Word: duking
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...president has had some trouble persuading any large institution to become the repository for his official papers. He has finally settled on Duke University, his law school alma mater (class of '36), but a number of professors, alumni and students have objected to Duke's willingness to accept the trove. They say the library will commemorate a criminal, a liar, a charlatan and a man who disgraced his country. This may be true, but given the right circumstances, Nixon's opponents should reevaluate their crusade and welcome the papers to the Durham, N.C., campus...
...Duke should demand unconditional control of the records and refuse to build a monument to the disgraced former president. Nixon deserves no museum and no shrine--and certainly no opening ceremonies celebrating his legacy. But no one should underestimate the importance and value of his presidential papers. Nixon, for better or (more likely) for worse, was a major political figure of the 20th century and his presidency remains an important factor in all our lives. Historians, journalists and interested citizens of the present and future will find his papers invaluable for understanding the use and abuse of power...
...meeting in New York City in late July, Sanford broached the subject to Nixon. Duke would provide the land; friends of the ex-President would raise the money; and the mountain of documents, as mandated by federal law, would be tended by punctilious national archivists. Back in Durham, Sanford quietly lobbied for the proposal among top university administrators. Six days after the New York meeting, Nixon's attorney Stan Mortenson turned up at Duke, conveying a sense of "urgency" and asking whether there was any opposition...
There was, but it had not yet surfaced. Students and faculty were on vacation. On Aug. 18, when Sanford sent a letter explaining the proposal to 65,000 Duke alumni, a terrible uproar arose. Professors, pro and con, outdid themselves with historical allusions. The Nixon Library was likened to a Trojan horse ("I fear Government officials bearing gifts") and an archival "Treasure of the Sierra Madre" ("We will not possess it. It will possess us"). Wits wondered if Duke could call it the Watergate Memorial Library. On Aug. 19 Trustee Emeritus Charles Murphy, a Washington lawyer who helped raise money...
After a debate last Thursday, the academic council voted 35 to 34 against the proposal. Some hoped for a compromise in which the Nixon papers would become part of Duke's library, without a special edifice bearing the Nixon name. Explained Historian Watson: "We'd all love to have Benedict Arnold's papers, but we don't want a Benedict Arnold building on campus...