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Reagan-Era Roberts Documents ReleasedThe National Archives August 18 released some 38,000 pages of material stored at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library covering Supreme Court nominee John G. Roberts Jr.’s term as associate counsel to President Reagan from 1982 to 1986, the Washington Post reported August 19.To date, 51,285 pages from the Reagan Library have been made public in preparation for Roberts’s confirmation hearings, which begin September 6. However, some materials have been withheld under Freedom of Information Act exemptions, and because of an executive order signed by President Bush in 2001, which allows an incumbent or former president to withhold the release of papers that would otherwise be made public after 12 years; Roberts’s files from his 1989 to 1993 role as deputy solicitor general for the Justice Department under President George H. W. Bush have been sealed. Senate Democrats have pushed for further disclosure of unreleased papers. “I request that you conduct a supplementary review of the documents that were withheld, redacting or segregating portions of the documents as necessary, and release the remaining records as soon as possible,” urged Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.), ranking Democratic member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, in an August 16 letter to the executive director of the Reagan Library. Leahy also pressed for an investigation into the disappearance of a folder from Roberts’s work on affirmative action, which went missing after two lawyers from the White House and the Justice Department had been granted access to the library to review materials before Roberts’s formal nomination in July. Archives staff said they were confident all the papers were returned after examination, and that the missing folder was apparently lost when staff reorganized the documents in anticipation of their release, according to the August 17 Post. It’s “very difficult to believe it’s anyone other than ourselves responsible for this loss,” said Assistant Archivist for Presidential Libraries Sharon Fawcett. Officials said that the library had already reconstructed the file based on one of the lawyers’ notes and other records, and that it has requested an investigation by its inspector general. Posted August 19, 2005. |
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