the Reformation of Social Laws, which was to create the first Code of Labor Law in Chile, in 1931.
In 1931, the country suffered an important social and financial crisis; then President Carlos Ibáñez del Campo was highly unpopular. These political convulsions, however, did not affect the recently appointed Chief Librarian. Upon taking the post, he noted that the bibliographic materials were not rigorously classified and established a catalogue to correct this situation. This task consumed five years, during which the Library modernized its user services, reducing the time required to retrieve a bock and respond to requests. Mr. Ugarte introduced the Universal Decimal Classification, which covers all fields of knowledge.
In 1937, Mr. Ugarte undertook the creation of several dictionary-catalogues on cards, different from those developed in other libraries, as a way to make retrieval easier and thus facilitating the work of parhiamentarians. Sorne of these catalogues have disappeared while others remain useful even today, having been automated, as follows:
a) Catalogue of Chilean law
b) Catalogue of foreign law
c) Catalogue of the contents of the Annals of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
d) Catahogue of Parliarnentary Work, referenced to the Gazettes, recording the work of Parliamentarians by date
e) Catalogue of the History of the Law, also referenced to the Gazettes, providing information on each bill’s passage through Congress and the attendant
