On April 8 the Bush Administration quietly pushed the current archivist, John Carlin, a Clinton appointee, to step down. To replace him, Bush will nominate Allen Weinstein, a historian who has been criticized for failing to abide by accepted scholarly standards of openness (more details will appear in an upcoming Nation profile).
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The surprise move to replace the archivist violates the spirit of a 1984 law that sought to depoliticize the office. The archivist, according to that bill, is not a political appointee who serves at the pleasure of the President, and his term is not tied to the term of the President, although the President can ask for his resignation. A House report in 1984 said Congress "expects" the nomination of a new archivist "will be achieved through consultation with recognized organizations of professional archivists and historians." There has been no such consultation.
Bush's move is part of a larger pattern of expanded White House secrecy, starting with its fight to conceal the names of members of the Cheney energy task force and continuing with the recent effort to prevent the 9/11 Commission from revealing such documents as the now-famous Presidential Daily Briefing of August 6, 2001. It's true that all Presidents want to control access to their papers, but it's the responsibility of the archivist to see that access is "free, open, equal, and nondiscriminatory," as the Statement on Standards of the American Historical Association puts it.
We are concerned about the sudden announcement on April 8, 2004, that the White House has nominated Allen Weinstein to become the next Archivist of the United States. Prior to the announcement, there was no consultation with professional organizations of archivists or historians. This is the first time since the National Archives and Records Administration was established as an independent agency that the process of nominating an Archivist of the United States has not been open for public discussion and input. We believe that Professor Weinstein must--through appropriate and public discussions and hearings--demonstrate his ability to meet the criteria that will qualify him to serve as Archivist of the United States.
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