The family of Dale Bumpers has asked the University of Arkansas library to temporarily remove some journal entries critical of former President Bill Clinton and his wife that are attributed to the former governor and U.S. senator.
Mother Jones magazine this week reported that the typewritten diaries contain entries in which Bumpers is critical of Clinton, also a former Arkansas governor, and Hillary Rodham Clinton. Bumpers' son, Brent, told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette in a story Thursday that he wasn't aware his father kept a diary.
"There's no way under the sun," Bumpers told the newspaper. "First, Dad doesn't type. There's no way he has even dictated a diary. Nobody has ever heard of him keeping anything close to a diary."
Brent Bumpers said his father admired the Clintons and that the typewritten entries seem out-of-character for his father. He wants to review the documents and asked the school to withhold access to part of the Bumpers collection. Just weeks after leaving the Senate in 1999, Bumpers returned to the chamber to present an eloquent defense of Clinton at his impeachment trial. Clinton was acquitted.
"The files with the diary entries have been pulled at the family's request to give them the opportunity to review those materials," said university spokeswoman Lara Jacobs. She said that while the school owns the papers, the family retains the copyright. It agreed to remove the papers, at least temporarily, to be "sensitive and respectful" toward the family, she said.
The newspaper said it appeared the material was gathered by a Bumpers' office worker named "Jo." A 1974 article in the Northwest Arkansas Times said a woman named Jo Nobles had joined Bumpers' office. A health care worker at Nobles' home said Wednesday that Nobles was elderly and wouldn't be available to comment.
Dale Bumpers is 89. His son told the newspaper in a story published Wednesday that his father couldn't remember the diaries.
According to Mother Jones, 1982 diary entries refer to Bill Clinton as a "tragic figure" and the couple as "manic obsessive" and "insensitive."
