Roberts Papers Missing after White House Review

Papers Lost After Lawyers' Review
By R. Jeffrey Smith and Jo BeckerWashington Post Staff WritersWednesday, August 17, 2005; Page A04

A file folder containing papers from Supreme Court nominee John G. Roberts Jr.'s work on affirmative action more than 20 years ago disappeared from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library after its review by two lawyers from the White House and the Justice Department in July, according to officials at the library and the National Archives and Records Administration.

Archivists said the lawyers returned the file but it now cannot be located. No duplicates of the folder's contents were made before the lawyers' review. Although one of the lawyers has assisted in the Archives' attempt to reconstruct its contents from other files, officials have no way of independently verifying their effort was successful.

It is rare for the Archives to lose documents in its care and the agency has requested an investigation by its inspector general, said Sharon Fawcett, the assistant archivist for presidential libraries.

The lost file has also aroused some concern on Capitol Hill. Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (Vt.), the senior Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, wrote yesterday to R. Duke Blackwood, executive director of the Reagan Library, asking that he "continue to investigate thoroughly" the missing affirmative action file and "clarify the basis upon which you believe you have reconstructed that file." And Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) requested a Justice Department investigation because one of the agency's lawyers had seen the documents involved.

At issue is one of hundreds of files maintained by the Reagan Library in Simi Valley, Calif., where an estimated 55,000 pages of material from Roberts's tenure as White House associate counsel from 1982 to 1986 are archived. The library is managed by the Archives. >>>continued

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