The New Hampshire Historical Society has announced that David Souter is donating his personal and professional papers to the society. But don’t expect a peek any time soon. The retired Supreme Court justice has placed an extraordinarily long restriction on public access, barring anyone from viewing the material for 50 years. That’s a lengthier seal than any other justice has placed on papers in recent memory.
The unusually severe bar is both surprising and very Souter-esque. Souter is an avid historian, but he’s also an intensely private person, especially protective of the Court on which he served for 19 years. He may have decided his files were too sensitive to be made public while any of his colleagues and many of his law clerks were still alive. “I would have been surprised by anything under 25 years,” said University of Cambridge professor David Garrow, who has written extensively about the justice.
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