American Notes: Assassinations

After the House Select Committee on Assassinations concluded its 1979 investigation of the death of John F. Kennedy, its files were stored away in 848 cartons deep within the National Archives. Most were supposed to remain sealed there until the year 2009. But as a result of the fuss created by Oliver Stone's film JFK, researchers may be able to sift through the boxes much sooner. Ohio Congressman Louis Stokes, the Democrat who chaired the committee, pledged last week to push a House resolution lifting the 30-year secrecy rule.

The committee concurred with the Warren Commission's finding that the President was shot by Lee Harvey Oswald. But it also concluded that Kennedy's assassination was "probably" the result of a conspiracy because a controversial acoustic analysis of audiotapes from the shooting seemed to indicate that a second gunman had fired a shot at the President.

What would conspiracy theorists find if the files were opened? Not much that has not already been made public except for some classified documents that contain CIA and FBI sources and methods. "There's no smoking gun in there," scoffs G. Robert Blakey, the assassination committee's chief counsel.