Transfer of Nixon Papers Faces Delay

The transfer of Richard Nixon’s presidential papers and tapes to his library in Yorba Linda could be delayed because the federal budget includes no money to move or house them.

Officials at the Richard Nixon Library & Birthplace had hoped to begin receiving the material, along with federal staff members to oversee it, later this year. A $3-million request by the National Archives and Records Administration, however, wasn’t included in President Bush’s 2006 budget request to Congress this month.

Rep. Gary Miller, (R-Diamond Bar), said he would ask Congress to fund the move and for an additional $4 million to construct a building to house the materials on the library grounds. The papers and tapes will remain in the control of federal officials.

Miller said he had support from House Appropriations Committee Chairman Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-Redlands).

“Thirty years have lapsed since President Nixon left the White House,” Miller said Friday. “It is time to bring these historical documents home to California.”

The issue of how to handle Nixon’s collection has been complicated by the library’s unique nature.

It is the only privately run presidential library, and holds only the pre- and post-presidential papers of the 37th president, who in 1974 became the only chief executive to resign.

Nixon’s presidential materials, including 46 million pages of records, 30,000 gifts and 3,700 hours of recordings, have been stored at a National Archives facility in Maryland. Congress, fearful that Nixon would destroy materials, passed a law after he resigned giving the government possession of them. The law was changed last year to allow the papers to be transferred to the library but remain under government control.

Library supporters said they asked Miller for help with construction funding but believed that the Nixon papers should be managed together. The $4-million request would include money for a 10,000 square-foot building in the library’s west parking lot where National Archive employees would continue to process, preserve and display the materials.

The library’s current collection and the archives material eventually could all be overseen by the National Archives, said John Taylor, executive director of the Nixon Foundation. “It’s in the long-term interest of history to be a unitary collection overseen by the National Archives,” he said.

The new building is needed to hold the material, which will not fit in the current library, he said. The most important funding, however, is for archive staffing in next year’s budget to begin the transfer of the materials, he said.

Without the $3 million, the transfer would stall, Taylor said. “We understand there are a lot of constraints on the budget, but we have a lot of momentum,” he said.

Sharon Fawcett, assistant archivist for presidential libraries with the National Archives, said it would be “very difficult” to find enough funds to accommodate moving and housing the papers in Yorba Linda without congressional help.

Adding Nixon’s presidential papers is seen as critical for the library to gain legitimacy as a research center on a par with the 11 other presidential libraries.

The others were built with private funds and are run by independent foundations, as is Nixon’s library, but the National Archives controls the collections. The facilities house the materials of every president since Herbert Hoover.

Some critics have urged the government to keep the Nixon presidential materials separate, fearful that the library, run by friends and supporters of the late president, would attempt to sugarcoat the legacy of the only president to resign, something the library has vigorously denied.

Miller said he would ask Congress to include the library as an official part of the Presidential Library System.

Discussions will begin next month on that request, Taylor said. Library officials hope to fashion an arrangement based on the relationship between the archives and the Clinton Library Foundation, where portions of the facility house historic materials and portions are privately run to raise funds for the library.

The goal is to have a signed agreement with the archives by summer, Taylor said.

Of the 46 million pages of Nixon presidential documents, just 7 million pages have been processed and made public.

After Congress sequestered the collection, Nixon sued, arguing that the government had seized his private property. The National Archives agreed three years ago to pay Nixon’s estate $18 million to settle the claim.

*

Associated Press contributed to this story.