Abstract ▼ AI-Helper

Public library legislation is the essential means of providing for all the citizen in modern society with a standard public library service. We can trace the origin of that back to the Public Libraries Act 1850 in England. This paper is reviewing all the measures concerning public libraries of Engla...

Public library legislation is the essential means of providing for all the citizen in modern society with a standard public library service. We can trace the origin of that back to the Public Libraries Act 1850 in England. This paper is reviewing all the measures concerning public libraries of England since then in order to find out some guidelines for revision of the Korean Library Law enacted in 1963. Although Public Libraries Act 1850 was an output of a series of social reform movement in the 19th century, it established first the provision of public library service su n.0, pported by public funds. However the Act had several restrictions hindering public library service from making progress. These are: 1. Adoptive legislation in nature 2. Limitation of the size of population and rate income 3. Small library authorities 4. Procedure for adoption by public meeting 5. Restrictions on the ways in which rate income might be spent 6. No governmental organization to direct or control for a standardized public library service 7. No cooperative schemes among libraries. Subsequent development was directed largely to removal of those limitations. The present Public Libraries Act 1964 as a model of public library legislation was enacted on the basis of such reports as Kenyon, McColvin, Roberts, and Bourdillon. All but the problem of small library authorities were removed with this new Act. The final object could be achieved by the Local Government Act 1974 which reorganized existing 383 small authorities into new 115 ones the average population of which was 280, 000. Now, McColvin's dream of 30 years could be fulfilled in the late 70's. He argued that the minimum size of population of a viable authority should be 300, 000. Although the effect of the 1964 Act on the development of public library services in England was great, there must be some considerations as to the provisions of public library objective, government funding for library services, free use of library materials to all regardless of residence, and placement of library committee within the authority.