Congressman Pat Williams of Montana organized this Subcommittee in response to information he received from Warren Haas warning him that the nation's books are eroding away. Lynne Cheney, who was then the chairperson of the National Endowment for the Humanities, was asked during her testimony arguing for mass microfilming of the nation's books what the costs would be for this. She replied that "the Council on Library Resources estimates that in order to film 3 million volumes over the next 20 years, $358 million is needed, or about $15 million annually" (Nicholson Baker, "Double Fold", 179-180). Cheney further stated in her testimony that her foremost concern was the intellectual content found in these brittle books and the preservation of this information.