[SOA] NCH & the Congressional History Caucus Effort--Your Help Is Needed

[George Bain]

Folks,
Here is a matter that requires your prompt action. It grows from SOA's 
membership in NCH.

The National Coalition for History (NCH) is trying to help create a 
Congressional History Caucus in the US House of Representatives. This 
effort started in the last Congress; there were approximately 25 members 
who joined. This being a new Congress, the effort starts again. But NCH 
says for it to be a meaningful group there needs to be at least 50 
members in the caucus. See the attached “Dear Colleague” letter for more 
information, and the (new) NCH web site as well www.historycoalition.org 
<http://www.historycoalition.org>; this letter includes goals for the 
caucus.

There were no members of the History Caucus from the Ohio delegation 
last time. But the Advocacy group in the Society of Ohio Archivists’ 
Advocacy & Outreach Committee would like to see that change, to invite 
and encourage members of the Ohio delegation to become members of the 
caucus. To do this, we need for SOA members (plus friends and associates 
too) to contact your representatives—or their staff members—to encourage 
them to join. Phone calls, e-mails, visits to the district offices are 
all good. The conventional wisdom is that only takes five different 
people to make a contact to have representatives’ ears perk up.

NCH’s goal is to reach this number (50) before Congress breaks for 
recess at Memorial Day. This means we need to make our calls before the 
SOA spring conference. Can you contact your representative by telephone 
or e-mail? Go to www.house.gov/representatives/ 
<http://www.house.gov/representatives/> and go to the list for Ohio. 
Most members have a web site that includes phone numbers for the DC and 
district offices.

Can you then get members of your nearby genealogical chapter or 
historical society to join you? What if we could interest three or four 
Ohio’s representatives to join? (We doubt that Speaker Boehner would be 
joining but anyone who lives in his district can still contact his 
office to inform his staff about the caucus and our interest in its 
existence.) And once you do make the contact please let either Robin 
Heise (rheise at co.greene.oh <mailto:rheise at co.greene.oh>.us) or George 
Bain (bain @ohio.edu) know so we can assess how well we are doing and 
what we can expect from this. Thanks.

Again, please make your contacts by May 11, three weeks from now.

George Bain, Co-Chair, SOA Advocacy and Outreach Committee

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