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[W]hen so much information among the vast U.S. national-security apparatus is classified without good reason, it exacerbates a culture of secrecy that is vulnerable to abuse. There is little oversight, Goitein said, when it comes to determining whether a decision to classify something was the right one--while decisions not to classify something can lead to heavy penalties. Most cases of overclassification are the result of simple habit, convenience, or an overabundance of caution, but this helps to create a climate that enables the use of excessive secrecy to hide things that are politically problematic or to cover up wrongdoing. That's allegedly what happened with the July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, which put Trump on the path to an impeachment inquiry. "The system is set up to fail," Goitein told me. "It's based on skewed incentives and lax accountability, and that's why abuses like this become possible."

During the call, according to a reconstructed transcript later released by the White House, Trump pressed Zelensky to investigate discredited allegations surrounding Joe Biden and his elder son's work in Ukraine. This came as Trump withheld nearly $400 million in military aid. According to the whistle-blower complaint that brought the contents of the call to light, about a dozen U.S. officials were listening in on the phone conversation. (On Wednesday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo confirmed reports that he was one of them.) But the call took place behind a wall of government secrecy. The notes and transcripts from it, as is common practice with calls between the president and foreign leaders, were classified. Then, according to the complaint, White House officials, allegedly wise to the troubling nature of Trump's remarks, moved the record of the call to a special computer system typically reserved for military and intelligence matters so sensitive that they require a code word, to prevent it from leaking.

Revealing the scandal required the whistle-blower--reportedly a member of the CIA who was detailed to the White House--to go through a bureaucratic process that was vulnerable to interference by the executive branch.

This series of events might suggest that the system worked: In the end, the details of the call became public. But it also underlines the risk of the same predisposition toward secrecy that leads to overclassification. U.S. officials are used to having their dealings walled off from scrutiny--and to making sure that classified information doesn't see the light of day.

The problem of overclassification--and of a fetishization of secrecy more generally--spans administrations. While Trump's rants against leakers are well known, the Obama administration oversaw a much quieter crackdown on them, prosecuting a record number.

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