Yes, Emily has stated correctly and succinctly  American convention
regarding the relationship of " to , . : : ? and !  And her assumption
that typesetters/printers/i.e., producers of the the material object
established the convention, rather than writers/editors, seems
reasonable. What we need is someone who has easy access to the original
versions of such works as the NY Times Style Sheet and/or the U. of
Chicago guide.
 
I should note, however, that I have just looked at the 3rd edition of
the MLA HANDBOOK FOR WRITERS OF RESEARCH PAPERS and have discovered that
they treat ; and : like ? and !----"All other punctuation marks--such as
semi-colons, colons, question marks, and exclamation points--go outside
quotation marks, except when they are part of the quoted material." (I
have just checked and discovered that this has been the MLA policy at
least since 1951.)
 
Norman Carlson
Western Michigan University