Federal Presidential Libraries

Through the National Archives and Records Administration, the Federal Government currently operates and maintains nine presidential libraries, and will soon assume responsibility for a tenth facility.Inaugurated with the Presidential Libraries Act of 1955, these entities are privately constructed on behalf of a former President of the United States and, upon completion, are deeded to the Federal Government.Deposited within these edifices are papers, records, memorabilia, and artifacts of the former President, his family, and, oftentimes, his political associates.These materials are made accessible to the public in accordance with prevailing law concerning custody, national security, personal privacy, and other similar restrictions.Federal presidential libraries have been established for Herbert Hoover and each succeeding Chief Executive except Richard Nixon.A Nixon library and museum was built and dedicated, but the facility is privately operated.The George Bush presidential library is under construction and plans call for it to be subsequently deeded to the Federal Government.Since the enactment of the 1955 statute authorizing the creation of presidential libraries: at least two additional laws have further modified arrangements concerning these facilities.The Presidential Records Act of 1978 carefully defined "presidential records" and specified that all such materials created on or after January 20, 1981, were governed by its provisions.It effectively made presidential records Federal property which was to remain under the custody and control of the Archivist of the United States when each incumbent President left office.More recently, Congress enacted the Presidential Libraries Act of 1986, which set certain reporting requirements, architectural and design conditions, and fiscal limitations regarding presidential libraries, includingrequiring an operating endowment.However, portions of the endowment requirement pertaining to new presidential libraries or archival depositories were specifically made applicable "to any President who takes the oath of office as President for the first time on or after January 20, 1985."A George Bush presidential library will be the first such facility to be subject to all of these recent reform requirements.President Zachary Taylor not already scattered by descendants were also burned during the Civil War when the family plantation was put to the torch.Peculiarities surround the papers of some Presidents.After leaving office, President Ulysses S. Grant reportedly returned certain of the letters he had received from political friends and associates to their writers.Most of Chester A.Arthur's papers "disappeared."The documents of Warren G. Harding's presidency vanished for a time and were thought to have been destroyed by his widow.Some were acquired by the Library of Congress, but a quantity of them then turned up in Marion, Ohio: where certain materials remain under seal, the most sensitive items to be released in 2014.For over a century and a half, the papers of the President were regarded a s his personal property to be taken with him when he left office.However, as the Federal establishment began to grow, questions arose as to the propriety and wisdom of this practice.By the turn of the century, historians had become alarmed that papers were accidently destroyed, lost, and sometimes only selectively released for scrutiny.Archivists lamented omissions in the national governmental record which the situation created.Not only might entire files be carried from the White House, but presidential correspondence might be retrieved from departmental files.As it applied to government records, the concept of presidential papers knew no bounds.This aspect of the practice became particularly acute in the aftermath of the creation of the Executive Office of the President in 1939.Franklin D. Roosevelt established a panoply of emergency and wartime agencies within this domain, all of which served the President in immediate and direct capacities and all of which, therefore, could be considered producers of "presidential papers."The potential loss of the documentary materials of these entities, however, presented both a records management problem and an administrative continuity difficulty.5 THE FEDERAL PRESIDENTIAL L I B M YAddressing this situation, Franklin Roosevelt sought to return presidential papers to the public realm through a new type of institution-the presidential library.When F.D.R. advanced this concept in 1938, two prototype libraries were already in existence.In 1914, the State of Ohio completed the Rutherford B. Hayes Memorial Library in Fremont, Ohio.Built in fulfillment of obligations to receive the former Chief Executive's papers and memorabilia, the library contains 67,425 items and 293 volumes of historical material."hememorial, which also houses certain local and regional historical papers apart from those The bulk of the records of the temporary Executive Office agencies are, in fact, divided between the Franklin D. Roosevelt presidentiallibrary at Hyde Park, New York, and the National Archives and Records Administration in Washington, D. C.