Dick Cheney PLEASE Make History
Working in an archive that acts as a state repository this summer, I gained insight into the interesting but sometimes endlessly frustrating world of the historical archivist. The Senator whose papers were being processed had done what the archivist I was working with had considered to be a fairly good job preserving his records simply by keeping them. Unfortunately, the space where he had room to keep them was an outdoor barn. The records were damp and moldy. Some papers had little mouse teeth marks on their edges. Especially disconcerting were the occasional dead animals that had gotten caught in boxes. The archivist seemed pleased rather than irked by the condition of the paper. Yes, the working conditions were not ideal, but the Senator had kept his papers fairly well, giving us a pretty clear picture of his time in office. And that is what really mattered.
Apparently, lately, archivists and historians in Washington have (rightfully) been freaking out a bit that Dick Cheney might not have done as nice a job as my senator did by shoving his records in his barn. Worried that with Dick’s departure from office, a wealth of history and insight into the Bush administration will be lost, they formed an advocacy group called the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington and are suing Cheney in order to force him to preserve his documents. Also cited in the suit is the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA).
- I think its funny that Cheney must somehow have found the only archivist ever who would agree to let him burn his papers, or send them into space, or do whatever he has been doing with them. It is hard to find a right-leaning librarian in my experience, but beyond that, regardless of political leaning, librarians understand the need to preserve documents so that future generations can understand how policy decisions were made.
Either way, apparently the White House and NARA have taken the view that Cheney, as President of Senate, is not part of the Executive Branch. Therefor, his records do not fall under the requirements of the Presidential Records Act. CREW is asserting that as Cheney played an integral role in executive policy decision making, his records must be preserved in order to gain insight into the administration’s process.
CREW filed their lawsuit today in D.C. district court. It will be interesting to see if this ragtag team of librarians is able to finally get Cheney to tell us what he has been up to all these years. Unfortunately, based on past disappointments, I am not holding my breath.
For a much more coherent and well-researched article on this subject, please read the Washington Post article.
Filed under: By: Miss Information, Intellectual Freedom, News, change or die, libraries | 3 Comments
Tags: Archives, Dick Cheney, Ethics, history, libraries, Special Collections
Right-leaning librarian here…and yeah, I not only understand the need to preserve historical documents but I took archival administration classes in grad school. Not all documents have historical value. I sifted through many a crappy personal letter and smelly old document to cull irrelevant and extraneous records that have no significance to a collection. Just because it may be in Dick Cheney’s office doesn’t mean it has anything interesting to offer. And perhaps your conspiracy theories about Mr. Cheney’s drawers (pun intended) are misplaced. He may just show up on January 21, 2009 and dump a pantload of “policy documents” at the Archives and won’t you be shocked. I know BDS has caused you left-leaning librarians to foam at the mouth, but not everything the administration does is malicious and calculated. For as much as you all like to call President Bush an idiot and a moron, he seems to be such an evil genius as to keep you all running in circles.
And as a side note, as vice president, the only job Mr. Cheney is formally charged to do, besides wait for the president to kick-off, is to preside over the Senate — which is not the Executive branch. The US Constitution does not explicitly note that the VP is part of the Executive branch, nor part of the Legislative branch, hence the interesting tactic taken up by the administration. Food for thought.
Flame away.
Things that may seem to be valueless now may prove important in the future. Who are we to decide what future researchers may need or want? What’s important in an archive is provenance, trying to maintain collections as they were kept.
Also – if the elusive Mr. Cheney decides to plunk all his documents down when he leaves office, then there’s no real reason for him to fight the lawsuit, is there?
I do not deny that there are probably hundreds of important documents that are important or will be important one day, however many of the groups seeking access to his papers are doing so in the name of “gotcha”. The whole point of this exercise is to get his documents to prove Mr. Cheney has done something wrong.
CREW states — CREW has closely monitored government ethics, bringing egregious conduct to light and holding public officials accountable for their misconduct. Is this group really interested in preserving history or prosecuting someone?