A Reporter's Last Battle

The clash between Anderson's family and the FBI is the latest example of the Bush Administration's post-9/11 push to crack down on leaks of sensitive information. A CIA official was fired last week because the agency says she leaked information to the press about secret CIA prisons for alleged terrorists; at the same time, the FBI is continuing its probe into who released details about an undercover domestic eavesdropping program run by the National Security Agency. Last month the National Archives halted an effort by the U.S. intelligence community to make thousands of declassified documents secret once again. To Tom Blanton, head of the G.W.U.-affiliated National Security Archive, which monitors government secrecy, the FBI's request to scrub Anderson's files "looks like another front in the government-wide effort to squash dissent."

For its part, the FBI says the law is clear. "Nobody is protected from having in their possession a classified document," says Persichini. When asked if the Anderson family could be criminally prosecuted for possession of the files they inherited, Persichini replied, "At this point, we haven't gone down that route." The Anderson family is relishing the tug-of-war with the powerful agency. "It almost seems like the good old days," Kevin Anderson says. "I wish Dad were around to enjoy it."