reviews.indd


others to pick up the slack. I have been a 
professional cataloger for twelve years, and 
although most of what I learned was on the 
job as a paraprofessional, I did have some 
in-depth, hands-on cataloging classes in 
school. Colleagues of mine, who attended 
library school after I had graduated, re-
ceived much less actual cataloging training. 
They have complained about the emphasis 
on the history and theory of cataloging 
(in most cases, they only cataloged a few 
books in an entire semester), as well as on 
the lack of advanced courses in cataloging. 
Upon graduation, they have had a hard 
time matching the requirements of even 
entry-level professional positions. The state 
of cataloging education is indeed in need 
of analysis. This book offers some insights 
into these problems but seems to reach the 
general conclusion that most in-depth cata-
loging education in the future will happen 
outside library schools.—Isabel del Carmen 
Quintana, Harvard University. 

Foerstel, Herbert N. Refuge of a Scoundrel: 
The Patriot Act in Libraries. Westport, 
Conn.: Libraries Unlimited, 2004. 
232p. $35 (ISBN 1591581397). LC 
2003-065950. 

Foerstel’s new book seems to address 
two needs. One is to recount an engaging 
and sometimes inspiring description of 
the continuing struggle in which library 
employees and others join forces against 
those who would impose police-state tac-
tics to “protect our freedom” in the name 
of security. (Or is it to protect our security 
in the name of freedom?) 

The second purpose would to be 
to document some of the legal issues 
involved. These include a listing of the 
components of the Patriot Act, Homeland 
Security Act, and similar acts and policies 
that the Justice Department has initiated 
under the cover of fighting terrorism. This 
portion of the book is a reference source 
for those wishing to conduct further re-

Book Reviews 457 

search, those writing library policies on 
how to respond to investigative inquiries, 
or those actually facing the need to re-
spond to such a request for information. 
To this end, sample court order forms are 
included in the appendices. 

Many library workers will want to read 
the narrative but skip over the details of 
the legislation or proposed legislation. 
Foerstel writes well, documents thor-
oughly, and provides both a bibliography 
and an index. The latter is almost detailed 
enough to overcome the lack of a glossary, 
which would have been useful to help 
readers keep the alphabet soup of initial-
isms mentioned in the text straight. 

The first fifth of the book is a sum-
mary of the author ’s 1991 Surveillance 
in the Stacks: The FBI’s Library Awareness 
Program. Even those familiar with the 
FBI’s Library Awareness Program will 
find it instructive. It documents a con-
tinuing struggle in which the pendulum 
has swung back and forth over the past 
several decades between advocates of 
citizens’ freedom to read and the eff orts of 
government agents, particularly the FBI, 
to control subversive behavior by moni-
toring the information-seeking habits of 
citizens. Reading this book, especially 
chapter one, cannot help but cause one 
to be proud to be a library worker and 
to realize the potential power we col-
lectively wield in promoting democratic 
values. Information is power, and those 
who control the flow of information are 
powerful. If the government controls 
information, the citizens are accountable 
to the government for their actions; if the 
citizens control information, the govern-
ment is accountable to the citizens for its 
actions. It is a zero-sum game. Every bit of 
control that one side gives up adds to the 
accountability it owes the other side. 

Foerstel explains how difficult it is to 
evaluate comments made by FBI officials 
concerning their use of the Patriot Act to 



458 College & Research Libraries 

gain access to patron information. Agents 
often collect information without citing 
the authority under which they are op-
erating, and many of us are intimidated 
by their authority and arrogance. (This 
reviewer witnessed that phenomenon 
from the other side of the badge for four 
years as a special investigative officer 
for the USAF.) Vaccinating one’s self by 
reading Mr. Foerstel’s latest work will 
go a long way toward helping us remain 
level-headed when confronted by law 
enforcement officials. 

The FBI has a long and well-docu-
mented history of doing whatever it 
deems necessary, whether legal or not, to 
gain access to information on American 
citizens. Unfortunately, the book includes 
only two brief references to Carnivore, 
the FBI’s twenty-first-century version of 
wiretapping, which processes many kinds 
of electronic communications including 
e-mail. Perhaps, this can be the topic of 
a future book. 

Foerstel has given a major portion of 
his energies over the past two decades 
to writing about this ongoing struggle. 
During this time, he has been on the front 
line to observe and participate in many of 
these skirmishes. His latest book contin-
ues this important work and should be a 
source of pride for all library workers. Ref-
uge of a Scoundrel also should inspire us to 
continue our vigilance and to increase our 
efforts to ensure that those who use our li-
braries have full access to the information 
they need to earn a living and lead their 
lives, particularly to exercise their right 
to hold their government accountable. It 
is still far too early to write the defi nitive 
book on the impact of the Patriot Act 
on libraries. However, the current work 
is clearly a solid beginning.—David R. 
Dowell, Cuesta College. 

Miskolczy, Ambrus. Hitler’s Library. 
Trans. Ridey Szilvia and Michael 

September 2004 

Webb. Budapest: Central European 
Univ. Pr., 2003. 164p. $39.95 (ISBN 
9639241598). LC 2003-12659. 

The “library” in question is housed at the 
Library of Congress, having been rescued 
from a salt mine at the end of World War 
II. This is some part of a library alleged to 
have been 6000 volumes strong, but, odd-
ly, Ambrus Miskloczy never tells readers 
how many volumes it now comprises. It 
is commonplace to analyze the influences 
on historical figures by scrutinizing their 
reading matter, largely, if necessarily in-
directly, by looking at whatever records 
survive about the holdings in their per-
sonal libraries. Sometimes this procedure 
is used to assess the independent value of 
historical sources; if X could have known 
about Y because information on Y was 
contained in books in X’s library, the prob-
ability that X corroborates information on 
Y is diminished by virtue of the fact that 
X had access to such information. 

In this multimedia age, this would be 
bad method and, even under the best of 
circumstances, leaves a lot of loose connec-
tions. This procedure can never be proba-
tive because it is indirect in at least two 
significant ways: it does not account for all 
the matt er these figures might have read, 
and owning a book does not imply reading 
that book. Although not evaluating Hitler’s 
writings as historical sources, Miskolczy is 
not unaware of this and divides his study 
into chapters that assess the infl uence of 
Hitler ’s library in diminishing degree. 
Thus, a chapter deals with works in which 
Hitler penciled his own notes, which seems 
a bona fide way to measure intensity of 
interaction. Following chapters deal with 
books that Hitler “read into” and books 
that Hitler “did not read (in depth).” This 
latter taxonomy is based on the absence 
of evidence; that is, Hitler left no physical 
traces behind, leading to the assumption 
that he spent less time on these books, 
which might or might not be true.