ASHINGTON, Dec. 3 — Although Vincent W. Foster Jr., the Clinton administration's deputy White House counsel, killed himself more than 10 years ago, the controversy provoked by his death has yet to run its course. The Supreme Court heard arguments on Wednesday on whether the Freedom of Information Act obliges the government to make public the graphic photographs that the police took of the death scene in Fort Marcy Park in McLean, Va.

The question was whether the release of the photographs, sought by a California lawyer who questions the official conclusion that the death was a suicide, would be an unwarranted invasion of the privacy of Mr. Foster's surviving family members.

While the Freedom of Information Act broadly requires the disclosure of government records, it has an exemption for law enforcement records that "could reasonably be expected to constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy."

The federal appeals court in San Francisco held that the exemption did not cover four of the photographs and that they should be released. The government, joined by Mr. Foster's widow and sister, appealed to the Supreme Court. The appeal presented two questions, whether survivors can claim any privacy right under the exemption and, if so, how courts should balance personal privacy with public interest in monitoring government behavior.

The lawyer seeking the photos, Allan J. Favish, argued his own case. Mr. Favish said the court had made clear in earlier Freedom of Information Act cases that privacy meant no more than "the right to control information about yourself." Information about other people, even painful information about close relatives, did not qualify for the exemption, he said, adding that if Congress wanted to write a broader privacy exemption, it was free to do so.

Justice Stephen G. Breyer objected. "For thousands of years," Justice Breyer said, "respect for the dead, respect for survivors, has run through every religious tradition. Why couldn't we assume that Congress intended to recognize something so deep in human nature?"

The Foster family's lawyer, James Hamilton, said, "After 10 years, it's time to give this family some peace."

Their desire was "to be free from seeing these photographs on television and in grocery store tabloids" and from having to answer more questions, he said.

Five years ago, Mr. Hamilton argued and won another Supreme Court case that involved Mr. Foster. The court rejected an effort by Kenneth W. Starr, the independent counsel, to obtain Mr. Hamilton's notes of a meeting with Mr. Foster nine days before the suicide. The justices said the lawyer-client privilege survived the client's death.

Patricia A. Millett, an assistant solicitor general who argued for the government, told the court that the purpose of the Freedom of Information Act was "not maximum disclosure, but responsible disclosure." Ms. Millett said applying the privacy exemption required a balancing test in which the person requesting the information should have to demonstrate "clear independent evidence of government misconduct" and not simply "unsubstantiated allegations."

Mr. Favish has maintained, and repeated in court, that the photographs would demonstrate inconsistencies in the official reports of the death and show that the government had been negligent in determining what really happened.

Justice Antonin Scalia, for one, was not impressed.

"You've just demonstrated some foot faults," Justice Scalia told Mr. Favish. "Who cares?"

There are larger implications to the case, Office of Independent Counsel v. Favish, No. 02-954. Although the lower courts have all agreed that survivors can assert a privacy claim, they have disagreed on how to evaluate the public interest side.