Typed letter, signed ("Bob"), as Attorney General, to Cyrus Vance, concerning his participation in an oral history program on the Kennedy administration.
Washington, D.C: March 5, 1964.
Price: $1,250.00
About the item
2pp. Office of the Attorney General letterhead. Inked stamps of the Office of the Secretary of Defense. 4to. Usual folds.
Item #320217
"As you know, we are planning an oral history program on the Kennedy administration -- i.e. a systematic effort to interview President Kennedy's colleagues and contemporaries about issues and decisions of the Administration. Such a program is unprecedented in American history. Its significance can be easily grasped when one considers the treasures which would have been available to historians if similar programs had been carried through for earlier Presidents -- Jefferson or Lincon or Wilson or F.D.R. You are obviously one of the persons who ought to be interviewed in order to get a full record of the Administration, its policies and achievements ..."
Vance served under Kennedy as the Secretary of the Army and General Counsel of the Department of Defense. Interviewed for the oral history project on August 3, 1964, much of his account concerns the "Oxford crisis", i.e. the riots surrounding the enrollment of James Meredith to the University of Mississippi and Kennedy's decision to use armed forces to maintain order in Oxford.
The JFK Presidential Library began conducting oral history interviews in 1964. The full transcript of Vance's interview accompanies this item.
