Scope and Content: In 1983 the Joint Committee on Education conducted a six-month study on the quality of elementary and secondary education in Massachusetts.  The committee held statewide public hearings, sponsored seminars, reported its findings to the legislature and educators, and made recommendations for modernizing and improving the public educational system.  It also drafted legislation leading to St 1985, c 188, “An Act improving the public schools of the Commonwealth.”  Administrative files contain records relating to the initial six-month study and its aftermath.
Arrangement: In four subseries: (1) Project files  (2) Media files (3) Study hearing files  (4) Hearing files; Arranged within each subseries chronologically
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Scope and Content: The Cambridge Bridge Commission was established in 1898 to administer construction of a bridge spanning the Charles River between Boston and Cambridge, to be known as the Cambridge (later Longfellow) Bridge.  St 1898, c 467, s 10 provided for the Supreme Judicial Court to appoint commissioners to determine proportion of construction costs to be paid by the Boston Elevated Railway Company equally to Boston and Cambridge.  Series was created to prepare for and record commission hearings.
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Scope and Content: In 1776 the Massachusetts General Court appointed a Committee of Sequestration to inventory, lease, and otherwise manage estates abandoned by Loyalists, primarily in Boston, and to forward their confiscated goods or proceeds from their auctioning to state authorities, until its charge was withdrawn in 1781.  Two prominent Boston loyalist merchants, Lewis Deblois and Edward Lyde, left Massachusetts in 1776 and were considered absentees. Deblois left Boston with the British evacuation on March 17, 1776 and went to London. Lyde, born in Boston in 1725, later returned from England to New York in 1789, where he died in 1812. Both had their property and large inventories of goods seized and sold by the state and were ultimately listed in the act of banishment, St 1778-79, c 24 (Oct. 16, 1778). Series lists goods by lots sold. –Vol. 1, Deblois sales, are in small lots numbered 1-280, sold Nov. 24, 1777 to Jan. 9, 1778. Items include snuff and tobacco boxes, knives, candlesticks, necklaces, tools, buttons, books, bellows, kettles, locks, and flatirons, with price of each indicated. Each lot sold is marked paid and/or delivered, with buyer’s signature or name, and in some cases the town. –Vol. 2, Lyde sales, are in lots 281-543, sold Jan. 10 to Feb. 27, 1778. Items include bedsteads, chairs, tables and other furniture, knives, forks, and buckles. –For records of additional auctions, June-July 1777 and Mar. 10, 1778-Mar. 29, 1780, see: Massachusetts. Office of the Secretary of State. Massachusetts archives collection ((M-Ar)45X), v. 280, p. 68 et seq. Here also are records of book sales held, Dec. 1777 and Mar. 1779, and receipts showing deposit of auction proceeds into the Treasury by the committee.
Arrangement: Arranged by estate
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Scope and Content: Resolves 1732-33, c 125 provided for the appointment of a committee of the General Court of the Province of the Massachusetts Bay to survey lands at Paquoig (now Athol, Mass.) and on the upper and lower Ashuelot River (now Swanzey and Keene, N.H.), for the purpose of establishing towns on those sites.  An additional committee was to be appointed to admit settlers to the towns (Resolves 1733-34, c 125 and c 198).  Such settlers were to live on their land within three years of admission, to build a house according to specifications, to till or fit for mowing eight acres, and to give bond of twenty pounds to the committee to be paid in case of failure to perform these requirements.  Series consists of completed printed forms stating this obligation, and signed/sealed by the settler and signed by witnesses.  All three localities are represented.  All documents (19) are dated June 26, 1734.  For additional (4) bonds see: Massachusetts. Office of the Secretary of State. Massachusetts archives collection ((M-Ar)45X), v, 114, p. 99-102.  For additional legislation relating to these settlements see Resolves 1733-34, c 82, 182, 184, and 210.
Restrictions: Restricted as fragile; access by permission of state archivist or curator of Massachusetts Archives only
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Scope and Content: The Cambridge Bridge Commission was established in 1898 to administer construction of a bridge spanning the Charles River between Boston and Cambridge, to be known as the Cambridge (later Longfellow) Bridge.  Series was created to plan actual bridge construction.
Arrangement: Arranged by bridge part
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Scope and Content: The Massachusetts Geographic Board was established by the governor at the request of the United States Geographic Board to prepare an accurate listing of Massachusetts place names.  This card file is the result of the board’s compilation of 6,000 such names.
Arrangement: In two subseries: (1) Card file; arranged by type of physical feature, thereunder by country, and then alphabetically by name. (2) Commissioners’ report; arranged alphabetically by name
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Scope and Content: The Joint Committee on Human Services and Elderly Affairs, a standing committee of the General Court, considers all matters concerning public welfare, children, the elderly, the handicapped, mental health, drug rehabilitation and control, veterans benefits, alcoholism, the correction system (including administration, prisoners’ rights, furloughs, work release, probation, rehabilitation, and parole), other social service programs, and other matters referred.  It drafts, reviews, and holds hearings on proposed legislation.  Series is created by the committee chair to enable the committee to formulate human services budget proposals and to react to gubernatorial vetoes of portions thereof.
Arrangement: Arranged chronologically by fiscal year
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Scope and Content: Pursuant to Resolves 1963, c 60, the Massachusetts General Court established an unpaid special commission including five members of the legislature, designees of the commissioner of administration, state secretary, attorney general, and state librarian, and appointees of the Massachusetts Historical Society and the Boston chapter of the American Records Management Association, to study records laws of Massachusetts. The commission’s mandate was extended by Resolves 1964, c 5, and Resolves 1965, c 2, and filed its report in Feb. 1965.
Arrangement: Arranged chronologically
Notes: Transferred to Archives from Massachusetts State Library
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Scope and Content: Resolves 1949, c 75 provided for an investigation and study by a special commission relative to an examination of the structure of the state government of Massachusetts with a view to elimination of duplications of functions, improvement of operations, and abolishment or consolidation of agencies, thereby reducing the costs of government and the burden of taxation.  Resolves 1950, c 36 and c 76 increased its scope to include consideration of an economic commission, a women’s business board, and protections for public employees.  It consisted originally of twelve legislative and gubernatorial appointees; Resolves 1950, c 83 and Resolves 1954, c 12 each increased its membership by two.  Resolves 1951, c 10, Resolves 1952, c 28, Resolves 1953, c 17, and Resolves 1954, c 12 successively extended the commission’s tenure in order to issue a final report to the General Court, from the original date of Mar. 31, 1951 to Mar. 15, 1954. –The commission issued fifteen reports, some of which formed the basis of legislation, as follows: (1) Progress report–1950 H 2685.  (2) Survey of overall problems–1950 H 2126.  (3) Utility and small purchases, unclaimed checks, commission procedures–1951 H 2186. Cf. St 1951, c 759.  (4) Industrial relations–1951 H 2523. Cf. St 1952, c 630.  (5) Public welfare and youth services–1951 H 2591.  Cf. St, 1951, c 801;  St 1952, c 602, c 605.  (6) Cigarette tax stamp–1951 H 2880.  (7) Education–1952 H 2051.  Cf. St 1952, c 499, c 585, c 630.  (8) Conservation–1952 H 2032.  Cf. St 1952, c 480, c 501, c 563, c 622.  (9) Public safety–1952 H 2400. Cf. St 1952, c 541.  (10) Restudy of parts of 4th and 9th reports–1952 H 2199.  Cf. St 1953, c 644.  (11) Building construction–1953 H 2575.  Cf. St 1953, c 612.  (12) Dept. of Corporations and Taxation–1953 H 2828.  Cf. St 1953, c 654.  (13) Public health–1953 H 200.  Cf. St 1954, c 581.  (14) Personnel administration–1953 H 2352.  Cf. St 1954, c 597, c 680.  (15) Salaries of state officers and employees subject to MGL c 30, s 46–1954 H 2600.  Cf. St 1954, c 407, c 453.
Arrangement: Arranged chiefly alphabetically by subject
Notes:  Transferred to Archives from Littauer Library, Harvard University, April 13, 2000. Series constitutes part of the papers of William Augustus Waldron, an attorney practicing in Boston with an additional career in public administration.  He held posts with the New York State Assembly and Constitutional Convention (1937-1938), the federal Dept. of Justice (1942), and the National War Labor Board (1942-1945); and in Massachusetts served with the Special Commission on the Structure of the State Government (1950-1954, from 1952 as executive director), as special assistant attorney general (1962), as commissioner of administration (1963-1965), and as special counsel to the General Court’s House Rules Committee (1969, 1971, 1973-1974)
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Scope and Content: The Committee on International Trade and Foreign Investment was established in 1983 as a joint special committee of the Massachusetts General Court to make an investigation and study relative to the advancement of foreign trade between the Commonwealth and various underdeveloped countries, especially in the Caribbean, Africa, and Asia.  Series document research and lobbying conducted by the committee .
Arrangement: In two subseries: (1) Outgoing correspondence (2) Subject files
Notes: Transferred to Archives from the Massachusetts State Library, March 1990
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