Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the Philippines in Legislature assembled and by the authority of the same:

SECTION 1. The Secretary of justice is hereby authorized to acquire by purchase from the legal representative or representatives of the late Mariano Ponce all the papers, books, documents, and other historical objects left by the deceased that should be preserved and owned by the Government of the Philippine Islands.  The Secretary of Justice shall carefully ascertain and determine which of the documents, papers, and objects should be preserved in the Philippine Library and Museum and which should be kept and placed on file in other Departments or Bureaus of the Government, and shall take the necessary measures to the end that those documents which the public interest requires to be kept secret and not to be published or exhibited, be so kept in the proper Departments or Bureaus of the Government.

SEC. 2. There is hereby appropriated, out of any funds in the Insular Treasury not otherwise appropriated, the sum of twenty thousand pesos or so much thereof as may be necessary for the purposes of this Act.

SEC. 3. This Act shall take effect on its approval.

Approved, March 11, 1919.