Radcliffe Council Votes to Abolish Book Slip System

The Radcliffe Student Council voted yesterday to abolish the present system of reserving books unless a cheap and practical way of dating book slips can be instituted.

Miss Ruth Porritt, head librarian, told the Council that some way must be found to improve the present system or she would personally abolish it. Books can now be reserved three days in advance, but this has proved ineffective because duplicate slips can be made for one book.

The Council suggested that, if reserved slips were dated by machine, duplication would be impossible for the earliest slips would be given preference. If a way of checking reserve slips cannot be devised, the reserve system used in Harvard libraries will probably be adopted. But the Radcliffe library, originally built to accommodate 400 students, is too small for this plan to be effective.

Honor and Efficiency.

The library is run on the honor system. Duplicate slips cannot be checked, and Miss Porrit told the Council that the library cannot employ an extra person to do this.

"There are two questions here, efficiency and the honor system," Lois Dickson '54, president of the Council, commented yesterday. "Council felt that, if students abuse the privilege of reserving books, it would be best to revoke all use of the honor system in the library."