Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1927-04-10
COMMITTEE URGED
TO SORT RECORDS
Congress May Appoint Body
to Select Documents
to Be Saved.

With the long-awaited Archives
Building scheduled to be erected with
in the next few years. the coming SEES
sion Of Congress will be requested TO
create a committee 10 tackle the I'M
portant task of going over the enor-
NOUS accumulation OF Government rec
ords in Washington to select the doc
uments worthy OF being permanently
preserved in the structure.
Senator Smoot of Utah, chairman of
the Public Buildings Commission. said
yesterday he would introduce the nee
essary legislation for the creation Of
such a committee as soon as the new
Congress convepes. and its passage
IN virtually certain. The Senator
drafted a bill for this purposel shortly
before the last Congress died, but
there was no opportunity to consider
it in the short time available.
There are countless files of papers
in various Government bureaus that
are seldom used and of no exceptional
value to the Nation. Documents of
this character, Senator Smoot said.
can be stored away in other places.
Choice Offers Problem.
The problem of the proposed COM
rnittee will be to pick from all of
Uncle Sans innumerable file cabinets
those records which will be Of value
permanently, which are frequently re-
ferred to or which have great histori-
cal merit.
According to Senator Smoot, there
has never been a thorough survey
that would show the papers and rec
ords worthy OF preservation in the
Hall of Archives. Now that plans for
the structure are being prepared and
half Of the site already acquired, it is
felt that steps should be taken soon
looking to a classification of the ar
chives. The Archives Building will be
in the group south of Pennsylvania
avenue and just west of the Post Office
Department.
Asked for an illustration of the
character of documents that would be
considered of sufficient value to go in
the Archives Building, Senator Smoot
said:
"All of the important records con-
nected with Americas part in the
World War should be collected there.
where they could be preserved and at
the same time referred to easily. The
files relating to the various foreign
debt settlements should be kept there.
The debt agreements cover a maxi.
mum period of 81 years. Then we
have stored here in the vaults of the
Capitol very valuable records of the
early sessions of Congress that have
already suffered greatly from the
ravages of time and that should be
placed in the Archives Building"
Copies May Be Needed.
Senator Smoot said that some of the
very old documents probably will have
to be copied for use and the originals
kept in their present condition for his
torical purposes. Some Of the orig
inals, he said, are worn to such an
extent that they could not be handled
The bill which Senator Smoot has
prepared for passage in December
would establish a group to be known
as the committee for the preservation
of historic records of the United
States. 1t would be composed of the
secretary Of the Smithsonian Institu-
ton, the librarian of Congress. the
comptroller general Of the United
States, the director of the Bureau of
the Budget and the chief of the Bu-
reau of Efficiency.
The head Of each governmental es-
adjustment, including the District
Commissioners, would be directed to
furnish the committee with a list of
all papers and documents in the pos
that are considered worthy of preser-
walton as archives. The committee
would have the responsibility OF Sc
Iecting from the lists the records to
go in the archives structure.