FORTY-EIGHTH CONGRESS, 1883-1885. 937 



national surveys are worth preserving, then has the Medical Museum 

 a double claim on our fostering care. 



* * * * * * * 

 Mr. J. F. FOLLETT. Mr. Speaker, the most magnificent medical 



museum and library in the world belongs to the Medical Department 

 of our Army, and is to-day exposed in a building where no private 

 individual owning such a library would permit it to remain for twenty- 

 four hours. It has accumulated through the efforts of the medical 

 fraternity of the United States and has cost the Government com- 

 paratively nothing. 



In the museum department there are illustrations of the effects of 

 gunshot wounds and injuries received in battle, such as medical 

 students and the medical profession can have access to in no other waj r . 

 That museum and library should be kept by itself, and should be kept 

 in a building where it would not be exposed to danger by reason of 

 its surroundings. To the medical fraternity of the United States it 

 has been for years, and is now, an object of special solicitude that this 

 property should be put in such a position as not to be constantly 

 exposed to the danger of being lost or destroyed. The building in 

 which it is now located has already begun to tumble to the ground. 

 The rear wall is more than 12 inches out of plumb, and, as I said 

 before, no private individual would think of leaving such property in 

 such a building for any length of time. 



* * * * * * * 

 The question being taken on the motion of Mr. STOCKSLAGEB to sus- 

 pend the rules and pass the bill as amended, it was agreed to; there 

 being ayes 181, noes 23 (two-thirds voting in the affirmative). 



February 25, 1885 Senate. 



Mr. J. S. MOKRILL. I am directed by the Committee on Public 

 Buildings and Grounds to report favorably the bill (H. 48) provid- 

 ing for the erection of a building to contain the records of the library 

 and musuem of the Medical Department, United States Army. 



I desire to say that if the committee had deemed it necessary to 

 amend the bill they would have amended it by specifically providing 

 for the location of the site, which, as they believe, should be at the 

 corner of B street and Seventh street SW., for the reason that the 

 Regents of the Smithsonian Institution have a title to the land round 

 about the Smithsonian to the extent of 30 acres; and unquestionably 

 within a very short time, probably less than half a dozen years, the 

 museum there now will have to be doubled in order to contain even 

 the amount of articles that are ready to go into it at the present time. 

 I have conferred with two members of the commission, and 1 find 

 that they would be both in favor of the location on the site mentioned 

 by rue that is, on the corner of B and Seventh streets, SW. There- 



