Mr. Speaker, in the period since I made the findings of my study known to the members of this body, I have written to the Secretary and Assistant Secretary of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare on four occasions. I have met with an Assistant Secretary once in my office. My staff has met with the congressional liaison officer and an assistant to the Secretary on numerous occasions. We have had scores of telephone conversations with these officials. All this for the singular purpose of trying to obtain information from HEW that should be available and needs to be available. Each time HEW officials have offered a new excuse, I have soundly refuted it, only to be met with another equally refutable excuse within a few days.

Mr. Speaker, this then is the epitome of the "fourth establishment" at work. What it wants to do, it does. What it wants to change, it changes. What it wants to ignore, it ignores. Within the "fourth establishment," the efforts of one single Congressman or the combined voice of 130 are only minor annoyances, and that, Mr. Speaker, is why it is so frightening and why it cannot be allowed to continue unchecked in the future as it has been in the past.

Senator ROTH. I would, again, like to emphasize that I think this problem of unclassified information is only one part of the total picture. I feel, just as strongly, that we have the same kind of problems as to classified information. I would urge, if I might again, sir, you using your tremendous influence in seeing that action is taken on the problem of classified information, because, there, as in the case of unclassified information, the exception has swallowed the general rule.

Senator ERVIN. I think you have rendered a great public service in collecting all of the information which was finally printed in this last book.

We have a very unique institution in North Carolina, called the Institute of Government. It was founded by a schoolmate of mine, Albert Coates, when he realized that most government officials started their work without any instruction as to their duties, responsibilities, and powers.

It branched out, and he asked me to come down to visit with the faculty for about a week and to inform the county and municipal officials of the different Federal programs available to help them with their problems. Unfortunately, we did not have a compendium of this kind at the time.

I spent about 4 or 5 months just getting a little bit of primary information about Federal programs. This is a Herculean task you accomplished.

I should not say it, perhaps, but my experience with the executive branch of the Government has led me to the conclusion that if a person goes into one of these bureaus, departments, or agencies, and does not do anything to attract any attention to himself, or go out of his way to render any service, he can hope to be like the man in the old Chinese poem who hoped the sun would not be too bright or too brilliant so that he might pursue the quiet role of calmness.

I think there are too many people in the executive branch who just figure that if they can stay there and draw their breath and their salary long enough and do not attract any attention-do nothing, except just live there long enough to get retirement-they will be retired in due course without encountering any great obstacles in accomplishing that purpose.

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Senator ROTH. I am afraid I share your feeling on that.

I might say, I think there are a number of advantages, from a bureaucrat's point of view, in not making the information public. You can be much more freewheeling in what you do, which I do not think is in the interest of good government. Then, there is a question of vested rights. As you well know, many of these programs do overlap and duplicate each other. There is concern on the part of some bureaucrats that if this situation becomes known to the Congress there may be corrective action taken. So, I do not think this bureaucratic screen is entirely accidental. I think it is a self-serving effort. I realize, too, sir, that perhaps what I have brought before you today is not directly relevant to the question of "executive prerogatives." I had no one assert that right, but at the same time, I think it is a part of the total picture, and in many ways a most important part, because I think the problem is that, no matter what kind of legislation or rules you adopt, there has to be a will on the part of the executive branch to cooperate on supplying information.

Senator ERVIN. And you get to the monumental inertia particularly among those who administer these programs, which is very tragic because the Congress created these departments and agencies in order to serve the American people. They are supposed to be helpful. Unfortunately, there is nothing more permanent than a temporary program established by the Federal Government. Apparently, nobody wants any of these programs to ever be disturbed. The program administrators acquire what they think is a vested interest in their programs and, therefore, they do not want people to find out too much about them.

Senator ROTH. That is correct.

Senator ERVIN. Professor Kurland?

Professor KURLAND. Senator, I think what you have done is to point up a very important aspect of our work, and that is that it is not merely military secrets or secrets of state that result in the failure of Congress to secure information, necessary to its legislative programs. We have had our own experience along this line which certainly corroborates, unfortunately, your own, and I do think it is an important part of this committee's efforts at this time to emphasize this aspect of the problem.

There is a modicum of excuse where the matter may affect the military or may effect negotiations with foreign governments that totally disappears, despite the fact that executive behavior is exactly the same, when we come to domestic affairs of the kind you mentioned.

I thank you, sir.

Senator ROTH. Thank you.

Senator ERVIN. Professor Winter?

Professor WINTER. I take it that when you were seeking this information, you were seeking it as an individual Member of Congress not as a committee or subcommittee.

Senator ROTH. That is correct. That is the reason I say that it is really not a part of the "executive prerogatives," strictly speaking. I was doing it as an individual member of the Congress.

Professor WINTER. But Congress could write legislation that could cover a request by individual congressmen.

Senator RоTH. I am sorry?

Professor WINTER. Congress could pass legislation which would apply to requests for information by individual Senators and Members of the House; it does not have to be restricted to committees or subcommittees. The question I wanted to ask was: "Do you think the Fulbright bill ought to be expanded to include requests for information by individual congressmen?"

Senator ROTH. I would be inclined to say that broader rights to information is needed than we now have, because I think, particularly when you are dealing with nonclassified information. That there should be relatively free access to the information. I think there could be some problems on the other side; conceivably, there could be individual congressmen asking for studies and information that could be very burdensome to supply. That is one of the excuses given me in my requests where, admittedly, compliance with the request was burdensome. Frankly, much of this information was not available in useful form in the executive branch itself or even within an agency itself. HEW, itself, really did not know what its right arm was doing. But I really see no excuse why an elected representative of the Government, in the legislative branch, should not have free access to nonclassified material. I think the areas of congressional abuse are very limited. I think the problem has been on the other side, with too little information being made available. I tried to correct the fact that I was only a sole, freshman Congressman asking for extensive material by two devices: one, getting other Congressmen to join me in my request-and we did have a number, as I mentioned, roughly, 25; and we also, as I pointed out, had Representative Laird who was on a House committee that did have jurisdiction over the agency that refused to supply the information.

I might also point out that we introduced what we called a "Program Information Act," which would require by law the Federal branch or the executive branch to publish a catalog, containing up to date information on Federal programs. This legislation is directed at my specific problem and does not answer your broader problem of how far should we permit the individual Congressman to secure information. As an elected official, I think he should have pretty broad rights in this area.

Professor WINTER. Senator Symington suggested this morning that the committee structure provides some access to information, that should be confidential in the sense of keeping it out of the newspapers, for instance. I am not quite sure how similar structure could be worked out if individual Congressmen could invoke the kind of process the Fulbright legislation contemplates, which is cutting off funds to an agency.

Senator ROTH. I do not think you could have the individual Congressman authorized to cut off funds. It may be that by internal changes in the committee setup that the individual Congressman should look to his committees for assistance. This may be the most practical way of doing it. There could also be problems with your committee.

In my experience, mainly on the House rather than on the Senate side, it might be very difficult to get a committee to act. For instance, in one particular piece of legislation-I was at the time a member of

the House Judiciary Committee-I wanted a witness to appear from the Census Bureau but was unsuccessful in getting committee support. For that reason, I have some reservations whether the committee is a total answer or not; but, perhaps, that is a problem of internal reform.

Professor WINTER. You might also not be on the committee.
Senator ROTH. That is another problem; that is correct.
Senator ERVIN. Mr. Edmisten?

Mr. EDMISTEN. Senator, when you were attempting to gain this information, were not a good many of these bureaucrats in fact, rather low-ranking officials, who refused you, an elected representative of the people, the information you requested?

Senator ROTH. That is correct. I think you hit the nail on the head, that much of the problem is at the lower ranks. They do not want to give the information in many cases, as I said, for reasons of protecting their little empire, or because, as the chairman has pointed out, they do not want to ruffle feathers.

But that was only partly true. I will say, in the case of HEW, that was a decision made at a pretty high level, because we sent out the 438 and we got 21 replies, and the order went out from the Congressional Liaison Office not to send the questionnaires to me directly. So the problem is a mixture.

I will say this on behalf of some in the executive branch-there were a number of people at the lower levels very strongly in support of what I was trying to do, that felt that the public and the Congress were entitled to the information. We had any number, for example, within HEW that were very disappointed that this information was not made available. So, it is a mixed bag.

Mr. EDMISTEN. The basic issue is that the American people, as taxpayers, have just as much right to know what is going on domestically as they do in foreign affairs. I do not think you should weigh them any differently.

Senator ROTH. Absolutely. There is no excuse, basically, not to have free access to domestic information.

Senator ERVIN. I was reading the questionnaire you submitted in your request to the departments and agencies for this information. It seems to me to be such a frank, open, and honest questionnaire that I do not see how anybody could have entertained any suspicion about it.

You asked first for the name of the program. Then, you asked what statute authorized it; what was the name and office of the administrator; what the nature of the program was; who was eligible; what agency of government, local government, was eligible for benefits, what type of assistance could be made available; and how the funds could be spent. Then, you asked for very limited information about past appropriations for the 2 preceding yearsthat is, for the current year and the 2 preceding years and about the obligations which had been incurred in the current year and preceding 2 fiscal years. The remaining questions asked the average range of loan size and the conditions the applicant must meet to receive assistance; what post-grant evaluation was made of the work and who was the responsible Washington official to contact so that a potential beneficiary would know who to contact in order to

apply for benefits; what application deadlines there were, what ordinarily was the approval or disapproval time on the applications, and whether there were any related programs.

It seems to me that this information really should be made available every year to each Member of Congress so that he can obtain the maximum benefits from these programs for those whom he serves. Yours was a frank questionnaire-why anybody would be skeptical about its purpose is beyond my comprehension.

Senator ROTH. I can give you some interesting background. The questionnaire was based partly on my trip that I referred to earlier, but it was primarily based upon a study made by a midwestern research institute for HUD, and the purpose of this study was to ascertain what information does the potential applicant back home need to intelligently decide whether or not he is eligible for assistance and to help him in preparing his application. I do not recall exactly, but this study cost the Government $15,000 or $25,000 and was apparently filed with no action taken.

Now, I should point out that OMB is now publishing a yearly catalog, very much along the lines of what I did earlier. It is a very sizable step forward, although it is not being kept up to date as it should be.

One of the problems, if you go back to the problem of the constituent, is that the constituent needs up-to-date information today as to whether there are any funds available, or if the program is still in existence.

One of the requirements of my legislation would be to compel the Government, to maintain up-to-date information.

The second problem is that for some reason our Federal bookkeeping and financial records are inadequate. It is impossible, apparently, to provide financial information as to how many funds are available in a particular program. This is most unfortunate. I can give you two examples that occurred at home.

We have two small towns, very small towns, apply for assistance, and they got an outside consultant, prepared the forms, came down to Washington and found out the programs were receiving no funds and that consequently the programs were being phased out. I think this is inexcusable. I think this sort of thing makes people back home lose faith in governmental process.

Senator ERVIN. Especially on the local level, I think. In North Carolina, and I assume in other States, most of your information is accumulated in public records where a man can go in and demand access to it, as a matter of right, and obtain it.

So, the situation on the national level is quite different from what it is on the local level in that respect.

Senator ROTH. Absolutely.

Senator ERVIN. Thank you very much.

I wish you the best of luck with the bill.

And about the commission, I cannot see why anybody would oppose a study whose purpose is to find out whether there is some way to bring some order out of this chaos in the classification of public documents. That problem needs clarification.