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80–006 2003

ORGANIZATIONAL MEETING OF THE

JOINT COMMITTEE ON THE LIBRARY

ORGANIZATIONAL MEETING

BEFORE THE

JOINT COMMITTEE ON THE LIBRARY 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

Hearing Held in Washington, DC, March 7, 2002

(

Printed for the use of the Committee on Appropriations 

(II)

JOINT COMMITTEE ON THE LIBRARY 

House Senate 

VERNON J. EHLERS, Michigan, 

Chairman 

ROBERT W. NEY, Ohio 

CHARLES H. TAYLOR, North Carolina 

STENY H. HOYER, Maryland 

JIM DAVIS, Florida 

CHRISTOPHER J. DODD, Connecticut, 

Vice Chairman 

CHARLES E. SCHUMER, New York 

MARK DAYTON, Minnesota 

TED STEVENS, Arkansas 

THAD COCHRON, Mississippi 

(1)

ORGANIZATIONAL MEETING 

THURSDAY, MARCH 7, 2002

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

JOINT COMMITTEE ON THE LIBRARY, 

Washington, DC. 

The committee met, pursuant to call, at 2:56 p.m., in Room S–

219 The Capitol, Hon. Vern Ehlers [chairman of the committee] 

presiding. 

Present: Representatives Ehlers, Ney, Hoyer, and Davis, and 

Senators Dodd, Dayton, Stevens, and Cochran. 

Staff: Bill McBride, Kennie Gill, Bill Cable, Matt Pinkey, Barbara Wolanin, and Dan Mulhollan. 

Representative EHLERS. Let us call the meeting to order. I will 

do my best as the new chairman not to have this run so long that 

this becomes a dinner instead of a lunch. First of all, as a matter 

of the election of the chairman, which is done by poll, but without 

objection I will announce the results of the October, 2001, poll of 

the membership of the Joint Committee on the Library electing 

Representative Ehlers as chairman and Senator Dodd as vice chairman, and that has been approved by poll. So I hereby declare that. 

Representative HOYER. So much for democracy, Mr. Chairman. 

Representative EHLERS. Well, you voted for me. 

Representative NEY. He comes from a Dutch background. They 

had a king over there. 

Representative EHLERS. The committee is called to order. Before 

we begin our business I would like to make a brief opening statement. I assure you it will be very brief. 

It is indeed an honor to me to accept this position. I have a deep 

love for libraries and a long history with them. First of all, I read. 

As a child, I read very heavily in the library and developed a great 

love for them. I served on the city library, the county library and 

the board of the Library of Michigan, the state library, and on this 

committee. I commented on that to a House member recently, who 

is a Catholic, and I said, well, I guess this will be the last one I 

serve on. And he said, well, I think I can probably get you on the 

Beckton Library, but I didn’t think they would accept me. 

We are honored to serve on this committee. The Library of Congress is the jewel of the Capitol complex in many ways, the world’s 

greatest repository of written and encoded language, and it is indeed an honor for all of us to serve on this committee and we will 

certainly do our best to discharge that responsibility well. 

If any other members request to make a statement, I will be 

happy to recognize them. Senator Dodd. 

2

Senator DODD. First of all, congratulations for being chairman 

and I want to, and to have the record reflect it, thank the Library 

of Congress. This is the first opportunity we have had to meet since 

the events of last fall, and all of us here have asked to be here in 

one way or another and are very supportive of the work the Library does. I want to make special reference to Jim Belikove of the 

Library as well as Daniel Mulhollan of the Congressional Research 

Service and the many people who work with them for their tremendous job. And I also want to thank them, particularly Jim and Dan, 

for their support when the Senate office buildings closed. I mean 

they were asking could they help, how could they help serve the 

Senate, what space did we need? They just couldn’t have been more 

supportive, and I want the record to reflect our deep sense of gratitude for the Library during those days. It meant a lot to us over 

here, and I know I speak on behalf of all of us in expressing our 

appreciation. So thanks to the Library and the CRS. 

Representative EHLERS. Thank you, and you expressed the opinion of everyone here. You have an agenda before you and, without 

objection, we will include the agenda as shown. Hearing no objection, so ordered. 

[The information follows:]

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Representative EHLERS. The Chair laid before the committee a 

resolution adopting the committee rules for the 107th Congress. 

Only technical and no substantive changes made to the rules for 

this Congress. I have personally reviewed them and find them to 

be in order and ask your discussion. 

[The information follows:]

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Senator STEVENS. Mr. Chairman. 

Representative EHLERS. Yes. 

Senator STEVENS. Do we normally adopt the House rules as the 

rules of the Joint Committee? 

Representative EHLERS. My understanding is that we adopt the 

rules of the body having the Chair. 

Senator DODD. I am sure that what we would want to do is, for 

instance, we have a rule that the Vice Chair can call witnesses 

along with the minority. There is one distinction in that area. So 

I would just assume comity works here. 

Senator STEVENS. I hope so. But if I may continue, there are 

some comments about expenditures and subject to paragraph so 

and so or clause so and so of the House rules. I have got to tell 

you I am sure you all work under very good rules for the House—

and other things about public hearings according to clause 4, rule 

I of the House as far as public hearings or broadcasting the meetings. All I can say is all right, but I hope we don’t get caught up 

in them by not knowing them. I have urged the staff to keep us 

informed if there is something we are doing that is not consistent 

with the House rules. 

Senator DODD. I think what we ought to do, and I just make the 

suggestion, adopt these and then maybe ask the staff for a tenure 

because this is a joint committee and I think melding this is a way 

that is satisfactory to avoid the same kind of going back and forth 

all the time. It might be a good suggestion in the future. 

Representative EHLERS. That would certainly be appropriate and 

let us proceed with approving these and then I will direct the staff 

to——

Senator STEVENS. Could I make one observation? 

Representative EHLERS. Yes. 

Senator STEVENS. It is interesting to note that the House rules 

are adopted every 2 years, fresh, brand new, ours were adopted in 

1789, and they are still the rules. They can be amended, but it 

takes an extra-extraordinary charter to amend the rules. So it is 

assured continuity and stability over a long period of time so that 

no matter which party is in charge or which is in the majority, you 

can’t just come in and change the rules of that body. The body has 

a continuance of the rules, and that is why I think the question 

Senator Stevens asked was very appropriate to ask. It is hard to 

keep up with what is the House rules and——

Representative EHLERS. I think that is probably the objective. 

Let me just suggest that we follow the recommendation of Senator 

Dodd that we approve these, and directly after that I will instruct 

the staff to review the rules that were used under the Senate’s 

chairmanship and compare them with the rules under the House 

chairmanship and see if we can’t come up with a set of rules that 

actually is the independent——

Senator DODD. And in the meantime Senator Stevens is concerned we just have the staff checking each other to make sure we 

are not doing something that causes a——

Representative EHLERS. And I will assure you of my desire as 

chairman to certainly accommodate any requests and comments 

from the Senate. 

17

The question is on the adoption of the rules presented. Any further discussion? 

All those in favor will say aye. Opposed? 

The rules are adopted, and I hereby with authority of the Chair 

ask the staff of both the House and the Senate to review the rules 

carefully and combine the best of the House rules and the best of 

the Senate rules into a permanent document. 

The next item on the agenda is a resolution on electronic support, and that relates to the comments that Senator Dodd made a 

moment ago about the assistance offered by the Library of Congress and CRS at the time of the anthrax disruption, and the Library of Congress and CRS have made some recommendations on 

that, they are working on that problem, and we have before us a 

resolution regarding electronic communication which will commend 

the Library and the CRS for their efforts and also lay out the direction and guidelines that we wish to proceed. So I will present these 

to you, and I will be happy to recognize Senator Dodd for a motion. 

[The information follows:]

THE JOINT COMMITTEE OF CONGRESS ON THE LIBRARY 

Committee Resolution 107–lll

Electronic Communication 

Adopted on lll, 2002

Whereas, the Joint Committee on the Library commends the Congressional Research Service for its efforts to constitute to provide vital information support during periods when Members and staff were relocated to alternative work locations. 

Whereas further, the increased use of electronic tools for communication and education has resulted in increased requirements to serve Members and their staffs, including a recently concluded mobile information pilot with participants from the 

Senate, House and Library of Congress. 

Whereas further, the events of September 11th and the anthrax-related building 

closures have clearly shown that Congress needs to be served by a flexible and resilent infrastructure so that essential information needs can be met in a variety of 

ways. 

Be it therefore resolved, that the Library of Congress, as it develops and implements business continuity plans, ensures that the critical resources of the Library 

and the Congressional Research Service, including e-mail, web sites, and other support, be structured to be available to Members and staff regardless of their respective physical locations. 

Resolved further, that it be necessary to make CRS reports available to Members 

in a format which allows Members to efficiently provide for the public release of 

such reports via methods of the Members choice, including traditional methods as 

well as electronic posting and distribution. 

Resolved further, that the Congressional Research Service completes their ongoing efforts to establish direct e-mail support between the CRS and Congressional 

Offices, with appropriate consideration to supporting individual Members with the 

tools and methods that they prefer, including support for information retrieval and 

communication with CRS analysts using wireless devices. 

Resolved further, that finally the Congressional Research Service and the Library 

of Congress are directed to report their plans and progress to the Joint Committee 

of Congress on the Library within 30 days of the adoption of this resolution.

Senator DODD. I think it is a good resolution. I recommend its 

adoption, and what it does in addition to what the chairman said 

is provide the electronic transmission of CRS information to Members of Congress, which will be very helpful to us. 

The one thing it doesn’t do, which was the subject of some discussion the last time around, the issue of whether or not these reVerDate Jan 31 2003 19:09 Mar 27, 2003 Jkt 085794 PO 00000 Frm 00019 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A006.XXX A006
18

ports ought to be made available to the public, and there was some 

concern about what that meant and the implications of it. This resolution does not embrace that suggestion. This is strictly to the 

Members of the Congress, the CRS information, as I understand it, 

as is crafted here. 

I think it is a good suggestion, and I also think it is wise to leave 

out the transmission of the public directive. This is a Congressional 

service and I think it will raise real issues about the value of all 

of this if we ended up doing that. There is nothing that restrains 

any Member of Congress from sharing it with the public, but having CRS to end up doing it would create some real problems. 

Senator STEVENS. Can I ask a question about that? I came across 

a very interesting briefing on the war effort, an ongoing briefing on 

our website. Is that available to the public in general? Do you 

know? 

Mr. MULHOLLAN. If you are talking about the terrorism briefing 

book, that is only available to Congress. 

Senator STEVENS. How is it that I can pull it down off the web? 

Mr. MULHOLLAN. Working with your office, anything you would 

like to have available—let me step back. The electronic briefing 

book only exists electronically. We can provide selective analyses 

that are referred to in the briefing book and get them on your 

website and we can work with you. In fact the Wills administration 

for a long time, for several years, has had reports that they would 

identify, and they are kept up to date, that they have placed on 

their website; for instance, on campaign finance, election reform. 

We could work with your office to have those reports on there. 

Representative EHLERS. Excuse me, but I believe the Senator’s 

question is how can he get this on the web? 

Senator STEVENS. How can I——

Ms. GILL. It was off of the CRS website and it was one of the 

highlighted topics, terrorism. 

Senator STEVENS. It was on a briefing book. Are those available 

to the public? 

Mr. MULHOLLAN. No, sir. It is available solely to Members of 

Congress and staff. 

Senator STEVENS. But on your web? 

Mr. MULHOLLAN. On the CRS website. 

Senator STEVENS. Can I pull those off at home? 

Mr. MULHOLLAN. If you are in your district office you can do it 

or if your office has arranged to have connection from there. 

Senator STEVENS. It is e-mailed through our system? 

Mr. MULHOLLAN. Not e-mailed. It is direct contact with the Senate system itself, the Capitol Hill Internet. 

Senator STEVENS. That is where I am coming from. We are 

spending more and more of our time at home, obviously in an election year. Can we pull it down, can we make arrangements to do 

that? 

Senator DODD. You have a code by which you access it from your 

computer as a way to do that and then your computer pops up the 

screen with the codes you have, the same as it would be—— 

Representative EHLERS. It is a secure document. It is on the 

Internet of the Capitol. You can access it from any computer on the 

19

Capitol grounds or in your home district. If you want to do it from 

your home, you have to get the code. 

Mr. MULHOLLAN. But you can do that? 

Representative EHLERS. You can do it. 

Senator STEVENS. Another question, can we get an index of those 

things that are published so that we don’t have to go through the 

web to pull them all down? Can we go to this website through this 

connection and find out what is there? 

Mr. MULHOLLAN. Yes. On the CRS website you can immediately 

put in a topic and it will pull up——

Senator STEVENS. I want to pull up a list of all the topics that 

are there and decide which ones I want. Can I do that? 

Mr. MULHOLLAN. Yes. On the website we have analyses by issue 

of the 150 issues that are on the House and Senate’s agenda for 

this session. 

Senator STEVENS. It was the best one I have ever seen on the 

war. 

Senator DODD. The CRS website is a fabulous service, a great 

service. 

Representative EHLERS. We all appreciate their efforts, and the 

resolution before us will in fact strengthen the relationship in electronic communication between the CRS and the Members. 

Senator DODD. I so move the resolution. 

Representative EHLERS. The resolution is moved by Senator 

Dodd, supported by Representative Ney. Any further discussion on 

the resolution? 

Hearing none, we will call for the vote. All those in favor will say 

aye. Those opposed, no. 

The resolution is adopted. There are a few minor technical 

changes we have to make. In fact we will deal with that right now. 

I ask unanimous consent that the staff be authorized to make technical and conforming changes on all matters considered by the committee at today’s meeting. 

Senator DODD. So moved. 

Representative EHLERS. Without objection, so ordered. 

Moving on to the agenda item four, correspondence, we have a 

letter from the State of Alabama requesting that they be allowed 

to replace their statue, and the material is in your folders. 

Senator DODD. They want to change their statue. 

Representative EHLERS. They want to replace the statue of Jabez 

Lamar Monroe Curry to a statue Helen Keller, and there is a request to us for permission to begin that process. They do not have 

another statue ready to be placed. 

It will take some time to appoint a study committee to prepare 

recommendation on the statue and then build the statue and then 

ship it here. This is merely a request for them to begin that process. 

Senator DODD. They also have to pay for the removal; isn’t that 

it? 

Representative EHLERS. They pay for the removal and the replacement and the statue, yes. 

Senator DODD. Senator Durbin for one and others may have 

brought this up about ways in which to recognize States and, as 

I understand it again, every State has to pay too and I guess this 

20

is how it has worked over the years. They pay for it to come down 

and so forth.

With the construction of the new visitors center, and so forth, 

there has been a suggestion to also provide some way to continue 

to reflect—in some ways we are looking at figures of our States 

that date back—in my case it is Jonathan Trumble and Roger 

Sherman, who were here in the founding of the Republic, no intention of moving them, and also there have been people in the 19th 

and 20th century who we would like to recognize in some way. 

The suggestion has been to think about some ways States might 

be able to do that in the visitors center, not necessarily statues but 

some way to think about an idea that would incorporate more—we 

wouldn’t want to double the numbers of the weight. I was told by 

the architects that it would create serious problems to the structure to have these large statues, but we could take a look at the 

visitors center and see how we might accommodate additional contributions to it from our States. I don’t make that as part of this. 

I just——

Representative EHLERS. I understand. There are going to be a 

number of decisions that are left to be made on the visitor center. 

That certainly is an appropriate one. Let me also comment that 

this approval will be the first case which will operate under the 

law which this committee supported and passed by the 106th Congress, Public Law 106–554, which establishes a procedure for a 

State to replace its statues. It had never been in law before, and 

this makes it more straightforward and spells out exactly what the 

requirements are. 

The motion to approve the placement of a new statue and removal of the old one in the State of Alabama is a motion that has 

been made by Senator Dodd. 

Senator DODD. Does that require that there be some additional 

steps taken, that they need someone from the State of Alabama 

that agreed to do it? They have agreed to pay and do all that 

stuff—— 

Representative EHLERS. Yes. Are there any further questions 

on—— 

Senator DAYTON. Mr. Chairman, do we still have the discretion 

to decide whether or not to approve the State’s request or not? Is 

there any criteria——

Representative EHLERS. We still make the decision whether or 

not to approve, but not the statue. We approve whether or not 

they——

Senator DAYTON. And is there any direction under the law or tradition in terms of whether or not to grant that approval? 

Representative EHLERS. This is the first case in which it has 

been approved. It has always been on an ongoing basis before. This 

sets down very clearly what the—— 

Senator DODD. It says clearly the procedures and also what they 

have to do to be eligible for us to approve it, but it doesn’t set any 

criteria by which we make the decision whether or not to grant 

that approval other than the fact they have made met these requirements. 

Representative EHLERS. That is correct. 

21

Senator DAYTON. Is it tradition to defer to the States’ prerogative 

here, they make the decision about replacing somebody, or are we 

responsible for exercising any independent judgment? 

Representative EHLERS. I am not familiar with the history of 

that, but I suspect we give general leeway to the States, except I 

assume if California would decide they want to place a statue of 

John Walker for his actions in Afghanistan we might reject the—— 

Senator STEVENS. Beyond that we put some time frame on it, as 

I recall. You can’t do it every year—— 

Representative EHLERS. Ten years. 

Senator DODD. The Curator’s office, why don’t you tell us? 

Ms. WOLANIN. The subject of the statue is up to the State. So no 

one in the joint committee as far as I know has ever—— 

Senator DODD. The point being if all of a sudden a southern 

State decided to set someone up and the Governor signed it and it 

is highly objectionable, I assume we would have some ability here 

to say no. Are you suggesting we—— 

Ms. WOLANIN. I am just saying there isn’t a historical precedent 

for it. Like Jefferson Davis, it didn’t get accepted for many, many 

years. 

Representative HOYER. Well, the statute says, Mr. Chairman, 

that we have got to approve their request, which is what we are 

doing here. They have suggested Helen Keller is the person they 

are going to send the statue of in replacement for Mr. Curry. 

Senator DODD. I feel a little bad for him. I don’t know if I should 

or not. 

Senator DAYTON. We are not instructed to approve it? 

Representative EHLERS. No. We have the choice and that is what 

is before us at this point. 

Senator DAYTON. No. I just wanted to know if—— 

Representative EHLERS. There are—— 

Representative HOYER. What do you have against Helen Keller, 

Senator? This is going to be a hot debate. 

Representative NEY. Technically they don’t have to submit drawings before they send it; right? 

Representative EHLERS. No. But they have to meet certain standards of the construction, of weight and so forth. 

Okay. Let us return to—— 

Representative HOYER. Mr. Chairman.

Representative EHLER. Yes, Representative Hoyer. 

Representative HOYER. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, in the letter 

that I am reading from Alabama, they do not address specifically 

the requirements in the statute in terms of payment. I presume 

that is presumed in the motion. 

Representative EHLERS. That is presumed because that is current law. 

Representative HOYER. Right. Secondly, the disposition of Mr. 

Curry, is it our presumption that the State would take Curry back? 

Senator DODD. He goes back home. 

Senator STEVENS. Take it back at their expense and on our 

schedule, yes. 

Representative EHLERS. Any further discussion? Hearing none, 

we will call for the vote. 

22

All those in favor of approving the replacement of one of the Alabama statues will say, yes. 

Those opposed, nay. 

The motion is approved. 

Are there other items of correspondence? 

Just for information, regarding the tunnel between the Madison 

Building and the Cannon Office Building which the Capitol Police 

decided to not be staffed, and the tunnel has been closed for some 

time, this has created great inconvenience for the Library and for 

the Congress because any materials coming from the Library had 

to then go to the off-site area to be checked and then brought into 

the Congress after being checked, a 3-day process, which is very exasperating to the Library staff but especially to the Congressional 

staff when they requested written materials to be delivered. In the 

interim before we were able to have this meeting, I directed a letter to the House Sergeant at Arms stating that it was essential the 

tunnel be opened and, if necessary, the Library would provide one 

of their security guards to man the station in the tunnel, and it is 

now open again, and I understand the Library staff was very appreciative of that. 

I must express concern that it was ever closed in the first place, 

and I am also disappointed that the Library has to provide their 

own staff for that tunnel. I just hope that the Capitol Police and 

the Sergeant at Arms would see a need for that and do it on their 

own, but be that as it may, it is now open and operating. 

Another aspect, incidentally, of the Capitol Visitor Center is that 

they are attempting to add a plan to direct a tunnel over to the 

Madison Building from the Capitol, which there will be a need for 

that particular tunnel and it might serve our visitors and especially 

the staff. So that is simply for information that I sent that letter 

as a result of inaction, and the Library staff is extremely happy 

with that and so is the Congressional staff. 

Is there any other business? 

Representative HOYER. Mr. Chairman, I would just make the observation it is my understanding from staff that this is open for 

Members and staff only. 

Representative EHLERS. Yes. It is not for the public. 

Representative HOYER. So the point being it is less of a security 

concern because of that restriction. 

Representative EHLERS. Right. I have been informed there is a 

new tunnel supposed to go to the Jefferson Building. The idea is 

to get more visitors in the Jefferson Building. There is already a 

tunnel from the Jefferson Building to the Madison Building, but it 

is extremely difficult to find it, however. We need direction signs. 

That ends the consideration of the agenda, except for other business. Are there any items of business which anyone wishes to raise 

at this time? 

Senator DODD. Mr. Chairman, and Kennie, why don’t you help 

me out? The Botanic Gardens Conservatory construction——

Representative EHLERS. That was pulled from the agenda. It was 

too preliminary to——

Senator DODD. Does that go for the Book Festival issue as well? 

Representative EHLERS. Yes. That has actually been taken care 

of. I addressed a letter to the Architect to take further action on 

23

that because we weren’t going to take our time to consider it. It 

just was not presented well. 

So if there is no other business before the body, I want to thank 

you all for your attention, and the meeting stands adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 3:21 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]

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