Dean Trevor Morrison, Eric M. and Laurie B. Roth Professor of Law, has been appointed by President Barack Obama as chairperson of the Public Interest Declassification Board (PIDB), an advisory committee established by Congress to help facilitate access to the record of significant US national security decisions and activities.
The PIDB provides recommendations to the president and other executive-branch officials concerning the systematic identification, collection, declassification review, and release of declassified materials; policies stemming from executive orders related to the classification and declassification of national security information; and Congressional requests regarding declassification of specific records. The board also promotes maximal public access to a “thorough, accurate, and reliable documentary record” of national security activities in order to support both Congress’s oversight and legislative functions and the executive branch’s policymaking role, respond to public interest in national security, and allow for historical analysis and new avenues of historical study.
Morrison, an expert on the executive branch’s practice of constitutional law, previously served in the Obama administration as associate counsel to the president. His earlier government service includes his work as a Bristow Fellow in the Justice Department’s Office of the Solicitor General and as an attorney-advisor in the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel.
Posted June 28, 2016