Committee Prints

DEAR MR. ATTORNEY GENERAL: During the past year, the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Constitutional Rights has been making a study of complaints it has received from many quarters concerning a growing tendency in this country toward secrecy in Government and the improper withholding of information by various public officials. The subcommittee's interest has centered, of course, on those aspects of the subject dealing with or affecting constitutional rights. In the course of our study, we have come across a number of instances in which executive departments or agencies have refused to give information requested by a committee or subcommittee of Congress. Some of the departments and agencies involved have cited as their authority for refusing to supply such information the letter written by the President to the Secretary of Defense on May 17, 1954, directing that Secretary to instruct the employees of his Department not to testify or produce documents concerning certain matters in their appearances at the Army-McCarthy hearings.

These refusals by executive departments and agencies to supply information to Congress, together with the citation of the President's letter of May 17, 1954, as the basis for such refusals, raise several serious constitutional questions. So that this subcommittee may have a more complete understanding of the basis and scope of the right claimed by executive departments and agencies to withhold information from Congress, the following questions are submitted to you as the chief legal officer of our Government.

(1) By what authority and under what circumstances may the President withhold requested information from Congress?

(2) What limitations are there, if any, on the President's power to withhold information from Congress?

(3) Under what circumstances may the President delegate to others his power to withhold information from Congress? (In other words, to what extent is any such power "personal" to the President alone?)

(4) In view of the fact that the President's letter of May 17, 1954, is limited by its very terms to Defense Department employees appearing at the Army-McCarthy hearings, may it properly be cited now by executive departments or agencies as authority for withholding information from Congress?

Your answers to these questions should be very helpful to the subcommittee in its present work.

Very truly yours,

THOMAS C. HENNINGS, Jr.,

Chairman.

VII

LETTER FROM DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL WILLIAM P. ROGERS TO SENATOR THOMAS C. HENNINGS, JR.

DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE,

OFFICE OF THE DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL,

Hon. THOMAS C. HENNINGS, Jr.,

Washington, April 10, 1957.

Chairman, Subcommittee on Constitutional Rights,
United States Senate, Washington, D. C.

DEAR SENATOR HENNINGS: This is with reference to your letter to the Attorney General of March 13, 1957, requesting answers to a number of questions concerning the furnishing of information to the Congress by executive departments and agencies. The letter states that the questions have been submitted in order that your subcommittee may have "a more complete understanding of the basis and scope of the right claimed by executive departments and agencies to withhold information from Congress."

There is enclosed herewith a copy of a study prepared in this Department on the following question: "Is a congressional committee entitled to demand and receive information and papers from the President and the heads of departments which they deem confidential, in the public interest?" The study discusses the matter in a comprehensive manner and supplies the answers to the first three questions posed by your letter. The fourth question is answered by the President's letter to the Secretary of Defense of May 17, 1954. This letter is merely a restatement of principles which have been in effect since President Washington's administration; and, of course, these principles continue to be binding on all departments and agencies in the executive branch.

Sincerely,

(Signed) WILLIAM P. ROGERS, Deputy Attorney General.

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