keeping history alive. be well.

this program is part of your history behind the headlines series, which features historians providing historical context for current events, suggesting how historical thinking can provide angles on

the world around history, behind the headlines generally sponsored generously sponsored by a member jarrid brew baker, whom i to whom i am very grateful for his help. this today's discussion which will run until 4:30 p.m. eastern time. brings together four leading scholars to place the current controversies and questions around records in historical context and obviously we have timed this very. however, i have to say i cannot say that we had any kind of internal info. notice about is currently going on we just guessed right. our discussion will be moderated by friend and colleague. associate dean for justice equity diversity inclusion, professor of public affairs barbara jordan, chair, ethics

and political values, founding director of the center for the study of race and democracy at the university of texas at austin. and of course, most important president of the pacific coast branch of the american historical association, my friend and colleague jacqueline price, also executive director of the society american archivists will offer remarks at the conclusion of today's event. i'm going to turn this over to peniel and turn off my camera and spend the rest of the next hour just listening. thank you for attending. okay. thank you, jim it's my esteemed pleasure to these three colleagues. nicole hemmer are tim naftali and trudy, who's camp petersen, who are going to be our our panelists today. nicole hemmer is the director of the rogers center for the american presidency and associate professor of history at vanderbilt university, a

scholar of conservativism, media and the president's. she is the author of partizans the conservative revolutionaries who remade american politics in the 1990 and messenger the right conservative media transformation of american politics. she is co-host of the podcast past and present and this day an esoteric political history and co-founder of made by at the washington post, tim naftali, a clinical associate professor of history and public service as as the director of the undergraduate public program at new york university and founding director of the richard nixon presidential library museum. and you may recognize from cnn as a presidential historian and scholar. trudy, who scott peterson is an archival consultant and certified archivist. she spent 24 years with the u.s. national archive, including more than two years as acting archivist the united states. she was also the founding

executive director, the open society archives in budapest, hungary, and the director of archives and record management for the united nations commissioner for refugees. she is a past president of. the international conference of the roundtable on archives and the society of american archivists and chaired the international council on archives, human rights working group and working group on a standard for access archives. among her publications. since are final acts a guide to preserving the records of, truth commissions and temporary courts permanent records. all right. and i would be remiss without noting that today april 4th, 2023, is the 55th anniversary of dr. luther king jr's assassination in memphis, tennessee. so there's a this is a hugely day, certainly as we are convening this conversation. and former president donald trump is facing indictment.

new york city. but we're here really to talk about the presidential act and really the fact that these records of late have been in the media with president biden, former president trump, former vice president mike pence. doc that are classified that should have been turned over to the national archives suddenly have been found in their possession or in their summer homes. and that's really caused a lot of controversy. so i want to start with nicole. nikki, what is the presidential records act? i think this is sort of a bit of that. most of the american doesn't even know there's such a thing. so what is it and why is it important? so the presidential records act is one of those pieces of legislation that came in the aftermath in the 1970s of watergate and the church committee hearings, which exposed all of this wrongdoing by the cia in the intelligence

communities and the in the wake of all this revelation of, wrongdoing by public officials, there was an effort to preserve records that in the case of the nixon, they had tried to destroy, to throw some sunlight on what was happening within the federal government and to make it possible under things like foia for americans to access some of the documents that had been created by the federal government. and so the presidential act, as part of that big push to, open up the government a lot of ways, i think people might be surprised to learn. first of all that there there wasn't an official preservation records law until. the 1950s that the idea of preserve being all of the records of the federal government, of different agencies and cabinets was relatively late the game and when it came to presidential papers presidential papers were

considered the private property of the president. so it wasn't considered to be part of the public record at until the passage of the presidential records act. and that's a pretty important shift because it recognizes the work done by the president isn't private property. it is in kind of an internal discussion that the president has with himself, but that those are public records. those are things that the american people to see, not just because they might evidence of crimes and wrongdoing, although that's going to up a lot today, but because it is part of our nation's history. right. it's part of how decisions get made. it's part of the record of, how politics runs. and in a democracy that should be part of the public record. so you get the presidential records. back in 1978 and goes into effect in 1981 and pretty much immediately presidents are trying to figure out ways to

limit because they understand that if their papers become public, in some ways they lose control their legacy and. the presidents from reagan on were very concerned about their legacy. you even get after the the beginning, after the september 11 attacks, george w bush more restraints on the presidential act. essentially, he he puts forward an executive order that essentially, you know what? these are off limits in perpetuity unless the president says, okay, you can look at them. and so has been this real push and pull not only with accessing presidential, but in some cases with making sure they never enter the to begin with. i mean, this is something we saw with other administrations as well, especially with the rise in telephone calls and finding ways around creating written record. but at the beginning of the trump, people might remember that they were using a system called confi where they could send messages to one another that would automatically so that

there would no record created in the first place. or that story. politico from early in the trump that talked about how after donald trump would rip up all of the records and then there were two people who were hired to take back together to people were were ultimately fired. and so even though we have this presidential records act actually creating those records getting those records and then also getting those records, the wall of classification is is a challenge for making sure that as many of these records are publicly available as possible. right. thank you, tim. why should this? you know, nicole just gave us a great historical context for all of this. why should it matter to the public? you know, we keep hearing perspectives. mike pence on joe biden on trump. what is the public in in both

the presidential records act? but the fact that we're finding these classified documents sort strewn all over the place. one of the things happening lot one of the constants our political culture is americans tend to be about excessive power. and americans are americans tend to like the division of power and and the presidential records act is actually a check on presidential power as nikki has explained, presidents that and they are looking for ways to to to to lessen the power but it exists. and why is it a check on presidential power again riffing off of nikki, the president's are interested in legacy. that's something i learned. i knew it in advance. when you become the head of a presidential library, you very

you very quickly encounter people who are consumed by. the question of the legacy of the president whose name is over the the front. so why do these why does the records act matter? well, because accountability depends on evidence and the documents, the materials, because we're in a digital age now. so we're not just talking about documents that that's of good things and bad things. and one of the checks on a president is the knowledge if they do something wrong, somebody will find. now, they may not find out while the president is in office because presidents can control access to that material while they're in office. but once they leave office, eventually and we can talk about the deficiencies in, our declassification system, but events really that material is going to see the light of day

and and that will matter even if the president someday herself is no alive, their family will be and their family is deeply invested in that legacy. so that records act is a source of accountability and even though as as peniel said it's a very esoteric law. it has profound consequence is particularly in an era of an imperial where the president's has as the most powerful in the world, arguably the has the ability to change lives and can i'm sure become besotted with this power and the knowledge that somebody many people will figure out how they misuse that power. let's leave aside the question of crimes. abuse of power is just as bad. i think that is a check. and so i believe that the health of this act is something

americans who care about power and i believe every american does should care about. so though it's esoteric, i am delighted by the fact that mistakes by vice president pence and former vice president current president biden and whatever it is donald trump did, we may see an indictment soon. and whatever his crimes are will be alleged that that is shone the bright light of scrutiny on on a on a on presidential power. most americans unfortunately to this moment don't really think about. so that that's how i see the connection between accountability and the presidential records act. great. thank tim. truly in certain ways the buck stops with in terms of the arc of as the former archivist of the united states, what's the role of the archives here in these presidential records? preserving them for future

historians and journalists to get like tim was talking about a perspective on the good and the bad or even ambivalent that has occurred in an administration. so what's role of archivists here? we think when we think about archive archives, we don't usually think about. these are the presidential records. we usually about archives, sort of public archives and open archives or people's individual archives, people like the rockefellers or but but the archivists of the united states and the national archives are where these things are housed, least since after 1981. so in addition to presidential libraries, what's the role of archivist in the context of the presidential records act? well, let me answer that by adding a little bit to nicky's good discussion of, how the act came to be, because you you start to understand the archives

role when you understand where the archives was at that and starting in 1915, the national archives was placed under called the general services administration, which was a conglomerate which did everything from motor pools to buying a paper cups for the government. it was an unhappy marriage, but it was a subordinate part and it became a real problem. when nixon left office, because nixon's negotiation over, his papers was with the head of the general services administration, not with the archivist of the united states. and some pretty ugly decisions made by those two men working together. and that's part of the background to records act as well. so when the congress decided it had to do something it decided

to create a presidential commission or not an actual commission called public documents commission shorthand, which was to look what had happened to the records of all three branches of government at the top. what happened to the records of the justices of the supreme court? what happened to the records members of congress? what happened to the records of the president and? a wonderful historian was, the key staff member on that commission. and so it's a good report. congress then chose only to look at the president part. they chose not to look at themselves and they chose to look at the justices of, the supreme court. but when they started, then to write that legislation, they were looking at an archivist was down in the bureaucracy, couple of steps from the president, but was also an appointee of the president.

and so the first step is, you can congress really do this guy really legislate in this realm? and if they did this, then how do you make a distinction between the president and his employee, which is supposed to have this power? and so some of the really odd parts of the act are trying to buffer that relation issue and make sure the archivist has enough authority to actually with this. and you see in the specific role where the president the acting president says, i think we should destroy some of this stuff. and the archivist required to give an opinion but can't overrule the president. the only ones who can overrule the president is, the congress, and the only thing the archivist can do is say hello. we think this is a bad idea. so it's a very act because the

way it's embedded within the government because of that, then the administer version of the act is not straightforward forward at all. you are dealing with past president and have to negotiate the between the current president, the past president who are often of different parties and you have to if the past president says i don't want this release you have to ask the current president, will you enforce. we get into presidential authorities all over again and then negotiate how. that is going to be worked. but it's i want to say one other thing. it's important know this is not about class ified records. the press has picked up on that and has overdone it.

the majority of presidential records are not classified. we deal with things like our legislation and how are we going to craft this legislation or how are we going to respond to legislative initiative. we get what are we thinking about health. we've seen it of course, in clinton on the his big effort to do health legislation. and we've seen it, of course, in the covid crisis and all of that of record keeping, which is so important for understanding history of how we got to where we are is not classified. and to look at this as an issue of classified records only is simply a mistake. all right. that's a great segway into my to tim. you know, right. in the context of the trump indictment or plans to indict what about the residents of this

and the presidential record jack now the partizan divides over you know if if if a democratic president has some papers that are askew republicans are accusing that person of corruption and really vice versa. the republican president has papers that are askew. democrats and others are accusing that person of corruption, especially within the context of your earlier comments about, how americans are really careful and are worried. anybody having too much power and really like divided government. what are we to make. we're we're in 2320 23 in a context where it there is so much hype or partizanship and and and really every thing even even something that is sort of coming out of the good government post watergate movement of the 1970s and like trudy's reminding us congress

didn't really spread the wealth in terms of in of putting checks on its own records and putting checks on a supreme court record attorney thank you for that history because i think that that's what they should have done right. i think i think that that all branches of like tim is explaining to us that divided government, they all have a check on their power. well we can check the congressional records. i'd love to see what mitch mcconnell was up to doing and not just mitch mcconnell on tip, too. i'm i'm a bipartisan an historian. i'd like to see what they were all up to. right. and so, jim, what are we to make of this during this this very pivotal moment in american, where, again, we've january 6th, we've got trump and the indictment, the big lie, so much is going on. what we to make. what are we to make of this right now? well, neil if there's ever any question about why historian is

an archivist matter, i think you've just answered it. the is in the details and. in trying to explain the difference between the pence and biden cases and i put them in the same. pretty well. well we'll know in in better detail. not because she was involved in those cases but she she knows that process i'm sure very well of how presidencies end and the role of nora and the national archives at the end of a presidency. i know of it only indirectly through nancy smith was at the archives when when i was a director and she ran that for a while. but i see biden, the biden and pence cases as quite similar the number of documents involved suggests that that they are similar that this is probably a mistake. whereas in the case of former president trump, we know that his counsel is white house counsel pat cipollone.

he warned him that that these boxes of materials in the residence had to be turned over to the national archives. the trump family left. the 20th of january 2021, and he ignored that. so it's not a matter of inadvertence of a mistake. this is volition. this is will. so for the moment, he takes the materials. there's a problem. what makes it even worse is that then he was asked for the materials and then he begrudgingly had his people provide. some of them, but not all of them. and then the fbi had to go and search his residence, discovered not only materials that belonged the american people, but materials belong to the american people that happened to be classified, which then rose retrace issue. as trudy mentioned. the presidential records act covers all presidential records, of which only a small percentage, important percentage, i'd say, for many of us, but small percentage is classified. so you the issue of him taking

something that didn't belong to him him being asked nicely it to be returned him not returning it in fact his people saying they had returned it when it was a lie. and then it turns out that what he kept was highly classified. so it's series of issues quite different from the pence biden matter now, in our highly partizan environs meant those details get washed away and it all is the same old same old. and all i can say is that as we have an obligation to try our very best, to try to show, to explain to our fellow and the interested public mainly the differences and why, one, both of them are a problem, but one is a major threat, the presidential records act and the other, while an issue was quite inadvertent. so that but it's very hard in a partizan era. i agree. but we have to keep trying. now, the other point i wanted to make is to keep in mind the

constitutional nature this and trudy raised it when congress decided to make presidential records public records they were taking property away from presidents. we might not think of it that way, but presidents did presidents didn't have for a long time? they did not get salaries as as former presidents. what they would get is the right to write off their taxes the value of their papers. nixon would actually get into trouble of this because his lawyer probably played around with a date predated a document anyway. my point is simply that what congress did it was take property from another branch. so if you think it that way, this is a constitutional issue. and so in return for taking from the presidents, the presidents representatives, which at that point, i think from the carter

administration said, okay, you do that, then we have to have a role in controlling these documents, is why trudy explained that there are these layers of of authority, not just for current incumbent presidents, but for former presidents in the act. that's why it's so complicated, because in a sense, congress had to admit, yes, actually, we're taking something from the other branch. and the other branch said, well, if you're going to take something from we're going to need to control what happened. now, what didn't and shouldn't have happened to you perhaps remembers that debate was that congress decided, as she mentioned, that it would not subject itself to this. and one of the great outrages for those of us who care about how our functions is the fact that the congress of the united states is not subject to for you right. right. which is the reason why henry kissinger, for example put his documents at the library of congress, which is outside the purview of foya.

so there is a i think significant power struggle that lies behind the story the presidential records act and foia which helps explain why we know a lot more about how presidents make decisions than we know about how congress makes decisions and much more than the supreme court. and so so, trudy, you know, let's talk about what what can the archives and the archivists do to sort of maintain neutrality in this hyperpartisan? because in a way, for some partizans, just the very the, very notion that the presidential record compels presidents to over what tim is saying property to the archives makes the archivist a partizan, especially when we're thinking about, you know, sort of, you know, trump or even even, you know, biden, if if people think that somehow those those material roles will sully that

president legacy in any kind of way because so many partizans i work at the lbj of public affairs and you know that folks there, you know, are obviously concerned about president lyndon legacy and tim's former director of the the nixon library and there were folks there who are very much interested in nixon's legacy. the library, when that's finally erected, people who are going to be very much interested in how history looks upon. barack obama so what can can the archivists do a especially you know, i'm really intrigued by the fact that yeah congress and this is a shame because you think about the 1970s and you know nicole tam you know do such great work on this that is the last era of good government that we had postwar watergate church committee where we were really having this internal dialog with ourselves and institutions. and i have to say probably

before 2020 and the reckoning around george floyd the 1970s and post-watergate are the time where so many americans find out about the and counterintelligence. and they really do do finance reforms things that citizens versus united transformed utterly. so i'm really sad that congress in the context of 1978 you say jimmy carter give it up but you don't say, you know, tip o'neill. and these are people who i think were, you know, great americans. i'm sad, you know, the supreme court and the us congress is not a part this if we're really thinking about a deliberative democracy. so what what can the the national archive do to and i think this is what you need in a democracy to really lessen the hyper partizanship because part of the with our democracy right now how is how vital operative you know really all sides are even as i think sides are not

morally equal equivalent but but people are yelling you can see this outside of the court in manhattan. there are people it's it's a it's a parade and a festival and a demonstration and. people are angry with each other and screaming and yelling. and in certain ways, it's exactly what the founders wanted to prevent with with with the division government in power. so what can the archive do? what can the archivist do in this context? well, i think it's both do or not do. first of all, the across the united has to be the most nonpartisan person can imagine. you have to be clear that you are there to enforce the law to protect records no matter what you to deal with presidential families of both parties you have to deal with both houses of congress because you do get the legislative records of both houses of congress and you get the records of the

congressional. and so it doesn't i was once chief of the legislative archives branch in the national archives. and believe me, when in that case, the senate turned over for the first time from democrats to republicans, we got a lot of records. we got a lot of records coming down because the are interest was making sure were in the archives and they were not in the hands of the incoming party so have to be neutral and you have show that you are a neutral all the time you have to go to to events in republican places and democratic places and then you have to stay away from the fundraisers and the the real partizan events and make that it's clear that you're not going to those kinds of things. you're going to go to the funeral of the republican president and the funeral of the

democratic president and on and on like that. the question is, you could do more than that and i think every time you start to step beyond that, you risk your your non partizan stage. it's one of the reasons why putting exhibits together in the national archives is such a challenge because you've got to get that balance right or people are going to be really unhappy and you're going to a lot of public criticism. and that has happened certainly to national archives. but beyond that you've got to try to stay with the document as history and you have to say as we always said when we certify the documents this is a certified true copy of document. we are not certifying content of the document as this is truly copy. it is an exact copy, but we are not certifying what the content

is. so at that neutrality of like the supreme court right? what court is supposed to be. so nikki, has this ever before in terms that when we think about presidents records, is there a context and we go and i know, you know, we've been reminded in the 19th century there is none. there is no. but have there been contestations like this where people wanted to sort of get at presidential records? and there were there were there was disagreements and sort of divides or are we in something really new and unprecedented? oh, sure. i mean, this has been as i mentioned in the introduction, a contentious area since the presidential act emerged in part, yes. is it is vitally important and it has power. but as trudy was saying, enforcement mechanism is a mess and so when people are trying to access these papers or argue that certain papers should be included in the archive and others, that's when there are

all sorts of conflicts that crop up over who has kind of the responsibility for for the papers, who has control over the papers. there was actually this big dust in the 1990 was because president george bush had worked out a deal with the archivist that, would have conferred complete control of the presidential records. but the president, he left office. and i think it's the fha that sues on behalf of on behalf of the archive and to make sure that that that that wasn't in the spirit of the presidential records act presidential records act was about creating a kind of oversight for the presidential records to make sure that they would be entered into a kind of public record, a public accessibility. and, you know, tim can tell you about stories from nixon library and the contest over what gets shared and what doesn't get shared.

certainly conflicts between people who see themselves as legacy preservers and people who see themselves as history preservers. those can sometimes look the same on the outside, but are vastly different. political projects. and so those kinds of contestations appear kind of wherever there presidential records or arguments about about government records, because there is so much invested in what's on the record, what gets held back. i mean, this is something we run into. i'm just finishing up the obama presidency oral history project and an oral history you run into some of these same kinds of things. only hear from official voices within the administration. or do you widen it so you hear, you know, voices of protests and voices of criticism within an oral history. and so there are things that historians and archivists can do

to kind of try to help round out the record. and i think organization like the age have been involved for a long time in both litigating, lobbying for, access to more records and the organizing and preservation of those records. but this is absolutely an area of contest ation from the word go and think that it will continue to be just because so much is at stake. and judy, you know, building on that, you have so much experience in terms international archives. and i want to ask you, how do we compare internationally both where are we better, we worse? and is there some kind of international model that you've seen that you even perfect that may be we would be better off if we followed aspects of that model. let me i'm happy to answer that. but let me add to what nikki just said, and that is i woke up

one morning as archivist of the united states to find myself being sued by the age of which i was a member. this is, you know, a very strange situation, but opposite of the united states is indeed member of the executive branch. and if the executive branch takes a position that you think is wrong, you have argued your way through as far as you can. and the administration decides, no, that's not the way we're going to go. you are stuck you either agree that you will follow the administration's line or you resign. there's there's no other two ways. and so people like aj, like all of friends in other organizations, watchdog role is really important. i can't emphasize this enough.

aj just one. i'm sorry. i'll get back to your question, but aj helped when a wonderful i think for the archives of the archives was going to close for financial reasons the seattle regional archives branch and aj joined with a large number of other people, people in the pacific northwest and got that stopped and now we've seen in the budget request from the white money to start planning to build a new archives in seattle. yes. that's the kind of thing that only outside forces looking at what's going on can do and your absolute depended upon them. i would also say that outside forces have to look at decisions that are being for what to save and what to throw away. those are public they have to be in the federal register for a

set period of time before executing and only by having comment is that ever changed. so sorry about that. no, no, it's great. and as to international well, of course, you have the difference between the presidential and the ministerial situation. one of the ones i'd point to you that's very interesting is south korea. i was there just before the pandemic, and they have built a very large new building for archives, and it's for all presidents. there's going to be a presidential archives. not one president or another one. now it's so we don't know how that's going to work. but as you think about what happening now with the obama material, where he has decided he does not want to have the classic presidential library,

the records in the structure in chicago, except for those which are not classified and then only in a copy. but the originals will stay with. the national archives. and of course, that's what is with trump right now. the trump records are in the national archives, not in a separate structure looking at this model out of south korea. starts to be a very interesting one. would we be willing to fund a structure that would be archives of the president seat of the president, and that makes a lot of sense in historical because things don't end with an administration. the national security council goes on the issues go on and in some ways i think by having these individual pods out there we shown a just in the government that actually true

and history of our country goes across administrations not. so it's an interesting model i don't know how it's going to work and i don't know if it would work here, but what starting to see now with and trump we have the records now in one location in washington we don't have them in presidential libraries or as they were technically called presidential archival depositories. can you imagine if we called them? adds but anyway, so my with the time that we have left, i want to talk about in the narrative wars and in these records and and so i'll start with nikki and and tim can can wrap us up, you know, both both you think about trump, obama, even the vice president's kamala harris, pence nikki discuss how these records

now and you've worked on the obama oral history project are so vital to shaping a narrative of a presidency. an argument about president's relevance and why that why that. because there are so many people connected to president including people who are going to get future jobs people who are going to run for office themselves. they're going to be part of private equity funds. they become presidents, universities, just all kinds reasons. they become k street lobbyist, they become global lobbyists. right. talk to us about that and why these records somebody who you know, i'm read john meacham's brilliant book, abraham lincoln. i've read your work. i've read terms like whether you're talking about richard nixon or presidents from the 19/18 century were constantly shifting the legacy. one year nixon's up and the

other he's down. one year we reevaluate eisenhower and say maybe he was a great statesman in year we say that bill clinton was magnificent or he was a disappointment. you know, sometimes say kennedy was an unfinished presidency. but fred logan is showing us in two volumes. he's this extraordinary in a way that i really before. right. so why does it and by the time we have madam president, her legacy going to be contested, too, you know, so tell us about the records, this narrative war, the story these records are trying to tell. yeah, i mean, i think that the thing is that the records don't necessarily tell a story. it's what we bring to the records, the stories that we pull out of them that really matter right. that's why we see the narrative shifting. and even if we had a sort of perfect documentary record of a presidency, we would still continue to battle over what that presidency meant.

and those records though help us. they help us to understand the as more than a president. i think you can't spend very much time in records or presidential oral histories without realizing that the presidency is kind of this giant governmental full of hundreds if not thousands of people making decisions decisions into effect. and you get an appreciation not for, you know, the mind, the decision making of the person who sits the big seat. but the entire flow of people working around them and both their extraordinary ness and their ordinariness. i think that's the thing that i'm struck by during presidential oral history is us talking to of these people who've been running the country. and you're both so awed by all that they've done. but you're also like, wow you're not different from me. and i think that something kind of amazing about that, to know that our country is scary as it is at times, as by citizens which feels like an thing to

remember. and i think that presidential records can really help us appreciate and understand that. of course they don't exist in a vacuum. and the challenge and i think historians and archivists know but i think that it's worth we are saying is that an archive is only as complete documents that are in it and there are all kinds of voices are missing. there are all sorts of silences there, records that have been destroyed or records that remain classified that were never turned over. that leave gaps and absences in presidential records. and so we have to find a million different ways to fill those in not just by talking to other members of the administration, an oral history, but talking to ordinary people and talking to activists and trying to understand all perspectives outside of a presidency as well as all of those inside of a presidency. so, i mean, the presidential records act gives us that good.

first chunk and then from there it's kind of everybody's game. once they start poring through those papers to figure out what, do you think the story of this presidency and how do you make your case for all of those different narratives? thank. and now, tim. in terms of i want you to you know that question but amplified in a certain way because you mentioned at the start of this webinar the imperial and and you know sometimes people talked about richard nixon as an imperial president. ronald reagan as an imperial president. you know, certainly depending on your perspective, can see somebody like barack obama or as imperial presidents. when you think about some people's version of obamacare, a drone strikes certain things that that president trump did as well. when we think about these narratives and the presidential records act how and why is this

so important to the public because you know, we talk about the public and nikki was mentioning the presidency, why it's so important. there's a whole cottage of people loving john adams, george washington and thomas jefferson and and theodore roosevelt and looking at them as real. we hate to say it because we're in a democratic republic. but as some kind of chaos, monarchs. these these sort of these of heroic figures. and sometimes we even do it with, you know, dolly madison and we do it with first ladies is an extraordinary place zweig has an extraordinary book on lady bird johnson brilliant book. and so what how are these records shaping that? and are there are there opportunities as well as challenges? because the president is also a reflection of our democracy and our democratic and virtues at its best at its best. i remember when obama won on election night, he said that his victory proof that america was a place where all things are

possible. right. that's the kind of progressive american exceptionalism, even as that's the kind of country nixon. right. in terms of american. so can the records do in terms of that public narrative because, regular citizens are always with the president, whether it's their president, their favorite elected or not. well, first of all, i'm i think that this is an empowering moment for undergraduates and graduates students. i'm not talking about the job market, which is a whole different discussion. it's a very sad story. but terms of knowledge, because more materials are being digitized there's more that is accessible on the web, therefore. and because for lots of reasons, political historians have lot of questions they're asking. but there are also questions that are not being as much. so there's a great for changing

the narrative of presidents by people that might not necessarily be professors. so it's a great time be interested in american history because the are overwhelming in and the number of people working on them professionally is not that large. so this is a great time to be asking big questions about presidents. what what are the challenges? there are big challenges, but they're exciting challenges. you just have to think about. the first thing is you think about how were records created by the presidency. you've chosen and think of it as an organism trying to figure out how it documented something and then and to debate what might what record exist and then go for it. look it. it's a treasure. it's an exciting treasure. i'm a presidential biography of john f kennedy, where i'm going to describe how the legacy was by the destruction of material

also the removal of materials and by the way, in which the kennedy legacy c business edited things out of documents, edited out of manuscripts of the kennedy legacy is the product a very determined constant traded effort at creating a certain legacy for for this man was brutally murdered. i would that dealing with a legacy of someone was taken from us in a way as and ugly as the case in dallas in 1963 made it a real challenge to be balanced about that person's legacy. but it because of the that the pain the family it became even more difficult for historians actually get at the real truth of john f which is a real challenge. nixon. nixon people tried really to destroy documents and they destroyed a lot. fortunately, they didn't destroy everything. and one place where i would

disagree little i wouldn't disagree with trudy because was saying it's an opportunity. i would disagree with the south korean model is that one of the reasons the weather the ways we out things about presidents is that we have expert archivists who know the records. and when you combine all records into one place, unless you have money for a lot of staffing. and the way our government works, you are generally underfunded for such things. what happens is people don't know the records anymore. and so things get lost. nothing gets lost, but they don't get found and used. and unfortunately because the cost, even the cost of coming to d.c. is expensive. ata unless you digitize everything. scholars don't have the chance to find it, and so things don't. they get overlooked and they don't get put into the declassification system because things are not put into the classification system automatically. it's one of the misunderstandings of how our declassify nation system, workers things are reviewed by a

certain timetable. but then if they're found to be properly classified, you have to actually ask for that document. so kind of pulling all our records together into one place i think would be a disaster for presidential records. we've seen the problem already. one place where historians the can be more vocal is in asking questions of the national archives about its declassification system. at the moment it's under funded, understaffed and it has now the records the trump records and the classified materials of a number former presidents from an earlier era. and they don't have the staff to take care of it. one of the sad consequences of president obama's decision is that his records don't have the archival resources available that they would have had if had accepted an ordinary president. the library in chicago. so one of the unintended

consequence is of the barack obama model, i fear unless congress gives more money to the national archives, which i want to see happen, is that obama records will less accessible over time than the records of, for example a richard nixon or ronald reagan. thank you. well, we're going to end and wind up. i'm going to give it over to jackie price, sapo executive director, the society of american archivists. thank you to our panelists, all of really. thank you, panel. and thank you once again to our panelists, trudy timm and nikki, thank you so much for sharing your expertise and experience. i think in our panel, you basically summed it up towards the very end why is is this important to us is important to us as american people for the protection of a history democracy and our civil liberties. it is just simple. it is just as that it is necessary that we have this

protection so that we preserve our history. so once again, thank you so much for everyone who joined us today. we appreciate it and have a