Colleagues

As a follow up to my last posting about the Mayor of New York's records
here is another posting from the US Archives listserv about a recent action
by President Bush. Don't suppose any of us will make it to the meeting but
it's another insight into the issue.

Richard Taylor
National Railway Museum

Presidential Records Under Siege?

On November 1, 2001 President George Bush issued Executive Order 13233,
which radically reinterpreted the Presidential Records Act (PRA) of
1978. Congressional leaders, citizen groups, historians, archivists, and
journalists have all expressed their concerns that the order fundamentally
reverses the very premise of public access to presidential
records. Clearly, it increases the discretion that sitting presidents and
former presidents have in making their records public, and it legitimizes
access restrictions absent from the 1978 legislation. Bush Administration
officials have defended the order largely by invoking the importance of
national security. Public Citizen, a nonprofit consumer advocacy
organization, has initiated a lawsuit in conjunction with several leading
historical associations in hopes of overturning the executive order.

This distinguished panel will review the past, present, and murky future of
recent presidential records legislation from the formative days of the
mid-1970s through the current controversy and beyond. Speakers will be:

Dr. John Brademas, former Indiana Congressman and Democratic Whip of the
House of Representatives, as well as President Emeritus of New York
University, who played a key role in both the Presidential Recordings and
Materials Preservation Act of 1974 and the Presidential Records Act of
1978. He recently donated his congressional papers to New York University;

Dr. Alan Brinkley, Allan Nevins Professor of History and current chair of
the history department at Columbia University. He has published widely in
the field of twentieth century American political history, won the National
Book Award for his 1982 study, Voices of Protest: Huey Long, Father
Coughlin, and the Great Depression, and currently is working on a biography
of Henry Luce;

Dr. Bruce Craig, Executive Director of the National Coordinating Committee
for the Promotion of History. He assumed the leadership of this nonprofit
advocacy organization in 2000, after a career with the National Park
Service and a long history of promoting access to historical
documentation. Dr. Craig played a major role in the movement to open Alger
Hiss's grand jury records for historical research, and has been closely
monitoring the current controversy over Executive Order 13233.

Bob Sink, Chief Archivist for the Center for Jewish History and an active
proponent of archival legislative issues, will moderate. The program is
being co-sponsored by the New York University Program in Archival
Management and Historical Editing and the New York University Archives.


DATE: Tuesday, February 26, 2002
TIME: 5:30 pm - 6:15 pm - social , 6:30 pm - 7:30 pm - program

PLACE: Silverstein Lounge (Room 101), Main Building
         New York University, 100 Washington Square East, 1st Floor



DIRECTIONS: By subway: 6 to Astor Place. Go west on Astor to
Broadway. Walk south on Broadway to Waverly. Walk westward on Waverly until
you reach Washington Square East. Take N,R to 8th St. At Broadway walk
south to Waverly. A, B, C, D, E, F, V to West 4th St. Walk east on West
4th until you reach Washington Square East. Take 1 to Christopher St. Walk
east on Christopher Street to West Fourth Street. Continue east to
Washington Square East.

FEE: ART Members $3. Non-members $5.

               RSVP: To Nancy Cricco. Email:
[log in to unmask] or telephone at
                                 (212) 998-2641. Please remember hosting a
meeting represents a financial and meeting space
commitment on the part of our hosts.

A posting from the Archives & Archivists LISTSERV List!

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