In a spare ruling, U.S. District Court Judge Colleen Kolar-Kotelly invalidated part of President Bush's 2001 "Executive Order" which allowed former presidents and vice-presidents to review executive records before release under the Freedom of Information Act.
Judge Kolar-Kotelly ruled that Bush's "executive order" was, "arbitrary, capricious, created an abuse of discretion, and was not in accordance with law".
In sum, Bush's action effectively eliminated the National Archives' right (by Law) to make the final determination in respect to the release of presidential records.
In view of the Judge's ruling, the National Archives were ordered not to withold any more documents based on that section of the executive order in the future.
However, it should be noted that issues remain unsettled because of the limited scope of the decision.
For example, Judge Kollar-Kotelly failed to answer the legal question of whether George W. Bush may rightly claim the authority to hand over publication rights of presidential papers to the heirs of former presidents and former vice presidents.
National Security Archive General Counsel Meredith Fuchs emphasized to reporters,
“The court was enforcing procedural standards, but avoided the hard questions about the role former presidents, former vice presidents, and their heirs can play when it comes to disclosure of presidential records.”
So, there may be another round of legal proceedings in the future - in respect to the issue of Bush's papers, at least.
However, in the final analysis the whole matter may be a foregone conclusion.
The Presidential Records Act of 1978 requires former presidents to open their White House records to the public within 12 years of leaving office.
Hopefully, they won't vanish into thin air, as documents are want to do in this administration, and others in the past, for some inexplicable reason.
No comments:
Post a Comment