Restrictions to Access

This collection contains additional materials that are not processed and are currently not available to researchers. For information about access to these materials, contact Research and Instructional Services staff. Please be advised that preparing unprocessed materials for access can be a lengthy process.

Copyright Notice

Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item], in the John L. Sanders Papers #4858, Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Acquisitions Information

Received from John L. Sanders of Chapel Hill, N.C., in December 1996 (Acc. 96200), May 1998 (Acc. 98130), January 1999 (Acc. 98285), September 1999 (Acc. 98449, 98457, 98459), January 2000 (Acc. 98536), March 2002 (Acc. 99734), and June 2002 (Acc. 99273), August 2006 (Acc. 100477), June 2007 (Acc. 100692), September 2019 (Acc. 103703).

Sensitive Materials Statement

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations, the North Carolina Public Records Act (N.C.G.S. § 132 1 et seq.), and Article 7 of the North Carolina State Personnel Act (Privacy of State Employee Personnel Records, N.C.G.S. § 126-22 et seq.). Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill assumes no responsibility.

Processed by: Manuscripts Department Staff, January 1998 with subsequent additions

Encoded by: Roslyn Holdzkom, August 2002

Revisions by: Jaime L. Margalotti, June 2004; Roslyn Holdzkom, August 2006; Nancy Kaiser, October 2019

Since August 2017, we have added ethnic and racial identities for individuals and families represented in collections. To determine identity, we rely on self-identification; other information supplied to the repository by collection creators or sources; public records, press accounts, and secondary sources; and contextual information in the collection materials. Omissions of ethnic and racial identities in finding aids created or updated after August 2017 are an indication of insufficient information to make an educated guess or an individual's preference for identity information to be excluded from description. When we have misidentified, please let us know at wilsonlibrary@unc.edu.

Boxes 14 and 15 (materials relating to the University Buildings and Grounds Committee of The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 1984-1991) have been transferred to the University Archives, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.

The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.

Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.

• Apportionment (Election law)--North Carolina.
• College teachers--Retirement--North Carolina.
• College teachers--Tenure--North Carolina.
• Community colleges--North Carolina--History.
• Edenton (N.C.)--History.
• Education, Higher--North Carolina--History--20th century.
• Historical Society of North Carolina.
• Kellenberger Historical Foundation.
• Morehead Planetarium.
• North Carolina Bar Association.
• North Carolina--Politics and government--20th century.
• North Carolina--Tryon Palace Commission.
• Preservation North Carolina.
• Research Triangle Foundation.
• Research Triangle Park (N.C.)--History.
• Sanders, John L.
• Universities and colleges--North Carolina--History--20th century.
• University of North Carolina (System)--History.
• University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill--Centennial celebrations, etc.
• University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill--Faculty--History--20th century.
• University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill--History--20th century.
• University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Institute of Government.

John L. Sanders was born in Four Oaks, N.C., on 30 June 1927. He attended North Carolina State College in 1944-1945 and again in 1947 after serving on active duty in the United States Naval Reserve in 1945-1946. He then transferred to The University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill where he was elected student body president and earned his A.B. in history in 1950. After pursuing a year of graduate study in history at The University of North Carolina, Sanders entered The University of North Carolina law school in 1951. He served as associate editor of the North Carolina Law Review. He received his J.D. in 1954. Sanders spent the next year as a law clerk to Chief Judge John J. Parker of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, and in 1955 he became an associate at Manning & Fulton, a Raleigh law firm.

In 1956, Sanders returned to The University of North Carolina as an instructor and assistant director of the Institute of Government, the largest university-based state and local government training and research organization in the United States. The Institute of Government was founded in 1931 to provide training, consulting, and research activities for North Carolina's state and local governments. Through his affiliation with the Institute, Sanders became heavily involved in research and advisory roles to government. From 1957 to 1960, he was in charge of research for the Reorganization of State Government Commission. In 1961-1962, Sanders was on leave from the Institute of Government in order to serve as full-time secretary to Governor Terry Sanford's Commission on Education Beyond the High School, whose recommendations led to the creation of a statewide system of community colleges and the development of schools which later became part of The University of North Carolina. He also assisted North Carolina Constitutional Commission and the North Carolina State Constitution Study Commission. In 1965-1966, Sanders was advisor to the General Assembly which reapportioned itself and redrew congressional districts.

Sanders help found the State Capitol Foundation, an organization devoted to restoring the North Carolina capitol building, and served as its president between 1976 and 1991. His love of architecture dated from his youth; Sanders had planned to study architecture while at North Carolina State.

As his involvement in state government deepened, Sanders's academic career also advanced. Sanders was named assistant professor of public law and government in 1957 and full professor in 1965. Sanders became the director of the Institute of Government in 1962 and he continued in that position until 1973, when he was appointed vice president for planning for The University of North Carolina. In that position, he helped to draft the University's first long-range plan. Sanders resumed the directorship of the Institute of Government in 1979 and held it until 1992. Among other activities during his university career, Sanders served as chairman of University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's Buildings and Grounds Committee (1984-1994), president of the Faculty Assembly, member of The University of North Carolina Bicentennial Observance Planning Committee, and member of The University of North Carolina Press Board of Governors. He retired from the faculty in 1994.

Papers of John L. Sanders concern the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and North Carolina politics, business, and history. Topics include the North Carolina State Constitution, the reapportionment of the North Carolina General Assembly and the redistricting of its congressional districts, the restructuring of the state's community college system, the revision of tenure standards and the retirement age for University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill professors, and the Research Triangle Foundation and the development of Research Triangle Park, N.C. There are also materials relating to the North Carolina Bar Association; the Kellenberger Historical Foundation; the Tryon Palace Commission and other historic preservation work in Edenton, N.C.; the Historical Society of North Carolina; and the Historic Preservation Foundation (Preservation North Carolina). Also included are materials relating to Sanders's service at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill on the Bicentennial Observance Planning Committee, the Chancellor's Advisory Committee on Historic Properties, the Morehead Planetarium Task Force, and the Committee on the University and Public Service, and his time as a student at the University of North Carolina.