Attorney General suggests he may make secret Bush memos public John Byrne

Published: Tuesday February 3, 2009





Print This Email This Obama's freshly-confirmed Attorney General, Eric Holder, has opened the door to shedding light on a raft of clandestine legal memoranda issued in the name of the 'War on Terror' under President George W. Bush.



Holder told senators in written responses to questions before his confirmation that he would consider declassifying controversial White House legal memos from the Bush era if no support for their original classification could be found, according to transcripts provided by the Senate. Declassified briefs could then be made public.



A Justice Department spokesman declined to comment when asked directly about a new report detailing some three dozen secret memoranda issued by officials employed by President Bush. In secret memos, Bush's legal team outlined the defense of myriad controversial practices, such as the indefinite detention of enemy combatants, US policy on torture and the legality of domestic surveillance projects.



A chart created by the nonprofit reporting organization Pro Publica recently found that 40 of these memos remain secret, while just 12 have been made public. The ratio of private to public memos remains unparalleled by the standard of recent US presidents.



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Holder, who was confirmed by the Senate 75-21 on Monday, was responding to questions about " Secret Law " raised by civil liberties advocate, Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI), when he addressed the memos directly.



"I firmly believe that transparency is a key to good government," Holder said. "Openness allows the public to have faith that its government obeys the law. Public scrutiny also provides an important check against unpersuasive legal reasoning -- reasoning that is biased toward a particular conclusion."



Once the new Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Office of Legal Counsel is confirmed, I plan to instruct that official to review the OLCs policies relating to publication of its opinions with the [objective] of making its opinions available to the maximum extent consistent with sound practice and competing concerns, Holder wrote.



Asked about the abuse of classification, Holder added: "I will review significant pending cases in which Justice Department has invoked the state secrets privilege, and will work with leaders in other agencies and professionals at the Department of Justice to ensure that the United States invokes the state secrets privilege only in legally appropriate situations."



Holder's comments were first noted by Secrecy News ' Steven Aftergood.



