The 88th U.S. Congress passed the S. 2265 bill which the 36th President of the United States Lyndon B. Johnson enacted into law on February 11, 1964.

After the Great Depression in 1929 and the creation of the Works Progress Administration in 1935, part of Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal, the American Library Association (ALA) realized federal funding was the best solution.

[5] Some of these groups include but are not limited to the institutionalized, the physically handicapped, low-income families, senior citizens, and ethnic minorities.

[9] Federally funded, many programs for the purpose of educational and social development have more traditionally been a fiscal responsibility of each individual state.

[10] Perhaps as a result of this opposition, in 1995 the LSCA was replaced by the Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA), dropping construction from the federal funding available.