You believe that because it fits your view of Harvard but there is no evidence that is what happened. In fact Harvard disputes the story of the offer and appraisal.
This man is a junk dealer. He doesn't own the house in which the papers were found. He was hired to clean out the house, found the trunk, took the papers he thought might have value and left the rest of the documents and the trunk behind. You might say he stole the documents - although I don't know what his contract is with the owner of the junk company or the owner of the house.
Harvard made an offer - according to them significantly higher - which is more than Howard University did where Greener worked for a while. South Carolina did cough up some money where Greener worked before his job ended there too. Why didn't they buy the rest of the papers? Probably because they aren't worth $75,000 as claimed by the victim junk man. BTW Greener's children from his marriage didn't speak to him nor did the children he had with his mistress. Some of them are alive but apparently have little interest in the papers.
So what if the picker is a dumpster diver. He saved these historic items from the landfill! Harvard should kiss his ring for that alone.
I deal a little bit in documents, old books, etc. I know the mind set of institutional buyers and collectors. Advanced collectors and universities can be real cheapskates. They think they know everything and don’t want to pay anything. Institutions most often want a donation no matter how rich they are.
So it doesn’t surprise me at all Harvard is trying to pull a fast one here.