Foreign and Military Intelligence; Book I: Final Report of the Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities, United States Senate Together with Additional, Supplemental and Separate Views

Senate document, 94th Congress, 2d Session, Report No. 94-755. viii, 651, [5] pages. Wraps. Figures. Footnotes. Appendices. Glossary. Small tears at spine, slight soiling to text, staples in front cover, small stains on title page. Inscribed to Nancy Brooks by Michael Madigan (Staff Counsel) and Spencer Davis (Staff Press Secretary). In 1973 the Senate Watergate Committee investigation revealed that the executive branch had directed national intelligence agencies to carry out constitutionally questionable domestic security operations. In 1974 Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Seymour Hersh published a front-page New York Times article claiming that the CIA had been spying on anti-war activists for more than a decade, violating the agency's charter. Former CIA officials and some lawmakers, including Senators William Proxmire and Stuart Symington, called for a congressional inquiry. On January 21, 1975, Senator John Pastore introduced a resolution to establish a select committee to investigate federal intelligence operations and determine "the extent, if any, to which illegal, improper, or unethical activities were engaged in by any agency of the Federal Government." The Senate approved the resolution, 82-4. The final report included 96 recommendations, legislative and regulatory, designed "to place intelligence activities within the constitutional scheme for controlling government power." The committee recommended strengthening oversight of intelligence activities. Majority Leader Mike Mansfield cautioned the Senate "against letting the affair become a ‘television extravaganza.'" He and Republican Leader Hugh Scott carefully selected committee members, balancing experienced lawmakers with junior members and ensuring that members represented a variety of political viewpoints. Mansfield selected Democrat Frank Church of Idaho to serve as chairman. A 16-year member of the Committee on Foreign Relations, Church recognized the strategic value of the nation's top intelligence agencies and was also mindful of the need for American institutions to function within the confines of U.S. constitutional law. He had aggressively lobbied to lead the investigation. Republican John Tower of Texas, a member of the Armed Services Committee, was selected as the committee's vice-chairman. The committee decided that most of its hearings would be held in closed, executive session, in order to protect intelligence sources and methods. The committee held a series of public hearings in September and October of 1975 to educate the American public about the "unlawful or improper conduct" of the intelligence community, highlighting a few carefully selected cases of misconduct. These hearings examined a CIA biological agents program, a White House domestic surveillance program, IRS intelligence activities, and the FBI's program to disrupt the civil rights and anti-Vietnam War movements. These nationally televised events offered the American public an opportunity to learn about the secret operations conducted for decades by U.S. intelligence agencies. The committee faced a formidable task: to conduct a wide-ranging investigation of the nation's most secret agencies and programs, and based on those findings, write a detailed report including legislative recommendations. All of this work was to be completed within one year (later extended to 16 months). After a meeting with President Gerald Ford and his top national security advisors, Church and Vice-Chairman Tower secured from the president a pledge that the White House would cooperate with Senate investigators. Staff identified potential programs for study and began requesting documents from intelligence agencies. Though staff did not always receive documents in a timely fashion, they enjoyed unprecedented access to materials that had never before been made public. Perhaps the most well-known of these internal reports, the CIA's so-called "Family Jewels," outlined the agency's misdeeds dating back to Presi.…