The Department of Justice does not, at this time, have any specific amendments to propose, nor does it wish to comment spe cifically on any of the Freedom of Information Act amendments which are currently before Congress and this committee.

The Department intends to present to Congress a comprehensive package of administration amendments to the act within the next 2 months.

I hope this testimony will be accepted in the spirit in which it is offered-an effort to cooperate with this committee in its review of the Freedom of Information Act.

I should say, before I continue further, that the administration comes to this task of reviewing the operation of the act fully appreciative of the many hours devoted to this subject by this subcommittee, its predecessors, the other House of Congress and many prior administrations.

We wish to stress our strong support for the basic purpose and philosophy of the act: To inform the public as fully as possible of the conduct of its Government in order to protect the integrity and effectiveness of the Government itself.

We are also fully aware of the maxim that the best is often the enemy of the good in Government. Thus, the administration is not seeking perfection in the operation of the Freedom of Information Act.

However, it seems clear that there are significant problems with implementation of some of the provisions of the Freedom of Infor mation Act which urgently require legislative attention

I would like to summarize briefly what appear from our study to this point to be the problems with the current act which appear t be of greatest governmentwide concern and most clearly in need a legislative ETEW.

These problems are discussed more fly in my wrah #al

ment of Justice. I was with the Carter administration and I wish I could say I was with the Department but that is not the case.

I am here as a former Federal judge and former Deputy Attorney General to share my limited perspective about the Freedom of Information Act in areas that we found in the Carter administration that we think should be considered by this subcommittee. Mr. ENGLISH. Mr. Renfrew, I was going to introduce Mr. Rose who is with the Justice Department and who I understand will present a statement on behalf of the administration and the Justice Department. It is my understanding you would respond to questions and that you do not have a statement of your own. Is that correct?

Mr. RENFREW. I did not have a prepared statement because I was in England last week and just came here over the weekend when I was called and asked if I would come to Washington and share the perspectives I have had.

I said I would be delighted to do so. I came in last night. I do have some perspectives but I do not have a prepared statement. Mr. ENGLISH. We will keep that in mind.

We have Mr. Jonathan Rose, Assistant Attorney General for Legal Policy for the Department of Justice. We asked that the Justice Department represent all agencies within the Federal Government in presenting the administration's point of view with regard to potential changes in the Freedom of Information Act. Mr. Rose, I want to welcome you to the subcommittee and I look forward to receiving your testimony. If you would care to summarize we would be happy to include your full written text, without objection.

STATEMENT OF JONATHAN C. ROSE, ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERAL, OFFICE OF LEGAL POLICY, DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE

Mr. Rose. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

I was going to ask you for permission to do that. I do have a longer statement which I have submitted to the reporter for the record.

Certainly I am pleased to appear before you today to explain the current views of the Justice Department concerning the Freedom of Information Act, and Hon. Charles Renfrew who served in the Carter administration as Deputy Attorney General, needs no further introduction to you.

The need for the revision of the Freedom of Information Act has been under active study by the Department since December of 1978. Judge Renfrew can comment more specifically on the review of the act and the proposals developed by the Justice Department during the Carter administration.

At the request of the present Attorney General, the Department of Justice recently solicited comments from all Government agencies on the operation of the Freedom of Information Act and requested suggestions on how the act could be improved.

The Department is in the process of analyzing the comments as they are received and drafting possible amendments based on these comments and on the extensive work which was done on this matter by the previous administration.

The Department of Justice does not, at this time, have any specific amendments to propose, nor does it wish to comment specifically on any of the Freedom of Information Act amendments which are currently before Congress and this committee.

The Department intends to present to Congress a comprehensive package of administration amendments to the act within the next 2 months.

I hope this testimony will be accepted in the spirit in which it is offered-an effort to cooperate with this committee in its review of the Freedom of Information Act.

I should say, before I continue further, that the administration comes to this task of reviewing the operation of the act fully appreciative of the many hours devoted to this subject by this subcommittee, its predecessors, the other House of Congress and many prior administrations.

We wish to stress our strong support for the basic purpose and philosophy of the act: To inform the public as fully as possible of the conduct of its Government in order to protect the integrity and effectiveness of the Government itself.

We are also fully aware of the maxim that the best is often the enemy of the good in Government. Thus, the administration is not seeking perfection in the operation of the Freedom of Information Act.

However, it seems clear that there are significant problems with implementation of some of the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act which urgently require legislative attention.

I would like to summarize briefly what appear from our study to this point to be the problems with the current act which appear to be of greatest governmentwide concern and most clearly in need of a legislative review.

These problems are discussed more fully in my written statement.

First, there appears reason to believe that the current requirements imposed by the act on criminal law enforcement agencies may well have impaired the investigatory abilities of those agencies, imposed very substantial administrative burdens, and may, in sum, clearly not be in the overall public interest.

For example, the investigatory units within the Department of Justice yearly receive thousands of requests for law enforcement records. The FBI receives over 15,000 requests yearly and the DEA over 2,000.

The DEA estimates that 40 percent of its requests are from prisoners and another 20 percent are from individuals whom the DEA can identify to be connected with criminal drug activities. Prisoner requests to the FBI constitute a lesser percentage of requests, about 11 percent, but a greater absolute number, over 1,600 last year.

Individuals connected with criminal activities have made extensive use of the Freedom of Information Act to obtain investigatory records about themselves or to seek information concerning ongoing investigations, Government informants, or Government law enforcement techniques.

To comply with requests for investigatory information, investigatory files must be reviewed line-by-line to segregate exempt from nonexempt information.

The present exemption applicable to criminal investigatory files is narrowly drawn and the review and segregation process is timeconsuming and complex.

It is often very difficult for an analyst to determine what information may have an adverse effect on important law enforcement interests.

Requesters may be able to piece together, in ways unknown to the FBI employee responding to a Freedom of Information Act request, segregated bits of information which appear innocuous on their face but which can be used to identify the existence of a Government investigation or an informant.

It has been the Department's experience that some criminals, especially those involved in organized crime, have both the incentive and the resources to use the Freedom of Information Act to such ends.

Some have shown great persistence in using the act. The FBI, for instance, has received 137 requests from one imprisoned felon, who is reported to be an organized crime hit man.

Moreover, experiences of the FBI and DEA indicate that there is a widespread perception among confidential information sources that Federal investigators cannot fully guarantee the confidentiality of information because of the Freedom of Information Act. This perception apparently exists not only among individual street informants, who have become increasingly aware of the existence of the Freedom of Information Act, but also among institutional information sources, including local law enforcement agencies.

In light of the complexity of the act and the obligation to release segregable information, this perception is difficult to dispel even in instances where we believe that the information offered by informants can clearly be protected by the act as it stands.

The FBI and the DEA have reported to us a number of incidents in which potential informants have specifically cited the Freedom of Information Act as their reason for declining to cooperate with the Government.

It should be noted, finally, that the administration of the Freedom of Information Act entails a signficant commitment of the limited resources of our criminal law investigatory agencies. In 1980, the FBI employed a unit of approximately 300 full-time employees at a direct cost of about $11.5 million.

When viewed in light of the substantial use of the act which is made by prisoners or individuals connected with criminal activity and its interference with law enforcement, one must wonder whether the public is indeed benefiting from these expenditures.

It should be noted that only about 5 percent of all the requests to the FBI and DEA are from the media, scholars, or public interest research groups.

A second area of major concern to the administration is the impact of the Freedom of Information Act on national security agencies. Confidentiality is obviously of paramount importance to

intelligence information sources, whether they are individual sources or foreign governments.

But the agency processing and judicial review requirements of the Freedom of Information Act, along with the mandate to release "reasonably segregable" material which is not properly classified, make it impossible in the judgement of the national security and intelligence agencies to offer the clear and certain guarantee of confidentiality which national security intelligence often requires. Our intelligence agencies can demonstrate that there is a belief among some important foreign sources that the Freedom of Information Act makes it impossible for our Government to adequately protect sensitive information from disclosure. That belief, in their view, significantly impedes our intelligence activities abroad.

Moreover, the Freedom of Information Act imposes upon the intelligence agencies administrative burdens which can interfere substantially with their ability to carry out their primary functions.

Within an agency such as the CIA, no single individual or even any single unit has access to a comprehensive cross-section of files which would permit a complete and timely response to broad Freedom of Information Act requests. Line personnel are forced to respond to Freedom of Information Act requests while continuing to attempt to fulfill their regular duties.

Our intelligence agencies have no excess of trained intelligence agents, and their time is of great value to the United States. The line-by-line review of documents requested under the Freedom of Information Act seems a very questionable use of their time, particularly in light of the fact that, even though a great deal of material must be reviewed, very little can ultimately be released by intelligence agencies.

There is, of course, nothing in the act to prevent its use by those whose interests are directly contrary to the national security.

Mr. Phillip Agee, for example, has made extensive use of the Freedom of Information Act in his personal crusade to undermine the CIA abroad. The response to one request from Mr. Agee for all CIA records containing mention of him cost the American taxpayers over $30,000.

That is a Government expense which many citizens and Members of Congress might justifiably question, particularly in a time of severe budgetary constraints. However, under existing law, CIA had no choice but to expend the money.

The use of the Freedom of Information Act as a litigation discovery device presents a third area of great concern to the administration.

It is common practice for parties in litigation with the United States, or for that matter parties engaged in private litigation, to request information under the act, even where they have compulsory process available under the rules of civil or criminal procedure or under agency regulations.

Such requests are often nothing more than attempts to circumvent the limitations of relevance and need imposed by applicable discovery rules, or, simply to harass the Government.

A requester/litigant can, through the Freedom of Information Act, impose burdensome document production requirements which