In 1901, a Commonwealth Parliamentary Library was started to help the newly formed Federal Parliament of Australia. From its beginning, the Commonwealth Parliamentary Library began to develop of a truly national collection. In 1907 the chairman of the Joint Parliamentary Library Committee, Sir Frederick Holder, gave the reasons for having the library. Australia should have a great public library, like the famous Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. It would be a home for the literature of the world, for ever.