Part 1

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LIBRARY ESSAYS

PAPERS RELATED TO THE WORK OF PUBLIC LIBRARIES

LIBRARY ESSAYS

PAPERS RELATED TO THE WORK OF PUBLIC LIBRARIES

ARTHUR E. BOSTWICK, PH. D.

THE H. W. WILSON COMPANY NEW YORK 1920

PREFACE

The author of these papers began his service in librarianship in April, 1895. He celebrates his silver jubilee by gathering them into a single volume. Before becoming a librarian he had worked for many years as teacher, editor and journalist, and the use of the pen having become second nature, he took it up in behalf of libraries and librarians, somewhat sooner, perhaps, than experience would warrant. However, the papers reflect to a certain extent the progress of library work during the past quarter century.

A. E. B.

CONTENTS

PAINS AND PENALTIES IN LIBRARY WORK 3

Read at the Magnolia Conference of the American Library Association, June, 1902. (_A. L. A. Proceedings_, 1902, p. 29-34)

HOW LIBRARIANS CHOOSE BOOKS 17

(_Public Libraries_, April, 1903, p. 137-41)

THE WORK OF THE SMALL PUBLIC LIBRARY 29

(_Library Journal_, August, 1903, p. 596-600)

LAY CONTROL IN LIBRARIES AND ELSEWHERE 39

Read before the Trustees’ Section of the American Library Association, at the Niagara Conference. (_A. L. A. Proceedings_, 1903, p. 199-202)

THE WHOLE DUTY OF A LIBRARY TRUSTEE: FROM A LIBRARIAN’S STANDPOINT 49

An address before the Trustees’ Section of the American Library Association (_A. L. A. Proceedings_, 1906, p. 40-4)

THE DAY’S WORK: SOME CONDITIONS AND SOME IDEALS 59

Presidential address before the New York Library Association, Lake Placid, September 21, 1903. (_Library Journal_, October, 1903, p. 704-7)

LIBRARY STATISTICS 69

(_Library Journal_, January, 1904, p. 5-8)

OLD PROBABILITIES IN THE LIBRARY--HIS MODEST VATICINATIONS 79

Read before the Pennsylvania Library Club, Philadelphia, May 9, 1904. (_Library Journal_, October, 1904, p. 517-23)

THE LOVE OF BOOKS AS A BASIS FOR LIBRARIANSHIP 97

Read before the New York Library Association, Twilight Park, September, 1906. (_Library Journal_, February, 1907, p. 51-5)

THE LIBRARY AS THE EDUCATIONAL CENTER OF A TOWN 111

(_Public Libraries_, May, 1907, p. 171-4)

THE LIBRARIAN AS A CENSOR 121

Presidential address before the American Library Association, Lake Minnetonka Conference, June, 1908. (_Library Journal_, July, 1908, p. 257-64)

HOW TO RAISE THE STANDARD OF BOOK SELECTION 141

Read at the meeting of the Library commissions of the New England States, Hartford, Conn., February 11, 1909. (_Public Libraries_, May, 1909, p. 163-7)

LIBRARY CIRCULATION AT LONG RANGE 221

(_Library Journal_, July, 1913, p. 391-4)

CONFLICTS OF JURISDICTION IN LIBRARY SYSTEMS 231

Read before the round table of branch librarians at the Washington conference, May 28, 1914. (_Library Journal_, August, 1914, p. 588-91)

THREE KINDS OF LIBRARIANS 241

Read before the Missouri Library Association, Sedalia, November 18, 1914. (_Public Libraries_, January, 1915, p. 1-4; February, 1915, p. 47-50)

SCHOOL LIBRARIES AND MENTAL TRAINING 255

(_School Review_, June, 1915, p. 395-405)

THE LIBRARY AND THE BUSINESS MAN 269

A luncheon address to the Advertising Club of St. Louis. (_Library Journal_, April, 1917, p. 259-64)

SYSTEM IN THE LIBRARY 153

Read before the Missouri State Library Association, Columbia, Mo., October 28, 1909. (_Library Journal_, November, 1909, p. 476-82)

THE EXPLOITATION OF THE PUBLIC LIBRARY 171

Address before the American Library Association at the Pasadena Conference, May 19, 1911. (_A. L. A. Proceedings_, 1911, p. 60-5)

SERVICE SYSTEMS IN LIBRARIES 183

(_Library Journal_, June, 1912, p. 299-304)

EFFICIENCY RECORDS IN LIBRARIES 199

(_Library Journal_, March, 1913, p. 131-3)

MAL-EMPLOYMENT IN THE LIBRARY 205

Read before the Iowa Library Association. (_Iowa Library Quarterly_, October, 1912, p. 247-52)

COST OF ADMINISTRATION 217

Report to the American Library Institute. (_Public Libraries_, December, 1912, p. 416-18)

POETS, LIBRARIES AND REALITIES 283

An address at the opening of the new building of the Indianapolis Public Library. (_Library Journal_, December, 1917, p. 944-50)

THE CHURCH AND THE PUBLIC LIBRARY 299

(_Homiletic Review_, June, 1918, p. 435-9)

THE FUTURE OF LIBRARY WORK 309

(_A. L. A. Bulletin_, September, 1919, p. 50-7)

POPULARIZING MUSIC THROUGH THE LIBRARY 325

Read before the National Association of Music Teachers and reprinted from the published Proceedings for 1918.

TWO CARDINAL SINS 341

A MESSAGE TO BEGINNERS 357

LUCK IN THE LIBRARY 373

THE LIBRARY AS A MUSEUM 393

THE LIBRARY AND THE LOCALITY 409

INDEX 429

LIBRARY ESSAYS

PAPERS RELATED TO THE WORK OF PUBLIC LIBRARIES

PAINS AND PENALTIES IN LIBRARY WORK[1]

In somewhat the same way as Irving makes Diedrich Knickerbocker begin his history of New York with the creation of the world, so we may open a discussion of this subject with a word on the theory of punishment. We all know that neither moral philosophers nor penologists are agreed in this matter. Do we inflict punishment to satisfy our eternal sense of justice, to prevent further wrong-doing on the part of the person punished, as an example to others, or to reform the delinquent? So far as the justicial theory goes, it is unnecessary here to discuss whether it is founded merely on the old savage feeling of revenge, which having done its part in ensuring punishment to the wrong-doer in the uncivilized past, should now be put aside. As a matter of fact the rule, “Let no guilty man escape,” is a very good one for practical purposes, whatever its theoretical implications. Why should it be necessary to proceed according to any one theory in administering punishment? Practically in the home, at school, and in the courtroom the simple administration of justice does very well for us, and when we go a little farther into the matter we see that each of the other elements enters into consideration. Certainly it is so in the library.

Penalties for the infraction of our rules should be so inflicted that future wrong-doing both on the part of the culprit and on that of the remainder of the public becomes less likely than before. Whether we always do this in the most satisfactory way may be queried.

Punishable acts committed in a library may be divided, according to the old ecclesiastical classification, into _mala prohibita_ and _mala in se_; in other words, into acts that are simply contrary to library regulations and those that are absolutely wrong. To steal a book is wrong anywhere and does not become so merely because the act is committed in a library; but the retention of a borrowed book for fifteen instead of fourteen days is not absolutely wrong, but simply contrary to library regulations.

The keeping of books overtime is a purely library offence, committed against the library and to be punished by the library; and with it may be classed such infractions of the rules as failure to charge or discharge a book, loud talking or misbehavior below the rank of really disorderly conduct, such injury to books as does not constitute wilful mutilation, the giving of a fictitious name at the application desk, etc.

For all these strictly library offences the favorite penalties seem to be two in number--the exaction of a fine and exclusion from library privileges--temporary or permanent. The former is more used than the latter, and I venture to think unjustly so. From the sole standpoint of punishment the great advantage of a fine is that it touches people in their most sensitive point--the pocket. But this is a ganglion whose sensitiveness is in inverse proportion to its size; in one case the exaction of a cent means the confiscation of the possessor’s entire fortune; in another the delinquent could part with a hundred dollars without depriving himself of a necessity or a pleasure. Of course this lack of adaptability to the conditions of the person to be punished is not confined to this one method. Imprisonment, for instance, may be the ruin of a life to the hitherto respectable person, while to the tramp it may simply mean a month’s shelter and food. But in the case of a money penalty the lack of adaptability is particularly noticeable, and hence wherever it is exacted a large portion of the public comes to forget that it is a penalty at all. Instead of a punishment exacted in return for the commission of a misdemeanor and intended to discourage the repetition thereof, it is looked upon as payment for the privilege of committing the misdemeanor, and it in fact becomes this very thing. Thus, in states where there is a prohibitory law, and periodical raids are made on saloons with the resulting fines, these fines often become in effect license fees, and are so regarded by both delinquents and authorities. Where a municipality provides that automobiles shall not be speeded in its streets under penalty of a heavy fine, the wealthy owners of motor-carriages too often regard this as permission to speed on payment of a stated amount, and act accordingly. So in the library, the fine for keeping books overtime is widely regarded as a charge for the privilege of keeping the books longer than the formal rules allow. Being so regarded, the fine loses a great part of its punitive effect, and largely becomes in fact what it is popularly thought to be. Thus we have a free public library granting extra privileges to those who can afford to pay for them and withholding the same from those who cannot afford to pay--an extremely objectional state of things.

In making this characterization I am aware that the sale of additional facilities and privileges by a free library is regarded as proper by a large number of librarians, and that the extension of systems of which it is a feature is widely urged. It is found in the St Louis plan for fiction, which has been so successful, and still more in Mr. Dewey’s proposed library bookstore. That all these plans are admirable in many ways may be freely acknowledged. In so far as they may be adopted by endowed libraries they are certainly unobjectionable. But in spite of their advantages, it seems to me that their use in an institution supported from the public funds is a mistake. The direct payment of money to any institution so supported, even if such payment is logically justifiable, is open to so much misconstruction and is so commonly misunderstood or misinterpreted, that I would hold up as an ideal the total abolition of all money transactions between the individual members of a public and institutions supported by that public as a whole.

The present subject evidently does not justify further discussion of this point, but its mention here is proper because if library fines have become in many cases payments for a privilege, that very fact should lead those who agree with what has been said above to strive for their abolition.

Another objection to the fine, which is, curiously enough, also the chief reason why it is almost hopeless to look for its abolition, is the fact that wherever fines have been applied they have become a source of revenue that cannot well be neglected. In a village not far from New York the receipts from bicycle fines at one time nearly paid the running expenses of the place. Agitation in favor of substituting other methods of punishing the cyclists who ride on the sidewalks and fail to light their lamps at sundown would evidently be hopeless here. In the same way receipts from fines have become a very considerable source of income in large libraries, and are not to be neglected even in small ones. This is apparent in the following table[2]:

Income Fines

Boston $309,417.52 $4,621.45 Chicago 285,951.22 7,131.19 Philadelphia 141,954.45 2,385.52 Brooklyn 105,081.19 4,013.26 N. Y. C. F. L 91,613.12 4,648.98 Buffalo 87,946.85 2,951.21 Milwaukee 71,328.80 1,295.99 San Francisco 64,966.31 2,250.85 Newark 43,706.36 1,905.17

Evidently the abolition of fines in these cases would mean a reduction of income that would make itself felt at once.

Now, of course, the knowledge that the detection of wrongdoing is financially profitable to the detector results in increased vigilance. So far, that is a good thing. But it goes farther than this: it makes the authorities strict regarding technicalities; it may even lead to the encouragement of infraction of the law in order that the penalties may reach a larger amount. In the town that is supported by bicycle fines we may fairly conclude that no resident calls the attention of the unwary cyclist to the warning sign, past which he wheels toward the sidewalk. To do so would decrease the village revenue and raise taxes. So too, what librarian would wish to adopt any course that will certainly reduce the money at his disposal for salaries and books?

Supposing, however, that this loss can be made up in some way, is there anything that can be substituted for the fine? It has already been stated that suspension from library privileges is in use as a penalty to a considerable extent, and there seems to be no reason why this should not be extended to the case of overdue books. There might, for instance, be a rule that for every day of illegal retention of a book the holder should be suspended from library privileges for one week. The date of expiration of the suspension would be noted on the holder’s card, and the card would not be returned to him before that date.

This plan would probably have interesting results which there is not time to anticipate here. But as long as books cost money and librarians refuse to work altogether for love, financial considerations must play a large part in library changes. The only way in which fines can be abolished without decreasing income is to make the abolition a condition of an increased appropriation, which, of course, could be done by the appropriating body. The making of such a condition is extremely unlikely. Hence, if we agree that fines are undesirable we must regard their abolition as an unattainable ideal. We may, however, treat them so as to minimize their bad effect, and this, I believe, may be done in either or both of the following two ways:

(1) We may emphasize the punitive value of the fine and at the same time increase its value as a source of revenue by making it larger. This would doubtless decrease the number of overdue books, and the exact point where the increase should stop would be the point where this decrease should so balance the increase of fines as to make the total receipts a maximum; or, if this maximum should greatly exceed the revenue received from fines under the old arrangement, then the rate could be still farther increased until the total receipts fell to the old amount. The practical method would be to increase the fines by a fraction of a cent per day at intervals of several months, comparing the total receipts for each interval with that of the corresponding period under the old arrangement; and stopping when this sum showed signs of decrease.

(2) We may give the librarian the option of substituting suspension for the fine whenever, in his judgment, this is advisable. This is the course pursued by the law when it gives to the trial judge the option of fining or imprisoning an offender. In cases where a fine is no punishment at all, and where books are kept overtime deliberately, suspension from library privileges would probably prove salutary. A variant of the second plan would be to allow the culprit himself to substitute suspension for his fine. This in effect is what the offender in the police court does when he avows that he has not the money to pay his fine and is sent to jail to work it off. At present when a library offender is manifestly unable to pay his fine there is usually no alternative but to remit it or to deny the culprit access to the library until it is paid--in many cases an unreasonably heavy punishment.

Of course there is no reason why all these modifications of existing rules should not be made together. According to this plan fines would be raised and suspension would be substituted in any case at the librarian’s option and in all cases where the person fined avows that he is unable to pay his fine. The rates can be so adjusted that under this plan there is no decrease of revenue, but rather a net increase.

Of course the adoption of such rules would be regarded by a large portion of the public as a curtailment of privileges, but such an outcry as it would probably raise ought not to be objectionable as it is a necessary step in the instruction of the users of a library regarding the proper function of penalties for infraction of its rules. These rules are for the benefit of the majority and the good sense of that majority ought to, and doubtless would, come to the rescue of the library authorities on short notice.

As long as the library fine is a recognized penalty, numerous petty questions will continue to arise regarding its collection, registration, and use. Any exhaustive treatment of these is impossible in the limits of a single paper and I have chosen to neglect most of them in order to dwell on the question in its larger aspects. It is the exaction of the fine, after all, that is the library penalty--the money is part of the library income and its collection and disposition are properly questions of finance. One point, however, regarding the disposition of the fines bears directly on what has been said. In municipal public libraries like that of Boston, where the city requires that the fines shall be turned directly into the public treasury and not retained for library use, the substitution of a different penalty would presumably involve no diminution of income. From ordinary considerations of equity, however, it seems to me that this disposition of the fines is objectionable. If the fines are to be turned into the city treasury they should be placed to the credit of the library appropriation as they are in Brooklyn.

Regarding the collection of fines there are one or two points that bear directly on their efficiency as a punitive measure. First, shall fines be charged? It seems a hardship to refuse a well-known member a book because he does not happen to have with him the change to pay a 15 cent fine. This point of view, however, loses sight again of the element of punishment. When the delinquent who is fined a dollar in the police court does not have the money with him, does he request the magistrate to charge it and send in a bill for the month’s penalties all at once? The true method, I am convinced, is to insist on cash payment of fines, and if this is done promptly their character as penalties will be more generally recognized.

Another point in regard to the collection of fines is their effect on the assistants themselves. In every library a stream of money passes in at the desk in very small amounts. This must all be accounted for, and we have the alternative of requiring vouchers for every cent or of simply keeping a memorandum account and seeing that the cash corresponds with it at the close of the day.

This latter plan, in some form, is usually adopted. To misappropriate funds under these circumstances is not difficult, and I submit that it is not right to place a large number of young girls in a situation where such misappropriation is easy and safe. In spite of Mark Twain, who prays that he may be led into temptation early and often, that he may get accustomed to it, I do not believe that this is a good general policy to pursue. We all know of cases where assistants have fallen into temptation, and we should not hold the library altogether blameless in the matter. But on general principles such a plan is not good business. Every one who is responsible for money collected must show vouchers that he turns over every cent that has been given to him. Why should the library assistant be an exception? I look to see some form of cash register on every charging desk in the ideal library of the future, nor can I see that its use would be a reflection on the honesty of the assistants any more than the refusal of a bank to cash an improperly endorsed check is a reflection on the honesty of the holder.

This is on the supposition that we are to retain the fine as a penalty. Such considerations, of course, weigh down the balance still more strongly in favor of its abolition.

I have devoted so much space to the penalty for keeping books overtime because the rule on this subject is the one that is chiefly broken in a free public library. Other offences are usually dealt with by suspension, and very properly so. For the loss or accidental injury of a book, however, a fine is again the penalty, and here, as the offence is the causing of a definite money loss to the library, there is more reason for it The money in this case, indeed, is to be regarded as damages, and its payment is rather restitution than punishment. Even here, however, the argument against money transactions with a free institution seems to hold good. There is no reason in the majority of cases why he who loses or destroys a book should not give to the library a new copy instead of the price thereof, and for minor injury suspension is surely an adequate penalty.