ABSTRACT
Over the past twenty years, public servants in the United States have been increasingly called to account for their actions. Virtually every branch and level of government has been discussing and implementing codes of ethics that define the limits of activity of the individual in relation to his public service job. The impact of Watergate on the interest of both the private and public sectors in matters concerning the public trust cannot be overestimated. Inevitably, this interest now extends to those museums supported to any degree by public tax monies. Many museum professionals foresee that private institutions will become subject to the same kinds of ethical constraints that now operate in public institutions as federal support of museums increases through the National Endowments for the Arts and the Humanities, the National Museum Act and the Museum Services Act.
