“It’s Late”: How FRUS Volume Organization Teaches History (and Makes a Massive Backlog)

Abstract

Any archivist who works with new acquisitions must be comfortable
with a backlog, but the Foreign Relations of the United
States series seems to have pushed that idea to its limit. Originally
conceived in 1861 as a contemporary document collection,
designed to increase public awareness of international
affairs and support government transparency, the Foreign Relations
(FRUS) archive currently wades through a twenty-fiveyear
pile-up. Their most recent chronological publication covers
the end of the Clinton administration in 2000. In 2025,
they plan to release volumes to wrap up the 1977–1980 Carter
administration.1