Jack Anderson's family is up in arms over an FBI attempt to cull his papers for "classified" information before the archives are made public at GWU.

The muckraking journalist died earlier this year, leaving "some 200 boxes" to George Washington University's library. The boxes "could be a trove of information about state secrets, dirty dealings, political maneuverings, and old-fashioned investigative journalism, open for historians and up-and-coming reporters to see.

"But the government wants to see the documents before anyone else. Agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation have told university officials and members of the Anderson family that they want to go through the archive, and that agents will remove any item they deem confidential or top secret."

As Anderson's son says, he "would probably come out of his skin at the thought of the FBI going through his papers."

"They made it very clear on the front end that if they are looking through his papers and they come across documents that are stamped confidential or top secret, they would be duty bound to take those out of the collection," the son told the Chronicle of Higher Education.

GWU supports the family's position, but has so far mostly stayed out of the fight.