When is a nothingburger just a nothingburger?

Some inconvenient truths at the heart of the shakeup in libraryland.

The picture sleeve of a "Where's the Beef?" single, recorded by Coyote McCloud and Clara Peller, based on her advertisement catchphrase. Courtesy of Wikipedia.

The most constructive thing for the library community to do is to articulate and advocate for the changes it would like to see in the leadership structure of the world’s largest library and the country’s intellectual and cultural legacy —

but that will require less reactionary outrage, and more thoughtful research.

Trump’s firing of accomplished Librarian of Congress Dr. Carla Hayden on May 8th met with swift condemnatory statements from the library community. Her dismissal was characterized as

• “an assault on epistemic institutions” and part of a broader “epistemic secession” committed by a “populist-authoritarian Right now in political power” (Heterodoxy in the Stacks)

• “part of the authoritarian playbook” and “Kremlineque move to suppress ideas and to send a chill through the leadership of cultural and educational institutions” (Pen America)

• “attempting a hostile takeover of the Library of Congress to gain access to a trove of data that could be used to manipulate Congress” (EveryLibrary)

• “part of a troubling pattern of attacks on libraries, science, research, and the pursuit of knowledge that undermine the very principles on which this nation was built” (Association of Research Libraries)

• “part of a larger, relentless campaign of erasure” and “a direct attack on the independence of one of our most revered institutions” (Library Journal)

• an “assault on our civil and human rights” and “an assault on all librarians and an egregious act of racism and sexism” (Intellectual Freedom Round Table of the American Library Association)

• a “a shocking abuse of power” and “an affront to intellectual freedom, democratic values, and the integrity of our national institutions” (Authors Guild)

• “a profound rupture in our national commitment to knowledge, access, and public service” (Urban Libraries Council)

• “a whim” indicating “the library’s core responsibilities have been threatened” (School Library Journal)

• “outrageous and profoundly damaging” (EveryLibrary)

• “a grave mistake” and “disgraceful act” (Publisher’s Weekly)

• “a significant and troubling moment for the LIS profession in the United States” (asis&t, Association for Information Science and Technology)

• “unjust” (Illinois Library Association and American Library Association)

Among the more than dozen reaction pieces I reviewed from the library community, merely one addressed this simple fact, buried near the end of the piece:

the president has the authority to appoint the head of the Library, with Senate confirmation. (School Library Journal)

Perhaps it should come as no surprise that it was the school librarians who actually did their homework.

At a time when the library community still positions itself as an arbiter of “facts and disinformation” amidst “an ocean of misinformation/disinformation,” it is even more perturbing to see library organizations mischaracterize the Librarian of Congress as a Congressional or legislative position, as EveryLibrary did:

The Librarian of Congress is a vital legislative branch position. Congress must act to preserve the independence of its own institutions from unchecked executive interference.

Not to be outdone, the Editorial Board of the Baltimore Sun, paper of record in the city where Dr. Hayden directed the Enoch Pratt Free Library for more than two decades, published the same misinformation after chastising everyday Americans for having, “at best, a vague understanding of the Library of Congress and its mission”:

the Library of Congress is part of the legislative branch and should not be the latest example of the separation of powers undermined by a power-hungry White House.

Fact check: Embarrassingly wrong.

The US Code — our body of federal law — couldn’t be more clear:

The President shall appoint the Librarian of Congress, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate. (2 U.S. Code § 136-1)

While the appointment is a 10-year term — and Dr. Hayden still has approximately 16 months in her appointed term — it is also the prerogative of the President to terminate an appointment at any time, for any reason (or no reason at all), according to the Library of Congress’s Congressional Research Service:

Even though they have statutorily established terms of office, appointees to many fixed-term positions serve at the pleasure of the President. This means that incumbents can be removed by the President at any time for any reason (or no stated reason), as is the case with most presidential appointments. Lacking protection from removal, incumbents in these positions may remain subject to close guidance and direction from the President as well as to removal at the time of a presidential transition.

Dr. Hayden is well deserving of the many statements celebrating her exemplary career accomplishments. But those who characterize her firing as a dangerous overreach of the executive branch should think again. The sitting President is well within his right to remove the Librarian of Congress without cause.

The most constructive thing for the library community to do in this situation is to articulate and advocate for the changes it would like to see in the leadership structure of the world’s largest library and the country’s intellectual and cultural legacy — but that will require less reactionary outrage, and more thoughtful research.

Before you set out to change the world, it’s best to understand it first.

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