President's Page: Towards a Philosophy of Law Librarianship

Abstract

I have long felt that one of the great weaknesses of librarianship in general and of law librarianship in particular has been our failure to give adequate attention to the basic assumptions on which we function. I think we would deal better with our daily tasks if we thought a little more often and a little harder about the principles and purposes that underlie our work. We librarians are pragmatic people—we are creatures of routine, and victims of the fight for day-to-day survival. We work in a morass of administrative, technical, and bibliographic problems. Perhaps, because of this daily struggle to keep our heads above the mounting piles of books and papers, we tend to neglect planning, conceptualizing, and self-scrutiny. We live for the moment and frequently think only for the moment. We overlook the continuity implied in our traditions and fail to plan our steps for the future. We often do not even see ourselves as links in a chain of development that has a past and hopefully a future.