual army register; Work and publications of the drainage investigations; a Forest Service Circular on wood paving: a report on the meat-inspection service, with 15 pictures; Information for immigrants, a short and simple leaflet of fundamental knowledge for would-be citizens, prepared by the patriotic order of the Sons of the American Revolution; the Statement of Herbert Knox Smith, commissioner of corporations, in reply to the Standard Oil Company.

The March public document list is both long and strong.

The compilation in 38 volumes folio known as American state papers is made up of selections from the printed and manuscript documents of the early Congresses. It was originally planned by Gales and Seaton to include only the more important documents of the first 13 Congresses under the Constitution, and it was on that basis that the first order for 750 sets was voted by Congress, March 2, 1831. This plan contemplated 13 volumes, but its execution had hardly begun before Congress passed a resolution (March 2, 1833) authorizing 8 additional volumes, or 21 in all. It was supposed this number would permit the republication of Congressional documents to be brought down to March 3, 1829, the close of the 20th Congress, but the limitation proved too narrow.

Congress entrusted the selection and preparation of the documents to be printed to the Secretary of the Senate and the Clerk of the House, who when the work began in 1831 were Walter Lowrie and Matthew St. Clair Clarke. In 1832 these two signed a joint report setting forth the arrangement of the documents in 10 classes and announcing the beginning of the work of publication. When, in 1837, a report was published announcing the completion of the 21 volumes, the signatures of the Secretary and the Clerk had changed to Asbury Dickins and Walter S. Franklin. It appeared by their report that in but one of the 10 classes, the postal service, had the printing been brought down beyond 1827, while in most of them it stopped several years earlier. The Post-Office documents were printed down to March, 1833, the close of the 22d Congress. There is a strong probability that both of the reports mentioned were written by Gen. William Hickey.

From 1837 to 1858 no action was taken toward issuing further volumes. June 12, 1858, an appropriation was made to buy 2,000 copies of each volume of a continuation of the series down to March 3, 1859, the close of the 35th Congress. The limit of cost was fixed at $340,000, and it was thought that 34 volumes might be issued. The full design was not carried out, only 17 additional volumes having been printed, and the record was not brought down in any class beyond 1838 and in some classes not beyond 1823. The latest imprint date in any volume is 1861. Presumably this project, like many others, was interrupted by the Civil War, and after the war the chief movers were gone, Mr. Gales having died in 1860 and Mr. Seaton and Gen. William Hickey in 1866. The latter was beyond reasonable doubt the chief compiler of the whole series. He was the only man who was in either of the offices to which the work was entrusted printing of the last volume in 1S61, a period during which there were two secretaries of the Senate and nine clerks of the House. He was the only man in those offices who was known as a student of the public documents and an authority upon them. When the final series was authorized in 1858 he was chief clerk in the office of the Secretary of the Senate and was directly in charge of the work of selection and compilation. In a report in that capacity made Jan. 25, 1859, he claims also "a large share in the selection and compilation of the first series," which can hardly be taken to mean less than that he carried the chief burden of the work. His sons, two of whom are still living, remember their father's service in compiling the State papers, the eldest having been employed as his assistant in that work.

The American state papers supply the only readily accessible text of documents of the first 14 Congresses. It is, however, difficult to compare or identify them with the originals, because of the fact that in reprinting all title-pages., were omitted and headings manufactured by the compiler were substituted. Numbers consecutive for each volume were also given to all the documents; if they had been numbered before, the old numbers were dropped and different ones substituted. The Congresses and sessions during which the reprinted documents were originally printed are given, but no distinction is made between Senate and House documents or between reports of committees and other series of numbered documents. The 38 volumes of State papers are not included in the series of numbered Congressional documents.

The public document in 9 huge folios known to librarians and historians as "American archives," by Peter Force, was authorized by Congress under the title "Documentary history of the American Revolution." The first appropriation for its publication was made in 1833, the last in 1852. Congress was from the first restive because of the extent of the work, which threatened to exceed 30 volumes, and its cost, which was about $25,000 a volume.

The appropriation of Mar. 3, 1843, was accompanied by three provisos: (1) That the work should not exceed 20 volumes; (2) that it should not cost more than $20,400 per volume; (3) that the material for each volume should be submitted to the Secretary of State and approved by him before publication, and the publishers, Matthew St. Clair Clarke and Peter Force, were required to sign an agreement embodying these stipulations.

Mr. Force's plan called for 6 series of volumes, covering the history of the country from its discovery to the final ratification of the Constitution in 1790, a period of about 300 years. The incomplete work when discontinued in 1853 had covered less than three years, or only a hundredth part of the original design. The publication began with the 4th series, which was completed in 6 volumes, covering the period from Mar. 7, 1774, to July 4, 1776. The 5th series, designed to reproduce the documents and other material of the Revolutionary period, from the Declaration in 1776 to the treaty of peace in 1783, was abruptly terminated at the 3d volume by the refusal of a newly-incoming Secretary of State in 1853 to approve further publication. How abrupt the termination was is shown by the fact that the last words of the final volume are "Adjourned to ten o'clock tomorrow," the final date being Dec. 31, 1776.

The vast quantity of unused material which Mr. Force had been collecting for 40 years was bought by Congress in 1867 for $100,000 and deposited in the Library of Congress, where (1908) it remains unpublished. Senate mis. doc. 34, 46th Cong. 1st sess., being a report by the Librarian of Congress, dated May 15, 1879, in response to a Senate resolution calling for information as to the Force papers, with a view to their publication, gives a discouraging account of the incompleteness and confused condition of the collection and of the probable cost of completing it and editing it for publication. This report also states that "Six folio volumes, known as the 4th series, and three folio volumes of the 5th series * * * were published during the years 1837 to 1844, when the work was stopped by the discontinuance of appropriations on the part of Congress." These statements are surprisingly inaccurate, but whether or not the Joint Committee on the Library, to which the report was made, detected the inaccuracies does not appear. The imprint dates show that the 9 volumes were published 1837-1853, a period nine years longer than stated in document 34. So far from Congress having discontinued appropriations for this work in 1844, several appropriations were made of later date, the final one, for publication of 2d and 3d volumes, 5th series, by Act approved July 21, 1852 (32d Cong. 1st sess., chap. 66, Stat. L. v. 10, p. 21), and several appropriations for the purchase of additional copies were made at even later dates.

In the Atlantic monthly for May, 1898 (vol. 81, p. 678), Dr. A. R. Spofford states that the work was discontinued because Secretary W. L. Marcy, who was called to the State Department by President Pierce in March, 1853, refused to approve for publication the contents of a volume submitted to him in that year by Mr. Force, who made no effort to secure the approval of later Secretaries. This statement harmonizes with the known facts and has been generally accepted as adequate.

The 9 folio volumes of American archives were not published as numbered Congressional documents, but 1,500 sets were supplied to Congress for distribution.