The Papers of the Presidents

Abstract

The National Archives S INCE the early days of the Republic, the papers accumulated by a Chief Executive of the United States have been considered his personal property.George Washington set the precedent in 1797 when he took with him into retirement at Mount Vernon all the correspondence and papers relating to his eight years in the Presidency.John Adams, on leaving the White House in 1801, followed Washington's example and sent his papers to his home in Quincy, Massachusetts.Prior to Franklin D. Roosevelt all the Presidents or their heirs had followed the precedent established by Washington and Adams.These records, mirroring vital phases of our social, economic, and political history, are basic source materials for the study of our national development.In some instances, unfortunately, these valuable records have been lost through neglect, fire, or willful destruction.It is the purpose of this compilation to trace in bare outline -a volume could be written on the subject -the fate of the Presidential papers. GEORGE WASHINGTONAll but a very small percentage of the extant papers of George Washington are in the Library of Congress. 1 Professor Samuel Eliot Morison, of Harvard, furnishes some interesting background information on this collection: 2 Jared Sparks, editor of the North American Review, was first of the tribe of nosy historians who go poking about in public and private papers for the real low-down on history.Around the fiftieth anniversary of American independence, Mr. Sparks observed that no proper history of the American Revolution had yet been written; and as a means to have it written -and also as means of legitimate profit to himself -he conceived the idea of publishing a generous selection of the letters and other writings of George Washington.The General's papers were still at Mount Vernon in the possession of his nephew, Bushrod Washington, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States.By making a flank approach on the Justice through Chief Justice Marshall the Yankee scholar obtained an agreement by virtue of which he, 1 Congressional Record, 76th Cong., 1st sess., p. 9040 (Washington, 1939).

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