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A Guide to his Papers in the Modern Political Papers Collections of the Indiana University Libraries

Finding aid prepared by Kate Cruikshank.

Summary Information

Repository
Modern Political Papers Collection, Indiana University Libraries
Herman B Wells Library E460
1320 E. Tenth St.
Bloomington, IN 47405-7000
Phone: 812-856-4601
Email: congpprs@indiana.edu
https://libraries.iub.edu/modern-political-papers

Creator
Hamilton, Lee

Collection No.
MPP 2

Extent
276 linear feet (220 cartons and 3 document boxes)

Language
Materials are in English.

Abstract
Consists of the papers of Congressman Lee Hamilton relating to his 34 years of service in the United States House of Representatives as Representative of the Ninth Congressional District of Indiana, including extensive files on Indiana projects and from his chairmanship of the Subcommittee on Europe and the Middle East of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs.

Access Restrictions

This collection is open for research, with the exception of copies of official records of the House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs, which under House Rule VII must be restricted until 30 years from date of creation. Opening dates for restricted files are indicated at the end of the listing for the Committee on Foreign Affairs series.

Usage Restrictions

Copyright restrictions may apply.

Constituent correspondence may be used only after signing an agreement to protect correspondent privacy.

Prior arrangement is necessary to use these materials, as they are stored offsite. Contact Kate Cruikshank, Political Papers Specialist, 812-856-4601, cruiksha@indiana.edu.

Photocopying and digital photography are possible with permission.

Biographical Note

Lee Herbert Hamilton was born April 20, 1931, in Daytona Beach, Florida, attended the public schools of Evansville, Indiana, excelling in basketball, and graduated from De Pauw University, 1952. He studied at Goethe University, Frankfurt am Main, Germany, in 1952 and 1953, and graduated from the Indiana University School of Law in 1956. He went into private practice in Columbus, Indiana, and became active in the Bartholomew County Young Democrats. He was elected as a Democrat to the Eighty-ninth and to the sixteen succeeding Congresses (January 3, 1965-January 3, 1999), combining intensive efforts toward development in his largely rural district with extensive engagement through his committee work in international affairs. Hamilton served on the Foreign Affairs Committee for his full congressional tenure, chairing its Subcommittee on Europe and the Middle East for over two decades, chairing also the Select Committee on Intelligence (99th Congress), the Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran (100th Congress), the Joint Economic Committee (101st Congress); and the Committee on Foreign Affairs (103rd Congress). His complete committee service record also includes the Post Office and Civil Service Committee and the Joint Committee on the Organization of Congress.

Deciding to retire in 1999, he worked with President Miles Brand of Indiana University to establish the Center on Congress, which he directed, and was appointed director and then also president of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, DC, which position he held until November 2011. He served as vice chair of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (9/11 Commission) from 2002-2004, as co-chair of the Iraq Study Group with James Baker in 2006, and continues to serve as a consultant on national security and international affairs both individually and as a member of various commissions.

Additional information about Lee Hamilton and his congressional papers is available on the Lee Hamilton pages of the Modern Political Papers website .

Scope and Content Note

The Lee H. Hamilton Congressional papers are a selection from the approximately 3500 cartons of records generated during his 34-year tenure in the House of Representatives. The contents of the collection, chosen by his staff, illustrate the multiple roles of a model Congressman, i.e. local representative and constituent advocate, represented in the Legislative and Constituent Services series; national legislator and consensus builder, reflected in the Legislative series; educator, evident in the Public Communications series; committee member, reflected in his impressive record of committee service but particularly in the Committee on Foreign Affairs series; and investigator, again evident in his committee service but with special emphasis in the series on the Iran-Contra investigation of 1987.

A major strength of the collection lies in its portrayal of Hamilton's consistently strong record of service to his constituents both in projects of many kinds throughout the 9th district and his emphasis on personalized responses to constituent correspondence that by 1989 was numbering close to 30,000 letters a year. He developed his positions on legislative issues in part through his substantive responses to those correspondents, which are to be found in the Legislative Mail and Issues Files subseries. The mechanisms through which that level of communication was maintained are evident in the Alphas and Form Letters subseries, the Schedule Files, and the Weekly Reports, all in the Office Administration series. The Schedule Files in the Office Administration series are a rich resource for his face-to-face contacts with constituents. The content of Hamilton's side of the dialogue is richly represented in his weekly Washington Reports newsletters, Mailings, and Speeches in the Public Communications series as well as in the Extensions of Remarks and Statements subseries of the Legislative series. The Washington Reports are available in digital form through this finding aid, as are his Foreign Affairs Newsletters.

Resources for studying constituent positions are likewise quite plentiful, particularly for the early 1970s, for which there are nearly 34 linear feet of letters on specific legislation as well as local, national, and international issues of concern. Letters on the possible impeachment of Nixon, the energy crisis, and such continuing issues as abortion and drugs are particularly abundant.

The Projects subseries of the Constituent Services series offers particular potential for research because of both its extent and because of the abundance of records in certain portions of the subseries. The threat of base closures hovered over nearly the full span of Hamilton's career, with the consequent economic displacement and environmental problems. The records for the Jefferson Proving Ground in particular (7.5 linear feet), as well as for the Bakalar Air Force Base, the Indiana Army Ammunition Plant, and the Naval Ordnance Station in Louisville, trace not only Hamilton's efforts but the mobilization of local initiatives to exert pressure on numerous parts of the federal bureaucracy in order to humanize the process and the ultimate disposition of those installations. Broader coverage is available in other portions of the Projects files, supplemented by the files on Indiana Projects and Issues from the 1980s, found in the Research-News Clippings 1979-1986 subseries of the Constituent Services series. The Projects subseries also offers abundant resources for researching the specific environmental issues associated with flood control, watersheds, Ohio River development and pollution, nuclear power, and the pollution of unexploded ordnance at the Jefferson Proving Ground. There are also abundant resources on the evolution of proposals for the Hoosier National Forest and the Muscatatuck Wildlife Refuge in the Wilderness records of the Projects subseries.

Another strength of the collection lies in its reflection of Hamilton's emphasis on the integrity of the institution of Congress and its constitutional role, to be found in his work with the Commission on Administrative Review, the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct, and the Joint Committee on the Organization of Congress, and throughout his career in his work with the Committee on Foreign Affairs, as he built the foundations for a more active congressional role in the formulation of foreign policy. The records relating to the Committee on Foreign Affairs are an additional strength of the collection and will become more so over time as they are opened. The photocopies of official correspondence and memoranda are governed by House of Representatives Rule VII, which restricts access to them until 30 years from date of creation. Also of interest are the files relating to the hearings of the House Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran (Iran-Contra), for which there is a daily record of journalistic coverage from the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Christian Science Monitor as well as hearings materials in both preliminary and printed form.

Arrangement/Organization

The collection is arranged into seven series: Constituent Services, Legislative, Office Administration, Political, Public Communications, Committee on Foreign Affairs, and Iran-Contra. All series are divided into subseries and in most cases subdivided into sections within those subseries. A complete folder list appears later in this guide, with informational notes on specific portions of the collection.

Separated Material

Books from the congressional office library of Lee Hamilton have been cataloged separately in the Lilly Library. They may be located by doing an advanced search in IUCAT, searching under "Hamilton, Lee" as the author and "former owner" in all fields, limiting the search to the Bloomington Auxiliary Library Facility and the Bloomington Lilly Library

Related Material

Digital images of photos graciously made available for digitization by Nancy (Mrs. Lee) Hamilton are accessible in the Lee Hamilton Collection in Image Collections Online at Indiana University.

Preferred Citation

[item and date], [folder], [Subseries, if any], [Series], Lee H. Hamilton Congressional Papers, Modern Political Papers Collection, Indiana University Libraries, Bloomington, Indiana.

• Indexing Terms

• The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in IUCAT, the IU Libraries' online catalog. Materials about related topics, persons or places can be found by searching the catalog using these terms.

• • Names
  • United States. Congress --Reform.
  • United States. Army. Corps of Engineers --Civil functions.
  • Marble Hill Nuclear Power Plant (Ind.).
  • Indiana Army Ammunition Plant (U.S.).
  • United States. Congress. House. Committee on Administrative Review.
  • United States. Congress. House. Committee on Foreign Affairs.
  • United States. Congress. House. Committee on International Relations.
  • United States. Congress. House. Committee on Post Office and Civil Service.
  • United States. Congress. House. Committee on Science, Space, and Technology.
  • United States. Congress. House. Committee on Standards of Official Conduct.
  • United States. Congress. House. Joint Committee on the Organization of Congress.
  • United States. Congress. House. Joint Economic Committee.
  • Hamilton, Lee --Correspondence.
  • Hamilton, Lee --Archives.
• • Topics
  • Legislators --Indiana --Archives.
  • Iran-Contra Affair, 1985-1990.
  • Federal aid to community development --Indiana.
  • Federal aid to education --Indiana.
  • Federal aid to community health services --Indiana.
  • Federal aid to energy development --Indiana.
  • Federal aid to health facilities --Indiana.
  • Federal aid to hospitals --Indiana.
  • Federal aid to housing --Indiana.
  • Federal aid to outdoor recreation --Indiana.
  • Federal aid to regional planning --Indiana.
  • Federal aid to transportation --Indiana.
  • Federal aid to water quality management --Indiana.
  • Federal aid to water resources development --Indiana.
  • Flood control --Indiana.
  • Hazardous wastes --Indiana.
  • Military base closures --Indiana.
  • Military base conversion --Indiana.
  • Military bases --Indiana.
  • Ordnance testing --Indiana.
  • Persian Gulf War, 1991.
  • Post office buildings --Indiana.
  • Proving grounds --Indiana.
  • Rural development --Indiana.
  • Unexploded ordnance --Indiana.
  • Wilderness areas --Indiana.
• • Places
  • Hoosier National Forest (Ind.).
  • Jefferson Proving Ground (Ind.).
  • Naval Ordnance Station Louisville (Ky.).
  • Muscatatuck National Wildlife Refuge (Ind.).
  • Bakalar Air Force Base (Ind.).

Administrative Information