Not available until 2009?
Posted: Wednesday, October 24, 2007 1:35 PM by Mark Murray
From NBC's Mark Murray
A few days ago, Newsweek's Michael Isikoff reported on the lack of access to Hillary Clinton's papers at the Clinton Presidential Library, which he said runs counter to her complaints about the Bush Administration's secrecy and her vow to bring a "return to transparency" to government. That article followed an earlier Los Angeles Times article, which noted that nearly 2 million pages of her documents as First Lady were locked up in the library -- and wouldn't be released until after the presidential election.
So perhaps it wasn't surprising when a group opposed to Clinton's election handed First Read a copy of a letter it received from the University of Arkansas Libraries' Special Collections, which said that the group's request -- made back in May 2007 -- for access to the library's Diane Blair papers wouldn't be made unavailable until 2009. In other words, not until after the presidential election.
"The Diane Blair Papers (MC 1004) in Special Collections at the University of Arkansas Libraries, Fayetteville, will be available in 2009," the letter reads. "We are unable to photocopy pages for you from the Draft Finding Aid of this unprocessed collection."
Who is Diane Blair?
She was a friend to both Bill and Hillary Clinton, and her husband was the chief counsel at Tyson Foods, who had infamously helped Hillary earn nearly $100,000 in commodity futures. Blair was also a researcher on the '92 Clinton campaign, and according to Carl Bernstein's recent book on Clinton, Blair took on the project of writing a book on the '92 campaign -- but the book was never written. Yet Bernstein got his hands on her papers. In his book, he writes: "In the aggregate, the single-spaced contents of the binders, knee-high, provide a developing portrait of Hillary as she became the chief strategist and sounding board of her husband's presidential campaign, and contemplated the kind of first lady she intended to be. Her overreaching is recorded, on the one hand, and on the other hand, her incomparable ability to channel the best of Bill Clinton into action."
Reached for comment, Andrea Cantrell, the head of research services at the university library's Special Collections, told First Read that the Blair papers aren't yet processed, and that such a delay isn't that uncommon -- due chiefly to a lack of manpower. "It is not at all unusual."
For example, she said, the library received the papers of former Sen. Dale Bumpers (D) back in August 2000, and those papers still aren't processed. By comparison, the Blair papers were given to the library last year, and will be available in 2009 -- but not in time for those who want to look at them before the presidential election.
