(a) To individual applicants and employers to the extent necessary for the efficient performance of recruitment, placement, employment counseling, and other employment service functions.

(b) To any properly identified claimant for benefit or payments under a State, Territorial, or Federal unemployment compensation or readjustment allowance law or to his duly authorized representative, information which directly concerns the claimant and as is reasonably necessary for the proper presentation of his claim.

(c) To any officer or employee or any agency of the Federal Government or of a State or Territorial government, lawfully charged with the administration of a Federal, State, or Territorial unemployment compensation or readjustment allowance law, but only for purposes reasonably necessary for the proper administration of such law.

(d) To any officer or employee of any agency of the Federal Government or a State or Territorial government, lawfully charged with the administration of a law providing for old-age assistance, or other public assistance, work relief, pension, retirement, or other benefit payments, but only for purposes reasonably necessary for the proper administration of such law.

(e) To applicants, employers, and the public, general information concerning employment opportunities, employment levels and trends, and labor supply and demand, provided such release or publication does not include information identifiable to individual applicants, employers, or employing establishments.

(f) To individuals, organizations, and agencies or for purposes other than as specified in paragraphs (a), (b), (c), (d), or (e) of this section if such disclosure will not impede the operation of, and is not inconsistent with the purposes of, the public employment service program, and is authorized in writing in individual cases by the State agency official responsible for the employment service program.

(c) Reports by wage and hour law inspectors

Individuals and business firms are required by wage and hour, safety and child labor laws, to make available to Department inspectors, their wage and hour and other records. Reports made by Department inspectors containing the results of these investigations are not available, as such, to any persons outside the Department. Within the Department, only those whose official duties in connection with the administration of these laws so require, have access to these reports. The Department, for example, will not disclose to an employee the data secured from an investigation of the employer's records. Nor will it disclose to the employer information secured from individual employees. However, if a Member of Congress inquires about an investigation at the request of an employer or of an employee, a reply in detail is made concerning the investigation findings but without disclosing the source of any of the information furnished in the reply. Although such information is not generally available to other Federal agencies, they are usually notified of the probability of violation of other Federal statutes and information as to the payment of back wages is supplied to the Internal Revenue Service.

Access to the raw information in these reports is uniformly denied to all other persons.

(d) Union organizational statements and financial reports filed under sections 9 (f) and (g) of the National Labor Relations Act, as amended

Any union which wishes to avail itself of the services, protections, and procedures of this act must file annually the statements required by these sections. Disclosure of these reports is restricted to members of the union filing the report, upon proper identification, to members of the National Labor Relations Board or the courts in proceedings

under the act, and to Members of Congress through the chairmen of the respective Labor Committees.

(e) Specific information in collective-bargaining agreements which is submitted in confidence

Such information is not disclosed to anyone without specific permission of the person or organization submitting it.

(f) Medical and other personal data

This type of data appears in the case files of claimants for workmen's compensation benefits under the Federal Employees' Compensation Act. It is treated as confidential in the sense that medical information required by a physician from his patient is privileged material, and is restricted for use within the Department on a "needto-know" basis.

Persons who cannot readily be identified as parties in interest are required to produce written authorization of the beneficiary to inspect his file. In general, the beneficiary's personal physician is given full access to any information pertaining to the medical aspects of the claim, with the understanding that it is confidential and may be used only in the physician's professional capacity and imparted only to the beneficiary on the usual physician-patient relationship basis.

Such records are made available to any authorized representative of the beneficiary with the understanding that they are confidential and may be used only in the prosecution of the claim before this Department. Information is disclosed to other Federal departments and agencies with the understanding that it may be used for official purposes only related to the claim.

The Department makes available, to Members of Congress, information relating to the status of claims of their constituents who are identified by them, and it also provides such general information as they may require to respond to their constituents.

The same policy is followed with respect to information acquired by the Department from individual veterans, employers, or unions in performing the Department's various functions of assisting veterans to exercise their reemployment rights, find jobs, secure vocational rehabilitation, and other similar veterans' programs. Much of this information is received in confidence.

(g) Working papers, departmental and interdepartmental, and executive branch communications

All working papers, conversations, minutes of meetings, and similar information developed in the course of preparing a final product for publication or release are generally restricted to use within the Department, or to those within the executive branch who are directly concerned and can demonstrate a need to know in connection with their official duties.

This policy also applies to budget estimates and supporting materials prior to submission of the budget to the Congress by the President except where arrangements are made by the Bureau of the Budget for the presentation of data to the Appropriations Committees. It is likewise applicable to any form of communication between the Department and other executive agencies as well as the President's Office, which are used in the development of policy decisions.

(h) Bids for space, services, supplies, or equipment prior to opening are completely restricted

(i) Official personnel folders and personnel "security" files Disclosure of information in personnel "security" files and personnel folders is prohibited with the exceptions noted below. Access to those files within the Department is limited to those whose official duties require it. Other Government agencies have access to them on a similar "need to know" basis. Members of Congress may be given information with regard to the employment record of an employee (other than information of a "security" nature) if an appropriate interest is clearly demonstrated. Similarly, persons outside the Government, such as prospective employers, may be given information concerning an employee's employment record.

(j) Information formally classified to protect the national defense and security

The requirements for classification of such information are established in various Presidential orders and directives. Access to such classified material is strictly limited by such directives, both within the agency originating the material, and in other Government agencies, including Congress. Such information cannot be disclosed to anyone outside the Government.

2. Authority for restrictions

(Copies of all statutes, regulations, or other documents referred to, are attached.)

Much of the data described in the answer to question 1 of this part are undoubtedly covered by the provisions of two statutes which expressly prohibit disclosure of certain types of information. (These statutes are 18 U. S. C., sec. 1905, and the Federal Reports Act, 5 U. S. C., sec. 139 (b).) The first statute penalizes any Government official or employee who releases information relating to—

trade secrets *** or to the identity, confidential statistical data, amount or source of any income, profits, losses, or expenditures of any person, firm, partnership, corporation, or association ***.

The second prohibits release to another Government agency of statistical information except in the form of statistical totals, and the person supplying the information agrees to such release. This act also penalizes any officer or employee who releases to another Government agency such information which his agency "obtained in confidence." The Labor Management Relations Act of 1947 imposes a duty upon the Department to maintain a file on all "available" collective-bargaining agreements, but expressly prohibits the Department from disclosing any specific information "submitted in confidence" (29 U. S. C. 181). The Department's regulations (29 C. F. R., sec. 2.4 (c)) therefore expressly so provide.

With regard to union organizational and financial statements filed under section 9 (f) and (g) of the Taft-Hartley Act, the legislative history of this section clearly indicates that the Congress did not intend these reports to be made public. In the legislative debates on the bill in 1947 both Senator Smith, then chairman of the committee,

and Senator Taft stated, in sponsoring the bill, that the reports were not to be treated as public information. Senator Smith said:

This information is not made public. It is filed with the Department of Labor and is available to members of the union who have a right to know these things (93 Congressional Record, p. 4412).

Senator Taft stated that:

Such reports are not open to the public any more than corporation reports are open to the public, but they are open to inspection by the members [of the particular union] and they are also open to proper Government officials (93 Congressional Record, p. 3955).

The Department's regulations (29 C. F. R. sec. 2.4 (b)) therefore expressly so provide.

The Social Security Act expressly prohibits the disclosure of any return filed under the Federal Unemployment Tax Act, or of any information obtained at any time in the course of administering the Social Security Act except as the administering agency may prescribe by regulations (42 U. S. C. sec. 1306).

In addition to these statutory prohibitions, it is the position of the Department that the restrictions on disclosure described in the answer to question 1 are necessary in order fully to carry out its statutory obligations. The Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics, for example, is directed to collect, compile and publish, a wide variety of statistics on employment, hours, earnings, and other similar matters. In order to secure the voluntary cooperation of business firms and individuals in submitting the necessary data to the Department so that it can fulfill this statutory obligation, it is essential that the data not be released in such form as will reveal the identity of the reporter. The Department's general regulations (29 C. F. R. sec. 2.5) and Administrative Orders Nos. 3 and 6 of the Commissioner of Labor Statistics, therefore so provide.

The Social Security Act requires that such methods of administration of the unemployment insurance laws must be provided as are "reasonably calculated to insure full payment of unemployment compensation when due” (42 U. S. C. sec. 503). The Wagner-Peyser Act requires the Department to promote the establishment of a system of public employment offices (29 U. S. C. secs. 49, 49 (b)). Disclosure of information received by the public employment and unemployment insurance offices, from an employer about an applicant for a job or about a claimant for unemployment compensation, or of personal information submitted by the applicant or claimant, would tend to discourage workers from exercising their full rights under these laws, and employers and applicants from using the facilities of the public employment offices, thus defeating the purposes of the laws.

The Department's regulations (20 C. F. R. sec. 604.16) and all State employment security laws therefore prohibit disclosure of this type of information (20 C. F. R. 602.12; Employment Service Manual, 05000516, 9100-0149).

The same principles are applicable to nondisclosure of medical and other personal data under the employees compensation laws. The rules pertaining to these records appear in regulations of the Department's Bureau of Employees Compensation (20 C. F. R. sec. 1.22; 20 C. F. R. sec. 1.21).

The rules with regard to nondisclosure of budget estimates are those established for all Government agencies by the Bureau of the Budget (Bureau of the Budget Circular No. A-10, revised, Apr. 15, 1954, pars. 3 and 4).

The Department's general rules for access to originals and copies of departmental records appear in 29 Code of Federal Regulations sections 2.6, 2.7, 2.9, and 2.10. In these regulations, the Secretary of Labor has delegated to the Solicitor, the authority to rule on requests for originals and copies.

Departmental authority to issue these, and other regulations concerning the use to which information in its possession is put, is found in the statutory provisions in each law under which it operates to issue necessary rules and regulations, and also in the general statutory authority given every Government department generally, to prescribe regulations for the custody and use of its records and papers (5 U. S. C. sec. 22).

The rules for nondisclosure of official personnel folders and personnel security files are those established for all Government agencies by the President and the Civil Service Commission. They are found in (1) Executive Order 10561 of September 13, 1954; part 28 of the Regulations of the Civil Service Commission; Federal Personnel Manual R1-35; Presidential Directive of March 13, 1948; Executive Order No. 10501 of November 5, 1953; Budget and Management Circular No. 57; Memorandum No. 45 of the Civil Service Commission to all executive departments and agencies, May 7, 1952; letter from the President to the Secretary of State of April 3, 1952; letter of the President to the Secretary of Defense of May 17, 1954.

Court decisions dealing with access to Department of Labor records: Walling v. Comet Carriers (3 F. R. D., 442 (D. C. S. D., N. Y., 1944)) Andrews, Administrator v. Trelles (E. D., La. (1939) not officially reported)

Walling v. Richmond Screw Anchor Co. (4 F. R. D. 265, 52 Supp. 670 (D. C. E. D., N. Y., 1943))

Walling v. A. J. Friedman & Co. (4 F. R. D. 384, 61 F. Supp. 325 (D. Č. S. D., N. Y.,1944).

Fleming v. Bernardi (4 F. R. D. 270 (N. D. Ohio, E. D. 1941))

McComb v. Bond Brothers, 17 Labor Cases 65, 619 (D. C. Ky., 1950) United States v. Chadwick et al. (76 F. Supp. 919 (N. D. Ala., 1948)) cf. Durkin v. Pet Milk Co., 23 Labor Cases 67, 678 (D. C. Ala., 1953) Tobin v. Gibe, 22 Labor Cases 67, 106 (D. C. Del. 1952)

City and County of San Francisco v. Superior Court of the State of California for the County of San Francisco (231 P. (2d) 26)

3. Terms and procedures for nondisclosure

(a) and (b) By far the majority of information withheld falls within the types of information listed in (a) through (h) in the answer to question 1. This type of information is not usually given a formal classification which is stamped on the material, but is usually referred to as "confidential" to connote that the Department has accepted it under a promise of holding it in confidence. This is in conformance with general usage and with statutory provisions protecting this type of information. Its use in this connection should not be confused with the formal security classification of "confiden