Washington ? A troubled Supreme Court considered Wednesday whether government photographs of dead bodies should be kept private, in an emotional revival of a 10-year-old debate over the death of a White House lawyer.

Multiple investigations determined that a depressed Vincent Foster shot himself in the head, but California attorney Allan Favish and some others say he may have been murdered as part of a cover-up by the Clinton administration.

Favish’s pursuit of 10 death scene pictures, opposed by the government and Foster’s family, has raised a question for the justices: Can the government keep some records from the public to protect the privacy of survivors?

Bush administration attorney Patricia Millett said government files were packed with sensitive information — autopsy photographs of U.S. soldiers killed overseas and pictures of unidentified remains from the Sept. 11 attacks, for example. Releasing them would be irresponsible, she said, unless someone has clear proof of government wrongdoing.

Favish, known as a Clinton antagonist, told the court that the Freedom of Information Act did not give any special privacy rights to relatives.

He is backed by media groups, which say the government is trying to get a ruling that would keep too much information off-limits and hurt journalists trying to uncover wrongdoing and abuse in federal agencies.

Favish said it was clear that officials made mistakes in declaring the death a suicide. “I think the government can no longer be trusted to filter the raw evidence to the public in this case,” he said.