Bob Dalton wrote:  ". . . .NARA is absolutely at the same level in the food 
chain as the subordinates reflected in the report.  NARA does not have the 
authority nor will it be
given the authority by the agency heads that currently run their own 
kingdoms."

I'll just remind everyone that NARA does have the authority (if not the 
resources) to evaluate record keeping at the agencies and to issue reports.  For an 
example, see
http://www.fas.org/sgp/othergov/naracia.html which is a very interesting 
publicly posted NARA assessment from 2000 of records management at a well known 
agency.  As you glance through it, you can judge for yourselves whether 
subordinates within the agency could have issued the same report.

To take us back to Leslie's original posting and some of the followup messages
.  My point in sending all the messages(!!) about the Kissinger records, 
etc., was to illustrate the potentially vast differences in the environments in 
which records managers and archivists might work.  Larry wrote, ""One of the 
problems I've seen is if the individual who generated them doesn't see them as 
having an enduring value, then how is it the archivist is able to override 
that??"  Of course, ideally the individual generating the records, the records 
manager, and the archivist (if any) and the organization's lawyer (if necessary) 
would act in concert and in good faith to properly preserve the records 
required by law and/or for business needs and to dispose of the rest.

But I think as opportunities arise, we should remind RIM students and others 
just entering the field that there are going to be occasions and situations 
where it won't work that way!  Natch, we all bring our individual perspectives 
to these issues.  During the time that I worked at NARA, President Nixon's 
representatives in 1987 blocked us from releasing as governmental/historically 
significant some 42,000 documents.  The former President's lawyers claimed the 
documents were private, personal or privileged.  They had the right to challenge 
our disclosure decisions under several different categories of claims.) Under 
law, material that is personal and not governmental and historically 
significant is supposed to be withdrawn from NARA custody altogether and returned to 
Nixon.  

Disagreement over the status of over 42,000 documents obviously reflects very 
differing assessments not only of public access, but of retention status and 
enduring value.  For more on the eventual release to the public of the 
so-called "contested" Nixon records, see
http://listserv.muohio.edu/scripts/wa.exe?A2=ind9610d&L=archives&T=0&F=&S=&
P=4324
(please copy and paste the link if clicking it doesn't work--I didn't shrink 
the URL (sorry, Peter!!)) and 
 http://www.archives.gov/press/press-releases/1997/nr97-02.html .  

As you know, I once worked with the Nixon tapes and files.  After NARA 
released the contested files, I went back to the agency's research room and looked 
through some of them again.  The release of contested items showed that Nixon 
had regarded as "personal-returnable" a Haldeman note of a meeting on Vietnam 
negotiations that recorded the President's comment to Henry Kissinger, "get 
best deal let [President Nguyen Van] Thieu paddle his own canoe."  He also 
contested release of directives to "uncover Jewish cells" at the Bureau of Labor 
Statistics.  Nixon even blocked release of some notes on Watergate ("put it on 
Mitchell - we're protecting him adds up P is protecting John Mitchell.")   

Clearly, NARA's rejection of the Nixon claims against disclosure and release 
of the material illustrate the extent to which the creator of a record and 
archivists and/or records managers might disagree.  And that sometimes, in order 
to fulfill statutory mandates, archivists have to stand up and reject the 
claims of records creators.  Obviously, it's much easier for everyone when all the 
stakeholders are in agreement but it just doesn't always work that way.

If any of you know of any good published sources that discuss the ethical 
obligations of records managers, case studies that illustrate difficult issues of 
integrity that may arise, etc., please do post links to the List.  As a 
historian and former archivist, I know a fair amount about this from the archival 
side, but I definitely need to learn more about the RIM side.  In fact, that's 
one reason I joined this Listserv, while also sticking with my longtime 
subscription to the Archives Listserv.  

Maarja

  

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