Governors can leave a significant mark on New Hampshire. But they don’t have to pass on much record of it when they leave office.
There’s no state law that mandates governors turn over all emails to the state archives, or even some. It means the state’s record keepers have a patch-work when it comes to the written record of New Hampshire’s former leaders.
Former Gov. Maggie Hassan said she would hand over copies of her major speeches to the state archives. As for the troves of emails her staff generated over her last four years in office?
“The governor’s office may have retained certain information that was communicated via email for the office archives,” said spokesman Aaron Jacobs. Well, that’s revealing.
Like all outgoing workers, Hassan and her staffer’s email accounts were deleted when they left state service. Their electronic communications will be kept on backup tapes for a year before being purged, in line with normal retention schedules, said the state’s information technology commissioner. After that, any unsaved emails will be gone from the record.
The state did pass a vague requirement in 2010 that governors preserve some record of their time in the corner office. But it gives broad discretion to governors to decide what and how much they turn over.
The law requires the head of New Hampshire donate a “selection of official papers and records to the state” within a year of leaving office. The documents can be placed in a New Hampshire depository selected by the governor, meaning they could be kept at the University of New Hampshire, or another state institution.
The problem is, under the law, the required selection of records could include as much as all emails ever sent, or as little as a few proclamations.
The inconsistency is visible at the state archives building, off South Fruit Street in Concord.
On the shelf there is an empty document box with Craig Benson’s name on it, according to archivist Brian Burford. The Republican didn’t leave behind any personal correspondence or documents after his single term in the corner office.
“I am looking forward to somehow, sometime having somebody come in and say ‘I got this thing I got from Craig Benson’, or ‘I saved this from Craig Benson’s administration,’ ” Burford said. Who can grant the man’s wish?
Some items governors hand over are of questionable value to the public record. Democratic Gov. Jeanne Shaheen left behind a TNT plunger, Burford said.
“She apparently was asked to push the plunger and blow something up. I don’t know exactly what it was,” Burford said. “And I am not really sure what it documents of the time period, what does it say about our society or the issues our society faced. But on the other hand it is something she apparently left, and felt the public should have.”
The state archives doesn’t even have a complete record of all the executive orders various governors have enacted during their terms in office. “I hope that some of the agencies are preserving them, but I have no way of knowing,” Burford said.
What’s more, the archives doesn’t really have a way to keep emails should they be passed on. It doesn’t have a digital preservation program. “We just don’t have the budget,” he said.
Not all is lost. Some governors have left quite a document haul. The state’s first, Meshech Weare, left thousands of personal papers, including letters he wrote about his own personal tragedies and triumphs. Meldrim Thomson left probably 100 boxes behind at the state archives, Burford said. Many are letters from constituents, like one writing in support of the nuclear power plant at Seabrook.
The biggest deterrent to the donations is, what else, politics.
“If they donate records to the archives, and the records are public,” Burford said, “those records could be mined by their political enemies and distorted.” That’s not the legacy a governor would want.
Chris Sununu has only been governor four days, but he’s already changing things up from the Maggie Hassan years.
For one, he delivered an inaugural address from a set of notes.
Hassan always used prepared remarks for major speeches and read them almost verbatim. Her office would usually release an embargoed copy of the script ahead of time, so the press could follow along during her delivery.
The Sununu camp took a decidedly different approach. Since the Republican used only notes, his office couldn’t release any advanced excerpts from the address. So instead, his spokesman issued only a brief sentence setting vague expectations for the address ahead of time.
Speaking from notes gives Sununu a less scripted and robotic feel than Hassan. But his off-the-cuff approach can get him into trouble, like it has in the past.
Before the recent election, Sununu alleged Democrats were bussing in voters “all over the place.” Days later, after his comments were circulated online, he walked the statement back, calling it a “figure of speech.”
House Speaker Shawn Jasper kicked off the new session with a touch of over-confidence in his ability to control the Republican caucus.
Two of the major rule changes he endorsed – requiring a dress code and eliminating the child and family law committee – went down hard on the first session day last week, when some members of his own party joined Democrats to defeat them.
Though not major losses for Jasper, it’s a good reminder that Republicans in the chamber are ready and willing to buck his leadership.
Chris Sununu’s first public correspondence as governor began with a typo. Several actually.
A letter he sent Friday directing state agencies to put a hold on new regulations misspelled the two lawmakers’ names in charge of overseeing that process.
Sen. John Reagan’s last name was missing the first “a” and his first name was lacking an “h.” Rep. Carol McGuire’s first name got an extra “e.”