Nixon Data May Be Calif.-Bound

[kskiska]

Sponsors Vow Continued Public Access to Tapes, Papers

Congressional negotiators agreed this week to undo part of a Watergate-era law that prevented former president Richard M. Nixon from taking his tapes and papers with him, but they said the records would still have to be processed here before being released to establish the presidential library that Nixon and his family always wanted.

The change, sponsored by Rep. Thomas M. Davis III (R-Va.), was tucked into an appropriations bill without public hearing and scheduled for approval last night by a House-Senate conference committee. Democrats who agreed to it were mollified by the promise of continuing public access under safeguards Congress enacted in 1974.

Officials at the Nixon Presidential Materials project in College Park said it would take eight to 10 years before they can finish the work of making the records public.

(snip)

"Up here these days, Republicans usually don't ask when they want to make changes," said Waxman's chief of staff, Philip M. Schiliro. "What was different here was Tom Davis came in and said, 'What are your concerns, we want to address them.' "

John Taylor, director of the privately operated Nixon library and birthplace in Yorba Linda, Calif., said he is looking forward to negotiations with the National Archives over a presidential library there that could shine a spotlight on all of Nixon's records. He called Davis's bill, added to the appropriations measure by Rep. Ernest J. Istook Jr. (R-Okla.), "a first step in abolishing the anomaly" of Nixon being the only president between Herbert Hoover and Bill Clinton without a government-operated library.

more…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A33652-2003Nov12.html