IMPLICATIONS FOR POLICY 135

developments mean two things for the public library: more
clients and more use of “better”’ materials.

Thus, the public library in this country for the next few
years and for the long pull may be presented with a first-rate
opportunity for greater service to its community by defining
its service with reference to some qualitative standards. It will
still have to operate, as it always has, within the general level
of American culture. The public library cannot outdistance
the intellectual climate in which it finds itself. But given its
appropriate share of resources, administered to exploit its own
unique strength within the community’s system of communi-
cation, the public library over the years can make an effective
contribution to the development and the enrichment of that
cultural climate. And that is its proper task.