ArmInfo. US Congresswoman Dina Titus initiated the collection of signatures in the US House of Representatives in a letter to Librarian of Congress Carla Diane Hayden.
As reported by the Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA), in the letter, in particular, there is a request to correct outdated and inaccurate data on the massacre of Armenians related to the period of the Armenian Genocide, especially in the light of the recognition by the Congress of this historical fact. The letter also asks the librarian to use the historically accurate term "Armenian genocide" in the subject heading of books and other materials related to intentional, systematic and premeditated mass killings, deportation and expulsion of more than one and a half million Armenians in the period from 1915 to 1923 in the Ottoman Empire . It is also noted that this initiative runs counter to the response of the Library of Congress on June 19, 2020 to the ANCA request, where it is noted that it will not make changes even in the light of the recognition of the Armenian Genocide by Congress, since it is subordinate to the White House and the State Department. Titus noted in the letter that "while we understand that the Library of Congress has stated that it reports to the President and the State Department in terminology, we do not believe that legislative determinations of fact should be made for political reasons or in response to foreign pressure."
The letter also emphasizes that today it is archaic to use the terminology "massacre of Armenians" in the rubrics, which was adopted before Raphael Lemkin introduced the term genocide and before the adoption in 1948 of the United Nations Convention on the Prevention of Crime and Punishment of Genocide>. The letter goes on to stress that "the existing headline also runs counter to the broad, almost universal academic consensus recognizing the Armenian Genocide as a clear fact of genocide, as reflected in numerous resolutions, letters and statements of the International Association of Genocide Researchers." ANCA welcomed this initiative of the American Congressman.