"Wed, 07 Dec 1994 09:49:35 -0800", Fred Shapiro said:
.. [snip] here at Yale we have had to discard thousands of books
>over the last decade, including some where there were probably only a few
>other copies in existence.
>There needs to be some cooperative effort to ensure that unique or rare
>(I don't mean necessarily valuable antiquarian materials, just rare)
>materials are preserved. ... (snip) ... since the large libraries are also generally
>wealthy institutions, but none of us is wealthy enough to preserve the
>historical heritage without help.
----------------------
Fred, you raise a v e r y thought-provoking point. What about the
establishment of a "national law library" for the very purpose of "centrally"
preserving & housing "all" law materials, no matter how "obscure" or "old"?
I wonder how one would go about setting this up -- looking for "historic
precedent" (hey, law terminology pun not intended) in the commitment to,
funding, establishment & maintenance of the National Library of Medicine and
Library of Congress? Perhaps even look at the "concepts" of national libraries
in other countries as examples for a good funding/administration model?
In my personal view, I feel that the loss of law documentation, information,
be it caselaw, journals or anything else that does not come to mind for me now
would be irreplaceable if "just by chance" nobody ended up having given volumes
/ publications. And without access to such historic and often
precedent-setting primary sources, how could we document our own heritage?
---What are "y'all"'s thoughts about the feasibility and working mechanisms of something styled after a national library for the purpose of gapless, systematic preservation of law materials? (and "centralised" holdings would eliminate the shot-in-the-dark-style question of who has what)
What does everybody think about this idea? I'm serious.
Thanks in advance for your thoughts & have a nice day,
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