1800 On April 24th, as the American government moved from Philadelphia to Washington, the then second President john adams signed the Act on the Relocation of the American Government and Further Preparation of Necessary Equipment, and allocated $5,000 (which was already a huge expenditure at that time) to buy books needed by the Congress in Washington, D.C., and equipped a suitable warehouse for the collection of these books. It is generally believed that President Jefferson was the real founder of the Library of Congress because he believed that democracy came from knowledge. At the same time, as American legislators, members of Congress can use the knowledge of any subject, and these two beliefs have become the guiding principles for the establishment and development of the Library of Congress. To meet the needs of members. At that time, there were only 740 books and three maps in the Congress Hall, but the Library of Congress was born. Later, there were two fires, 18 14 and 185 1, which destroyed two-thirds of the precious books in the collection.

1802 65438+ 10 President Jefferson approved the first bill restricting the tasks and functions of the National Assembly Hall. Set up the director of the national assembly hall appointed by the president, and set up a joint library Committee to formulate corresponding rules and regulations to supervise the library's business work. The museum only serves the president and members of Congress.

1806 In February, Jefferson approved another bill to continue to allocate funds for books, and the funds were supervised by the Joint Committee of Libraries of the two houses. 18 14 During the American-British War, the Capitol was burned down and the library collection was damaged. Former President Jefferson sold his 6,487 private books to Congress for $23,950, and the Library of Congress regained its first collection.

18 16 the library of congress has been extended to senior officials such as vice president, secretary of state, high court judge, minister of justice, minister of finance, minister of navy and minister of war.

1832, according to the act of congress, 20 1 1 this law book was separated from the collection and a separate law library was established. 1846 revised copyright law gave the National Assembly the right to keep delivered copies, 1859 revoked, 1865 revised the copyright law again and resumed the contribution to the National Assembly. 1870 The Great Copyright Law stipulates that all records or other things related to copyright that need to be preserved according to law should be under the control of the Library of Congress. 1896 promulgated the annual legislative appropriation bill, which had a great impact on the reform and rectification of the Library of Congress and expanded the library's business. Separate administrative departments have been set up for copyright, law, cataloging, general library collection, periodicals, maps, manuscripts, music scores, calligraphy and painting, sculpture works of art, etc. Give the curator full authority to guide library affairs, and the appointment of the curator needs to be approved by the Senate.

From 1870 to 1980, with the increasing number of books, the Library of Congress has experienced three new constructions and expansions. The library was originally established as a research library of the American legislature according to an act of the US Congress. It is a reference library for members of Congress and senior government officials, and is now open to all federal departments and the public.

190 1 Appropriation Act, 1900 was approved by President McKinley in April, establishing the National Library as the national library and becoming the leader of American library industry. However, until now. The main function of the National Assembly Hall is still to serve the legislature.

19 14 The National Assembly allocated funds to set up the Legislative Reference Department to collect, classify and obtain legislative materials or materials related to legislation in the form of translation, indexing, abstract compilation or notification, and provide these materials to the National Assembly, committees and members of the National Assembly. The establishment of specialized departments indirectly recognizes the possibility of providing a wide range of services for the whole country, and of course Congress requires priority.

In the annual report of 1940, the National Assembly put forward its task: to perform its legislative duties for the National Assembly; Performing judicial and administrative duties; Serving education, academic and other libraries.

1946 the organizing Committee of the national assembly suggested that the size and scope of the legislative reference department should be greatly expanded immediately, so as to provide services for every member of the national assembly and provide a large number of available experts for various committees of the national assembly.

1946 In August, Truman approved the legislative reorganization bill 1946, which laid a legal foundation for the Legislative Reference Department as an independent department of the National Assembly Hall. At the same time, it is stipulated that the Joint Library Committee of the Senate and the House of Representatives should be composed of the chairman, four members of the Constitution and Administrative Committee of the Senate and four members of the Administrative Committee of the House of Representatives.

1958, according to Decree No.480, the National Assembly Hall was allowed to purchase foreign publications with foreign exchange from the sale of agricultural products in the United States.

1962 the China pavilion opened offices in Tokyo, Oslo, new Delhi, belgrade and cairo to buy books.

National Consulting Center, established in 1962, is funded by the National Science Foundation and undertakes the task of providing clues to solve problems for scientific and technical personnel in various scientific fields. At the same time, the Guide to American Intelligence Sources was published in volumes, introducing intelligence consulting institutions. The Library of Congress has become a reference center for Congress, government, academia and ordinary readers, an international exchange and lending center, a national catalogue center, a collection center for government publications and United Nations materials, a cooperation center between domestic and foreign libraries, and a library science research center.

From June 65438 to June 0963, the Appropriations Committee of the House of Representatives considered the National Pavilion as an important cultural and research institution in the United States, and suggested increasing the budget and expanding the area.

President Johnson approved the Higher Education Law on 1965, authorizing the Education Office to allocate funds to the National Assembly Hall to collect new editions of books with academic value from all over the world and provide bibliographic information of these materials in time.

1In July, 970, President Nixon approved the bill of Congress to establish the National Library and Information Science Committee, which recognized and strengthened the status of the National Pavilion, and the curator of the National Pavilion was an ex officio member of the above-mentioned Committee. 1970 The legislative reorganization bill approved by Nixon in June 10 stipulated that the Legislative Reference Service Department of the House of Representatives was renamed the Congressional Research Service Department.

By the end of 1987, the collection had reached 85,985,800 volumes (pieces), including 470 languages. Among them, there are more than 20,000 printed books, more than 7 million microforms, more than 20,000 audio-visual materials and more than 3.8 million maps. Social science and political science documents are the focus of the collection, especially books on American history and culture, and scientific and technological documents are mainly aviation.

2 1 century, the Library of Congress has started to provide online services in the information and data age. On the website of the Library of Congress, people can see more than 40,000 pieces of electronic cultural relics made of multimedia technology appear on the screen of personal computers, including American history, legends, country introduction, people's livelihood entertainment, multimedia audio-visual and book catalogue index.

In the Asia Department of Jefferson Building, which is known as the treasure of the Library of Congress, there are four departments in China, Japan, Korea and Southeast Asia, which specialize in collecting institutions related to oriental culture.

According to the statistics of Chinese Department, by the end of 20 15, it has collected more than 50,000 ancient rare books of China. Among them, there is a book called All Tathagata, which is a woodcut of Buddhist scriptures in the early Northern Song Dynasty in 975 AD. The Chinese Department of the Library of Congress also has more than 4,000 kinds of China local chronicles with more than 60,000 volumes, of which 100 is an orphan of China. With regard to the written materials of ethnic minorities in China, the Ministry also collected more than 200 kinds of Tibetan woodcuts, more than 400 kinds of Manchu materials and more than 3,000 kinds of Yunnan Naxi Dongba materials.

The Chinese Department of the Asian Department of the Library of Congress of the United States has also collected about 5,000 kinds of on-the-spot records of politics, economy, literature, art, drama, ballads, etc. in China and War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression. These materials were collected and sorted by Fei Zhengqing, the American Commissioner at that time, and handed over to the American government, which sent them to the Library of Congress for preservation. They have become precious documents for experts and scholars to study the history of War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression in China. The Library of Congress still collects all kinds of China classics, and imports15,000 books, 2,400 periodicals and 50 newspapers from Chinese mainland, Taiwan Province, Hong Kong and Macao every year, which continues to enrich the stacks in China.

The Library of Congress, with a history of more than 200 years, is the largest comprehensive library in hardware and software in the world.