Posted March 18, 2005.

Nixon Library Director Promises to Release Tapes, Papers

Responding to critics who fear that the transfer of former President Nixon’s materials from the National Archives and Records Administration in Washington to his library in Yorba Linda, California, will jeopardize public access, Nixon Presidential Library Director John H. Taylor has pledged to make public a substantial number of papers and recordings that have remained secret.

In a recent exchange of letters with newly appointed National Archivist Allen Weinstein, Taylor agreed to release hundreds of hours of Nixon tapes involving Republican Party business, as well as most of Nixon’s papers from before and after his presidency, the New York Times reported March 18. He also agreed to work with NARA in revising the library’s Watergate exhibit, which some historians have said minimized Nixon’s responsibility, and to plan another conference on the Vietnam War in place of the one the library cancelled for April, triggering a round of criticism.

Weinstein told the Times that the agreement should put the library back on track for the transfer of Nixon’s presidential materials and the takeover of the private library by NARA in 2006.

Posted March 18, 2005.