Celebrating the Fiftieth Anniversary of the 1974 Amendments to the Freedom of Information Act and Remembering its Conception: A Personal Odyssey

Abstract

November 21, 2024, marked the fiftieth anniversary of enactment of the 1974 Amendments to the Freedom of Information Act. That legislation has been described as putting teeth in a toothless FOIA and providing the model for subsequently adopted or updated state and foreign right-to-information laws. I was present at its creation and heavily involved in the drafting of that impactful legislation. This is not intended as a legal analysis or even a comprehensive description of the 1974 FOIA amendments; it is a description of how that legislation came to be, as seen through my eyes.

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