The International Exchange System 399 



the Act of July 20, 1840, the Librarian of Congress was author- 

 ized to exchange duplicates in the library for other books or 

 works. By the act of March 4, 1846, he was directed "to 

 procure a complete series of reports of the United States 

 Congress and of the laws of the United States, and trans- 

 mit them to the Minister of Justice of France, in exchange 

 for works of French law presented to the United States 

 Supreme Court." "By a resolution of June 30, 1848, it was 

 ordered that the joint committee on the library be furnished 

 with twenty-five copies of the Revolutionary archives, twenty- 

 five copies of Little and Brown's edition of the "Laws of the 

 United States," and seven copies of the exploring expedition, 

 then published, and an equal number of subsequent publica- 

 tions on the same subject, for the purpose of international 

 exchange."^ 



The first volume of Smithsonian publications issued was 

 a memoir on the ancient monuments of the Mississippi Valley 

 by Squier and Davis, published in 1848 and distributed in the 

 following year. It was found that after agencies were estab- 

 lished in different parts of the world for the exchange of the 

 Institution's own publications, other exchanges could be car- 

 ried on through them at slight additional expense, and the 

 Smithsonian Institution accordingly offered to other institu- 

 tions of learning, and in some cases to individuals, the 

 privilege of sending and receiving small packages through 

 these agencies. 



The plan of conducting the foreign exchange was to issue 

 at stated periods a circular to the effect that the Smithsonian 

 Institution was then making preparations to send copies of 

 its publications to the different libraries and societies in Europe 

 and other parts of the world, and that it would undertake 



1 '' Public Libraries in the United States of America, their History, Condition, and 

 Management." Special Report, Bureau of Education, 1876, part i, page 284. 



