Not Our Fault this Time!

The History News Network asked historian and former Nixon Project tapes archivist Maarja Krusten to explore why all the Nixon White House tapes haven't yet been opened. Though the reasons for the delay remain murky, her analysis makes clear that she doesn't believe the cause is the Nixon family, estate, or Foundation. She concludes:

After 2003, it should have taken 3 to 3-1/2 years to re-screen the remaining chronological segments. I had expected NARA to finish tape releases by the end of 2007 (or by the mid- to late 1990s, had it proceeded with plans formulated by officials in the 1980s). Instead, 32 years after I packed up tape reels in the White House, historians still await access to conversations from 1973.