It's said to be a memorandum sent Sept. 2 from the Bush administration to Gov. Kathleen Blanco of Louisiana spelling out the legal justification that the president would use for invoking the Insurrection Act, as it nears its 200th anniversary, and federalizing law enforcement in New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.

Blanco balked and Bush did not proceed with the plan. Gov. Haley Barbour of Mississippi was no keener on the option for his state. If Bush had gone ahead in the face of their opposition, it would have been the first time since the civil rights era that a president would have so acted in the face of gubernatorial objection.

That it didn't happen does not dispose of the issue. For Bush and his advisers have in essence already gone beyond the prospect of momentary invocation of the Insurrection Act, as dramatic as that would have been. They are suggesting a more regularized manner for involving military personnel in response to natural disasters, including, it seems clear, in law enforcement functions. Some in Congress have indicated they are prepared to at least take up the issue.

Therefore, Bush's reasoning on the Insurrection Act as it might have applied to New Orleans would be interesting to read and dissect.

Given the latest reports about how officials and news reports seem to have overstated the lawlessness in New Orleans, it would be interesting to see to what extent Bush's case rested on any exaggerated claims.

And besides, it's simply an important document that should be made public.

But, at the moment, at least, it's not in the interest of the White House or Blanco's office to rehash what was but one moment in an unpleasant set-to.

That doesn't surprise Peter Raven-Hansen, a specialist in national security law at George Washington University Law School. Secrecy in such matters is the rule, he said. Congress may have more luck as it examines any changes in the Insurrection Act of 1807 or the Posse Commitatus Act of 1878, which further restricted the use of military in civilian law enforcement.

This Insurrection Act, as the law's short title suggests, allows the president to use federal troops to prevent or subdue insurrection.

The act was most recently invoked during the 1992 rioting in Los Angeles following the acquittal of police officers in the beating of Rodney King. Federal assistance in law enforcement was sought by Gov. Pete Wilson of California and approved by President George H.W. Bush.

Because the situation in New Orleans was not an insurrection, at least in the classic sense of the word, it would be interesting to see Bush's reasoning, as expressed in the memo to Blanco.

The main opening for getting a look at the document, Raven-Hansen said, is if congressional committees ask for it while reviewing proposals to enhance the military role in responding to natural disasters.

Congress should ask for the memo on its way to making no major changes. The military is too simple an answer, and the wrong one.

"I don't think there are law problems here," said William C. Banks of Syracuse University, one of the leading thinkers on national security law. "There are leadership problems and there are implementation problems."

Katrina so flummoxed public officials, from the president on down, that they are grasping. Maybe, in their muddle, they are confusing what they want with who can deliver it. What they want is military-like order and deployment.

A friend who has dealt with national security issues for several decades said that he once had to review the job that the Federal Emergency Management Agency was supposed to do. "Who should run that?" he asked rhetorically. "It screamed out for a four-star, a retired general or admiral. Someone who had deployed significant forces and marshaled materiel for most of their life."

Organizational talent. That's what the military model can bring to disasters.

In fact, as Richard A. Clarke, the former National Security Council official, suggests in the latest Atlantic magazine, that's what was done a year ago, as the Bush administration, along with Florida, braced for Hurricane Frances.

"Of course, " Clark writes, "the circumstances then were very special: it was two months before the presidential election ... . The president himself passed out water bottles to Floridians driven from their home."

Clarke also remarks:

"What is surprising, though, is that performing to this standard should be the exception for governmental departments whose raison d'être is high performance at times of crisis."

That does not mean calling in the military so much as performing like the military should and usually does.

Hines is a Houston Chronicle columnist based in Washington, D.C.