BUSINESS MEETING
Originator: HSCA
Document date: 10/13/1977
Document type: PAPER-TEXTUAL DOCUMENT

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JFK Assassination System

Identification Form

Agency Information

Date:

10/8/201

AGENCY: HSCA

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RECORD SERIES: NUMBERED FILES

AGENCY FILE NUMBER: 014662

ORIGINATOR: HSCA

FROM:

TO:

TITLE: BUSINESS MEETING

Document Information

DATE: 10/13/1977

PAGES:

65

SUBJECTS :

CIA, FILES

FBI, FILES

HSCA, ADMINISTRATION

HSCA, TRAVEL

HSCA, METHODOLOGY

HSCA, STAFF

HSCA, FINANCES

DOCUMENT TYPE: TRANSCRIPT

CLASSIFICATION: Unclassified

RESTRICTIONS: Open in Full

CURRENT STATUS: Redact

DATE OF LAST REVIEW: 08/17/1993

OPENING CRITERIA:

COMMENTS :

MLK matelial withdrawn, pp.61-65.Box 270.

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Stenographic Transcript Of

HEARINGS

Before The

SELECT COMMITTEE ON ASSASSINATIONS

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES.

BUSINESS MEETING

Washington,D.C.

October 13, 1977

Alderson Reporting Company, Inc.

Official Reporters.

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THOMAS : M9 1

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House of Representatives,

Select Comnitteeion Assassinations;

Washington, D. C.

The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:20 p.m.,

in Room 2220, Rayburn House Office Building, the Honorable

Louis Stokes (Chaiiman of the Committee) presiding.

Present: Representatives.

s. Stokes, Preyer,

Dodd, Fithian,

Devine, McKinney, and

Sawyer.

Also Present: G. Robert Blakey, Gary Cornwell, James

Wolf, Robert tiehner, Tom Howarth, Doröthy Kuhn, Elizabeth

Berning, Jan Schlichtman, I. Charles Mathews and Robert

Morrison.

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The Chairman. At this time we will call the meeting to

order, a quorum being present.

I understand, Professor Blakey, that the majority of the

matters to be considered by the Committee under the rules

must be considered in executive session and that there may

be one or two items that acn be discussed in open session, and

in addition to that, we still need one member of the Committee

in order to close the hearing for executive purposes.

So if there is something that can be done in open

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session at this time, the Chair would entertain --

Mr. Blakey. Mr. Chairman, there is one item on our list

that could be done in public session without difficulty.

As you know, under our House Resolution 222 and Committee

Rule 4 it is possible to designate counsel to take abatements

under oath, and you have before you a drast resolution that

would designate counse

primarily from the Kennedy side, to

take statements under oath.

(The above referred to resolution follows)

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Mr: Blakey...

I would indicate to you beforehand that

this is a limited number of counsel, primarily those of the

supervisory rank, or senior counsel, and that intent is that

they take statements under oath only under limited circum-

stances.

We will have for you a similar resolution at the next

Committee meeting finally designating the counsel to take

statements under oath on the King task force.

My recommendation to you then is that yself, Mr. Cornwell,

Mr. Goldsmith, Mr. Leodis Mathews, Mr. Hornbeck, Mr. Charles

Mathews and James Wolf be designated as counsel to take state-

ments.

This will be primarily on the Kennedy side.

Mr. Sawyer. May I make an inquiry? •

The Chairman. Certainly.

Mr. Sawyer. Does this designation then subject the

person

who is being interviewed to perjury if he falsifies

himself?

Mr. Blakey. The effect of it would be to authorize the

statement under oath and if the oath was violated he would

be subject to perjury sanctions.

I would call to your attention, Mr. Sawyer, that these

kinds of statements cannot be taken pursuant to subpoena;

they have to be voluntary statements. So it does not have a

formality of a Committee meeting although we intend to use it

only in significant circumstances.

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Mr. Sawyer. The reason I ask this, I am not familiar

with the Federal law, but under my State's law you have to go

through some kind of designation or else it is not perjury,

and I just wondered if that is the same thing in Federal law?

Mr. Blakey. Our practice is to have a Federal Magistrate

swear the witness in. # court

reporter would be present, the

witness obviously would be represented by counsel.

Mr. McKinney. The witness would have to be volunatry?

Mr. Blakey. Yes.

The Chairman. Mr. Devine.

Mr. Devine. I have two questions. Number one, Mr.

Blakey, any lawyer that is a notary public is authorized to

give an oath. Do you need something in addition to being a

notary public?

Mr. Blakey. You many not. But we have taken the posi-

tion as a matter of good practice that we would make it as

formal and solemn as possible and thus get a Federal Magistrate

to do it.

Mr. Sawyer. It is psychologically good with the witness.

Mr. Blakey. That is true.

Mr. Devine. The other question I have is maybe it is

an omission or maybe Mr. Lehner has qualified. I don't see

his name on the list.

Mr. Blakey. We will have for you next week the names

of the people on the Martin Luther King side.

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Mr. Devine. You can't do it all at once?

Mr. Blakey. There is some debate as to who should be

designated on the king side. We haven't resolved that yet.

I don't mean real debate, it is discussion. There are some

people on the King side, including Mr. Lehner, who are already

designated.

MI. Devine. That is what I thought.

Mr. Blakey. Mr. Lehner, Mr. Lee and Mr. Johnson are

already designated, so the question is which additional

counsel on the. King side would have to be designated.

The Chairman. MI. Dodd.

Mr. Dodd. I raise my own ignorance. We had a debate

several weeks ago in the Rules Committee.

The Select Committee

Looking at the Korean investigation requester permission to

take sworn statements from witnesses without a member of

Congress present. Do we

still require the presence of a

member for these?

Mr. Blakey. No, the difference between what the Korean

Committee asked for and what we already have is primarily that

there is no compulsion involved in our taking of statements

under oath whereas, correct me if I am wrong someone, what the

Korean people requested was a Congressional subpoena to compel

testimony before

a staff counsel without a Congressional

member present.

Mr. Dodd. I think you are correct, I think it was having

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to do with a subpoena and compelling testimony, but I was

under the impression during that debate that the thrust of

the arguments did not have to do with the compelling nature of

the testimony but rather the fact that sworn testimony would

be taken of a witness without a member of Congress being

present and in fact Chairman Rodino of the Judiciary Committee

argued no committee of Congress had ever had that authority

in the past, in fact the Judiciary Committee did during the

impeachment process but never utilized it. We have been doing

it; apparently.

Mr. Blakey. We have. It provides two things for us.

One, it provides

an important means of paying witnesses,

frankly, when we talk to them incident to taking a statement

under oath, and it does provide us, what amounts to a deposi-

tion, primarily to bringing a witness before the full Committee.

Under our rules the witness statement is not evidence

and it is only under a comparable set of circumstances that

would be applicable in civil proceedings or criminal proceed-

ings, the witness being dead or unavailable or not in the

interest of justice, that the Committee could openly rely on

it in formulating its final report as evidence. So it is a

very limited but very useful authority.

Mr. Dodday But a subsequent contrary statement could

subject the witness to perjury?

Mr. Blakey. Well, if the statement under oath is false

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it would sabject him to perjury without necessarily having

contradictory statements. It is not terribly different than

the authority given to IRS agents in investigating fraud

cases or to the FBI in investigating fraud cases in certain

limited circumstances to take a statement under oath.

Mr. McKinney. Still, if you wanted to use the statements

for evidence we have to then subpoena and have a formal hear-

ing with the Congressman present?

Mr. Blakey. Yes sir, unless there is a series of excep-

tions applicable.

Mr. Sawyer. The problem with contradictory statements

is you have the burden of proofing which one is false.

YOU

can't do it just with the two contradictory statements.

Mr. Dodd. The argument is that the House really doesn't

have any civil rules of procedure here, so that when we

interrogate witnesses, the Committee staff do, we don't have

any operating rules as such.. I am not sure whether this is

true with the IRS and FBI when they -

Mr. Blakey. Approximately the same sort of rules are

applicable to us. We do have a statement of relevance. If

we ask the person something outside of our legislative mandate

I suspect he would be privileged to answer, and since it is

all voluntary, anytime a person doesn't want to continue the

conversation they get up and walk out.

Mr. Dodd. Yes, that is I think a significant difference.

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Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

The Chairman.

Mr. Fithian. Having heard all our learned

lawyer friends I would move the question.

Mr. McKinney. I second the motion.

The Chairman.

Properly moved that the resolution now

before us be adopted.

The Clerk will call the rolle.

The Clerk. Mr. Stokes.

Mr. Stokes. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Devine.

Mr. Devine. Aye.

The Clerk. •Mr. Preyer.

Mr. Preyer. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. McKinney•

Mr. McKinney. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Fauntroy.

(No response)

The Clerk. Mr. Thone.

(No response)

The Clerk. Mrs. Burke.

(No response)

The Clerk. Mr. Sawyer.

Mr. Sawyer. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Dodd.

Mr. Dodd. Aye.

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The Clerk. Mr. Ford.

(No response)

The Clerk. Mr. Fithian.

Mr. Fithian. Aye. :

The Clerk. Mr. Edgar.

(No response)

The Clerk. Seven ayes.

The Chairman. Okay, seven ayes and the motion is agreed

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Mr. Blakey. Mr. Chairman, the additional matters that

would be before the Committee are such that. they should be

in closed session.

The Chairman.

These are matters which under the rules

must be considered in executive session?

Mr. Blakey. Yes.

The Chairman.

Then at this time the Chair would enter-

tain a motion.

MI. Devine.

#so move, MI. Chairman.

The Chairman. Proposal moved that the Committee go into

executive session and the Clerk will call the roll.

The Clerk. Mr. Stokes.

MI. Stokes. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Devine.

MI. Devine. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Preyer.

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MI. Preyer. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. McKinney.

Mr. McKinney. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Fauntroy.

(No response. .

The Clerk.

Mr. Thone,

(No response)

The Clerk. Mrs. Burke.

(No response)

The Clerk. Mr. Sawyer.

Mr. Sawyer. Aye.

the Clerk. Mr. Dodd.

Mr. Dodd. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Ford.

(No response)

The Clerk.

Mr. Fithian.

MI. Fithian. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Edgar.

¡(No response)

The Clerk. Seven ayes.

The Chairman. Okay, at this time the Committee is now

in executive session. We will ask members of the public to

leave the room..

(Whereupon, the Committee proceeded to executive

session.)

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(Discussion off the record)

Mx. Blakey. Mr. Chairman, the next matter that I would

like to bring up is really two items, not one.

We have now finished the negotiations and the drafting

of memorandums of understanding with both the Secret Service

and the Department of Justice. You have copies before you.

Basically, the terms should be familiar to you. They are

based on the general agreement reached with the CIA, The

specific agreement with the Department of Justice is the

draft one that I believe you wre shown at the preceding

previous meeting.

Again the heart of it in both situations, if I can fri

discuss them at this time, is basically the Secretary Service

has agreed to give us everhting in the first instance and

then when it comes down to disclose, if we cannot agree, we

have agreed to be bound by the litigation..

The Department of Justice has basically agreed to give

us everything in the first instance except live informants,

and as to live informants they will discuss it with us up to

the maximum

degree possible short of actually giving us the

name, and the assumption is that in this case that should be

less than one percent of what we are dealing with.

We thought then that would be kind of set aside, if

got say, five instances of live informatt that they wanted

to retain, then we would go to the issue of ultimate disclo-

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sure, and again if we could agree, there would be no problem.

If we douldn't agree, we would be bound by the litigation.

As to the one percent informahts, if we felt it was

absolutely essential thatwe saw them, that would become part

of the subsequent litigation.

My own recommendation to you is that the Committee ratify

both understandings.. Basically they are far more than to my

knowledge, any other Congressional committee has ever gotten

from either the Department of Justice or the Secret Service.

Mr. Devine. We have had them for sometime. I have read

them through and I am prepared to make a motion to adopt the

memorandum of understanding in both instances, if that is in

order.

Mr. Dodd.

Before we --

The Chairman.

Before doing so does amny member of the

Committee have questions?

MI. Dodd. I do. Again I have the same kind of reluc-

tance I did in the past, and I recognize that this may be a

real breakthrough in terms of relationships with these

various agencies,. but I still find myself in that very uneasy

feeling of

getting into binding agreements, and am particu-

larly concerned about the releasing of authority of the

service when it comes to certain materials that they would

offer, for whatever reason. I don't have a massive case of

paranoia about it, but sometimes the rationale for not wanting

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to release information doesn't have anything to do with the

sensitivity of the material, as we have seen in the past,

as it does with the image of some of the agencies in their

own embarrassment or what they perceive to be their embarrass-

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Id there any kind of documentation we have that spells

out what the releasing authority --

Mr. Blakey. The releasing authority is a technical word,

and what it means is there are two kinds of documents that

they can have. Documents that they themselves have generated.

That is obviously within the releasting authority.

The second class is documents given to them by a third

agency. And that is not within their releasing authority.

We have to go to the third agency.

What we have been doing is carving up the pie, getting

an agreement with every agency so, for example, if we went to

the Secret Service and said give us everhting on Lee Harvey

Oswald, they would give us under this all the documents that

they created. Those documents that they derived from another

agency, for example, the CIA, they would tell us the name,

date and place of the document and number and would tell us

it is a CIA document. We then would go to the CIA and get

it from them.

So in effect, we would get everything. And the releas-

ing authority means whatever we can release we will. Whatever

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only a third party can release you must go to the third and

get and get permission to turn it over. By getting the

Secret Service, the FBI and the CIA, we have gotten all of

the agencies now, I think the basic agencies on the Kennedy

side anyway, who will have documents either in their own

files or in the files of other agencies, so we should be

seeing everything.

Mr. Dodd. With regard to the disclosure of information,

I may have raised this once before. As I read the paragraph

5, there will be no disclosure without the prior written

consent of, in this case I am looking at the Department of

Secret Service, I guess that is what I am looking at here,

or his delegate.

How are we going to get around the eventual problem when

it comes to writing a report and certain information material

that clearly has core from one of these agencies where we

decide for their own reason, because apparently they don't

have to give any reason other than they deny consent to allow!

it to be made public?

Mr. Blakey. What we will do, we won't do it without

their consent, and if you read the last paragraph fully, part

of paragraph 5, unless we sue them. In other words, we will

sit down in good faith and negotiate out the maximum release

possible. If there is still something they want to hold, we

want to let it go and they want to hold it, litigation will

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ensue and we will both end up being bound by whatever the

courts tell us, which is probably where we are anyway.

Mr. McKinney•

That is probably a case we ought to have,

too.

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Mr. Blakey. The interesting thing. is we are in the best

of all possible litigation postures. We have got the document

and if ligitation ensues they will be in the position of

taking a public position that we cannot release something that

we think is necessary to explain what happened to Martin

Luther Kind or John Kennedy•

So I think from a practical standpoint, I just don't

think theys are going to quarrel with us, they can't afford

the heat.

Mr. Dodd. With regard to the Department of Justice,

last year I went down and spent time going over the assassi-

nation file of Oswald, and they are all excised, and I was

trying to read one page with numbers all over the sides of

them and they were xerox copies and it was a laborious task,

even sitting there with a couple of agents to explain to me

what each part meant.

Why is it necessary, if we have the proper security

clearances, that we cannot have total access to unexcised

material, then let the Department make a judgment as to what

they would like to excise?

Mr. Blakey. What you saw was I think the file excised

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pursuant to the Freedom of Information standards.

Mr. Dodd. Probably was.

Mr. Blakey. Which is very general. Ours go beyond that.

The only thing they say they will be openly holding back from

us is the identity of live informants.

Mr. Dodd. Why woüld they hold that back from us if we

have the security clearance?

Mr. Blakey. If you remember reading, not last week but

the previous week, in the New York Times Magazine an article

by Nick Gage, that indicates that Organized Crime sectionnin

the Department of Justice has lost, been killed, 23 informants.

and there is some question, Gage alleges at least, some ques-

tion that that leak came from within the Department-of

Justice, within the FBI itself.

Mr. Devine. Law enforcement agency, their life blood

is informants and they can't exist without them and when they

dry up why it makes it a pretty ineffective agency and I

think that they try to protect live informans at all cost.

I can certainly understand their attitude on that and I don't

know that there is any great need on our part to know the

identity of live informants if they will vouch for the

integrity and credibility of the information supplied.

Mr. Dodd. I agree.. I am sensitive to the whole

question of leaks, obviously, and the effect on law enforce-

ment efforts, but I wish I could function on the same with the

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same degree of faith. Whether or not someone is a live

informaht or a dead informant or just a name of someone who

is hothing, I never can make that determination, you are

looking at something. that has been excised and if we are

limited in the amount of people that can have access to the

documents in the first place I don't see where necessarily

we are going to increase the likelihood of leaks any more

than they already exist, they have already been going on in

the agency itself.

Mr. Blakey. Their posiiton is, it is not just us, I

don't really mean this or not, but what they say is you guys

are okay, you have got all your security clearances, you

have got a tight system of security over there, and they will

say Bob, look I know you and I trust you, but what are we

going to do about the blank blank committee. If you get it

how can we refuse them.

The Presidential character of this is such that we can't

resist them. How are we

going to say in court on the next

motion to suppress that we can't turn it over? We really

have to take the principal position that no live informants

are ever turned over, period. And this is an issue that

transcends this investigation.

Now, I might add that when they do excise, there is a

provision In. here what we call for random audit, we will

call for the number of excisions on a random basis and then

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when I will sit down with them and go over in detail why

these excisions were made to see if they were made properly,

and so there is a check on them, it is not just a blind

acceptance of what they have been doing, and one of the really

remarkable characters of these two agreements, in fact three

of them, is for the first time a Congressional comnittee has

gotten agreement for random audit, and I say this reluctantly

because I don't think we should talk about it. We got it,

let's keep it and let's not crow about it, we might lose it.

Mr. Sawyer. If you dealt with the FBI or really any law

inforcement agency, on this names of informants, they will go

to prison before they will tell you who their informants are.

This is a life and death matter to them and they don't care,

they feel this absolute trust that has been vested in them

and the life of the witnesses depend on it and they will be

like newspaper people, they will go to prison, there is no

way you can negotiate them out of this.

MI. Blakey. The place to litigate this is at the end of

our investigation when we know precisely how many excisions

they want to hold back and we want to look at. There may

be two or three. If it turns out there is not any there is

no sense in litigating. If we stick at this point and insist

on it we don't get any files, in which case our investigation

ends now. So I think given our time limitations this is

better than I thought we would get.

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The limitations are adequate to do our job.

MI. Dodd. Do we have everyone now?

Mr. Blakey. These are the three major ones. Well, I

think maybe we will enter into an agreement with or propose

an agreement to the Alcohol and Tobacco and perhaps Customs.

Mr. Doda. What I aws going to suggest is INS.

Mr. Blakey. Well, that is right, Immigration and Natural-

ization Service.

They are not major problems. Once you get

on from Justice, one from Treasury, and one from the CIA,

the others fall in line pursuant to their agreements, the

previous agreements:

Mr. Dodd. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

The Chairman. Okay, Mr. Fithian.

Mr. Fithian. No questions, Mr. Chairman.

The Chairman. No questions?

Mr. Devine. I renew my motion.

The Chairman. Okay, properly moved that these documents

be approved. The Clerk will call the roll.

The Clerk. Mr. Stokes.

MI. Stokes. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Devine.

Mr. Devine. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Preyer.

(No response)

The Clerk. Mr.. McKinney.

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MI. McKinney. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Fauntroy•

(No response)

The Clerk. Mr. Thone.

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The Clerk. Mrs. Burke.

(No response)

The Clerk. Mr. Sawyer.

Mr. Sawyer. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Doda.

Mr. Dodd. I will vote present. I am moving.

The Clerk. Mr. Ford.

(No response)

The Clerk. Mr. Fithian.

Mr. Fithian. Aye:

The Clerk. Mr. Egar.

(No response)

The Clerk. Five ayes, one not voting.

Mr. Dodd. One present.

The Chairman. Okay, the motion is adopted.

I think once again we have forgotten proxies ean be

used. We ought to try. The Clerk will contact all members

on the day of our meeting and try to get proxies. I think

it will help expedite our business in Committee.

Mr. Blakey.•

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Mr. Blakey. The next issue to tak up, Mr. Chairman, has

a number of dimensions to it. I would draw the Committee's

attention to the passage of the Federal Pay Comparability

Act of 1970, pursuant to which the President issued his

Executive Order giving all executive employees a 7.05 percent

raise. That has been to our knowledge generally followed by

all the standing committees. People have been given an auto-

matic percent raise. I would underline the phrase in the

title, however, Federal Pay Comparability Act. It was not

designed as a cost of living or as a merit process,. and in

light of the fact that we just adjusted our salaries in

August, making an effort to achieve comparability -- while

my staff may impeach me for this -- I cannot in good faith

suggest that an automatic seven percent be given at this time.

I think the salary structure was, with some compensations

which have grown up since the last time we talked on this

subject, are roughly equitable and more or less comparable.

Consequently, I am going to recommend to the Committee that

there not be an automatic seven percent raise given across

the board.

I would raise with you the following however, as we have

gone over the budget in the period of time since August.

seems to me that we need to increase the number of people.

The last bugget I

I gave you contemplated $2 million $328,500

annual basis with with 108 people.. It is my judgment now

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that we really ought on an annual basis to operate with 114

people. This is an

addition of one lawyer on the Martin

Luther King side, two document clerks on the Martin Luther

King side, one deputy chief clerk to assist the chief clerk

in the setting up of hearings, which is going to be a major

administrative burden; far more than even Elizabeth Burning

can do.

If we take that salary structure on an annual basis, with

some equitable adjustments, it would figure out on the yearly

basis to $2 million $439,500.

We will spend in fact, however -- this is an authorized

basis on a 12 month budget -- we will in fact spend approxi-

mage $450,000 less this year. This is directly related to

the fact that we haven't hired people as quickly as we might

have and we haven't fone as much field work as we might have.

My suggestion to you is the new budget be approced at

114 and at that figure that would giv eus over the two year:

cycle, under the $5 million that was originally authorized,

and we would pick up in the second year what we didn't spend

in the first year.

So in effect we would come in under the two year budget,

we would spend in fact less this year than we were authorized,.

and we would have less than 115 people.

I know that is kind of complicated to juggle figures

around but I would be glad to answer any questions about either

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the memorandum that you have on the salary strucutre or the

memorandum on the probably estimate of cost for the next two

years.

Incidentally, I do not expect to come back to you with

any additional budget changes or any additional personnel

changes. I would ask that in this context that the Committee

authorize up to seven percent merit increases for people after

they have been here a year to be handled on a case by case

basis.

Mr. Devine. Mr. Chairman, I don't want to deal in

numbers and I will assume that the numbers are accurate and

equitable as prepared on the memorandum.

Mr. Blakey. There is a resolution.

Mr. Devine. Yes, I merely want to say I agree with you,

Mr. Blakey, on the manner in which you have approached this.

You know all members of Congress are faced with the same

thing as far as their own staff is concerned. Each one

handles it differently. This particular Congressman signed

the sheet that we are not authorizing seven percent increase

for anybody, and then I took a sheet and had the Finance

Office advise me how much of a raise last year a person got

and what date that was and then adjusted the salaries upwards

to what I thought was equitable and sounded it off rather

than going to the 7.5 percent; you run into peculiar figures.

So I think some öf them did get an equal percent, many

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of them less than that, because they had had a raise in the

interim period. I think that your approach is businesslike

and warranted and I agree with it.

Mr. McKinney. It pains me to disagree with our counsel

and my friend here on the right. I find it, as one of the

few Congressmen who sponsored the Equal Rights for Congressional

Employees reolution, that one of the worst worms in the Capitol

building is the salary structure and I would have to say, Mr.

Chairman, as the ranking member of the District Committee

and the ranking member of the Economic Stabilization Subcom-

mittee, running my own office, that I have a firm policy that

people are being paid what they are being paid because they

are worth it, and if there is a comparability pay increase of

cost of living increase or whatever you want to call it, that

they get it across the board. If they don't get it they

shouldn't be in the damn office to start with because they

were not worth what they were getting.

MI. Devine. If you raise someone effective July Ist do

you think they are entitled to seven percent on top of that?

That is not comparable.

Mr. McKinney. I am assuming we are stressing compara-

bility. I stress merit. I don't raise anyone unless I

think they have merit. I will give you per example. I raised

my secretary because I think I am about to give her a nervous

breakdown after one sonner not being here and she ran the

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office and did everything and I raised her on August Ist,

and I am going to give her the 7.5. I think she deserved the

raise in merit to what I raised her to and I think she

deserves the 7.5.. I suppose we could be heroic about this

and say we are saving money, but I know who works for me and

works well should get the same increase. I would have to

vote against the motion, Mr. Chairman.

The Chairman. My. Fithian.

MI. Fithian. No questions.

The Chairman. Mr. Sawyer.

Mr. Sawyer. I may say I concur with the gentleman from

Co-necticut, I did the same thing for substantially the same

reasons.

One question I had because I still am a neophyte at this

Congressional financing methoa.

Mr. McKinney. You will never figure that out.

Mr. Sawyer. Can we carry forward this $400,000 from

this eyar's buget to next of get zeroed out? I am not totally

l. under --

Mr. Mckinney•

Zeroed.

Mr. Blakey. We will lose it but we will be in the posi-

tion of going back to the Rules Committee and saying we con-

templated $5 million over two years, we gave you back quota-

tion marks "$450,000 the first year, we would like to use

that $450,000 the second year, so that our two year budget

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would be $5 million. They could very well look us in the eye

and say you can have the second year which you spent the

first year.

Ms. McKinney. That is exactly what they will do.

MI. Devine. As a member of the Accounts Subcommittee

of the House Administration we face these there things every

year and it is ordinary for everyone to come in and say we

turned this much back, therefore we should get it and it

usually works.

Mr. McKinney. I was going to say that I usually let

most of my money for the city, I go down on the last day of

the fiscal year and tell them what they hadn't spent, so they

are in such a hurry to spend --

The Chairman. Okay, if there is nothing furhter, the

Chair will entertain a motion pursuant to the recomendation

of the staff director:

Mr. Dodd.

Iwould so move the resolution as proposed.

The Chairman. It has been properly moved that the

resolution be adopted. The Clerk will call the roll.

The Clerk. Mr. Stokes.

Mr. Stokes. Aye.

The Clerk.

MI. Devine.

Mr. Devine. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Preyer.

(No response)

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The Clerk.

Mr. McKinney.

Mr. McKinney.

NO.

The Chairman. Mr. Fauntroy.

(No response)

The Clerk. Mr. Thone.

(No response).

The Clerk. Mrs. Burke.

(No response)

The Clerk. Mr. Sawyer.

Mr. Sawyer. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Dodd.

Mr. Dodd. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Ford.

(No response)

The Clerk. Mr. Fithian.

Mr. Fithian. Aye.

The Clerk. Mr. Edgar.

(No response)

The Clerk. Five ayes, one nay.

The Chairman: The motion is adopted.

Mr. Blakey.

Mr. Blakey. Mr. Chairman, we have in the last several

months taken statements under oath from a number of people

in connection with coming to the Committee to give help --

to help us out, testimony of one kind or another, particularly,

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for example, the panels that have come in, the doctors that

have come in, the ballistic experts that have come in. To

complete the formal cycle it is necessary to formally present

those affidavits to the Committee for acceptance and I would

do that at this time. You have before you a list of affis

davits taken from MI. McMillan, Gear, Kosten, Kostman, Shaw,

Meagher, Thompson, Hoch, Scott, Harris, Rinsilla and Lane.

As you can see, I would ask that the affidavigs be

incorporated in the record.

The Chairman. Okay, without objection the affidavits

will be incorporated in the record at this point.

(The above referred to affidavits follow)

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Mr. Blakey. As you can see, most of them are formal in

character and simplified.

Mr. Dodd.

Mr. Chairman.

The Chairman. Mr. Dodd.

Mr. Dodd. What is the legal significance of incorporat-

ing these in the record. These now go that next step?

Mr. Blakey. Well, actually, the legal significance is

probably we can pay the

travel expenses down here.

Mr. Dodd. But as far as --

Mr. Blakey. They have actually given a statement to us

under oath affecting our investigation by receiving a state-

ment under oath.. As you can see, these are formal documents

and they have really no impact on us at all.

MI. Dodd. The language of the resolution is they are

hereby received in evidence and I am wondering if that desig-

nation adds antthing new to what they already were at that

time they were taken, the statements were taken?*

Mr. Blakey. It authorizes us to -- they are now formally

a witness before the Commitee and thus we can pay their travel

expenses.

The Chairman. Then this affects the public record?

Mr. Blakey. It affects the public record. They will

be noted as having been witnesses.

As you can see, a number of them are from the Critics

Conference. We have an extensive transcript of that

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conference in process and that, of course, will ultimately

be made available to the Committee with a summary of the

report on it.

Mr. Fithian. It is also historical evidence that they

were here and we did talk to them later on?

The Chairman. Yes.

Mr. Sawyer. Without getting into detail, did you get

anything very helpful from all of this?

Mr. Blakey. Yes, I think so. We have got some very

good leads on the Critics Conference.

Mr. Sawyer. What?

Mr. Blakey. - We got some very good leads from the

Critics Conference. I think the best thing that came ouf of

the Critics. Conference is a woman in Dallas named Mary Farrell,

who previously had a kind of ambiguous relationship to the

Committee, came to the conference, came away reasonably

impressed that the Comnittee was serious about its business,

went back to Dallas, and knows a lot of people in Dallas,

including the Chief of Police, and they told the Chief of

Police they ought to cooperate with us and now the Chief of

Police has given all of our investigators in Dallas a letter,

a personal letter from him to anybody in the Department saying

that they are to get anything that they want to have access to?

This is in contra distinction to the situation prior to that

when one of our investigators, Jack Moriaty, was in the

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Chief's office, he was not permitted to talk to the Chief

himself, only got to see an assistant chief, and had his

car impounded while he was in talking to the man.

So we have gone to a situation where our investigators

had their cars being impounded by the Dallas police. Legally

the car was not parked in the right place, nonetheless it

was impounded and we didn't get the normal courtesty that would

be given to another law enforcement official.

We go to the situation where the Chief now is very

enthusiastic and in fact urging his men to cooperate. If

that Critics Conference did that one thing, it turned around

Mary Farrell and turned around the Dallas Chief of Police

and I think it is fair to say it was worth the price of

admission. Some things happened indirectly and not directly

and I think that is an example.

The Chairman. Anything further?

Mr. Devine. An unrelated matter. Sometime ago, I think

perhaps prior to your becoming counsel, we received some

evidence I

think from the attending physician that the brain

of President Kennedy had been placed in the Archives and that

thereafter they were unable to locate it.. I was wondering

if anything developed in addition thereto?

Mx. Blakey. We have made an effort to find it, inclua-

ing talking with Mr. Lincoln, the President's personal

secretary, and we have been currently unsuccessful in finding

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it.

The President's brain is not located.

Mr. Devine. Was it not signed for? Wasn't it signed in?

Mr. Blakey. It was signed for but apparently not

delivered or not delivered -- the bottom line is it is miss-

ing. We have at least one rumor that it was subsequently

buried with the President's bady. We have not checked that

out to my satisfaction yet.

We have worked with Burke

Marshall, the Executor or designee of the Kennedy family,

and his recommendation is frankly that we sit and talk with

Senator Kennedy•

Mr. Devine. It might not have any particular bearing on

the investigation but it is a curious circumstance that could

have some significance. That is why I was merely curious.

Mr. Blakey. Our doctors have told us that they can do

an autopsy without the brain. They can fully review it and

their final report will say even without the brain, and there

are some slides that are unaccounted for, they can arrive

at their conclusions. Theywill say that for a full autopsy

they should have had access to the brain and access to the

slides.

I have on my list of delecate things to do is to go

over and talk to Senator Kennedy and riase with him as deli-

cately as I know how whether he knows where it is and whether

we can with due regard to all those involved, make an effort

to find it.

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Mr. Deveine. Didn't the doctor, and I blieve he was an

Admiral, wasn't he, I am not sure -- didn't he say that he

had personally delivered it to the Archives?

The Chairman. I don't remember. We did have the infor-

mation-rumor Burke Marshall said that Bobby and someone else

had gone out to the graveyard and put the brain in the casket

with the President.

Mr. Dodd. Do we need to move this other thing?

The Chairman. We have without objection inserted the

affidavits into the report.

Mr. Dodd. That is all we need to do?

The Chairman. That is right.

MI. Blakey. There are two additional things I would like

to do, and a little information report I would like to make.

The two additional things I would like to raise with you,

the first one deals with the following situation that I raised

with the Chairman and he thought it best that we raise it

with the full Committee.

This has to do with the Kennedy side.

We have roughly

all but one investigator hired and we have got one spot open

on the Kennedy side and what we have looked around for is a

person with a very special set of talents. What we have in

mind is a person who can work on the team that is dealing with

the CIA, and up until now we have hired only State and local

people, detectives with backgrounds, and for this one slot we

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want to vary that and our proposal to you is a man named

Harold Leaps be hired.

He happens to be a currently employed Federal investi-

gator. He is wiht the Drug Enforcement Administration. He

is known to Gary Cornwell personally and known to some of the

guys I knew in the Department of. Justice personally. He is

an older man, a very street wise Washingtonian sophisticated

investigator.

His background has been making high level conspiracy

cases in the narcotics area. He has had to deal with the CIA

overseas. It turns out a couple of cases Harold made were

on CIA agents in the drug area. And what we think we need

in this one particular slot is an older person who has been

around a great deal and who knows the agency, knows bureau-

cratic procedure, and street wise. If Harold was not connected

to the Department of Justice currently it would present no

problem and we in fact probably wouldn't even bring him as

such to the Committee's attention.

Nevertheless, he is a current employee of the Drug

Enforcement Administration and the arrangement that we can

work out with the DDE is they will lend him to the Committee

and he will be paid by the DEA.

What will happen, he presently is making more than most

of our investigators. The agreement tentatively is that we

will reimburse the Drug Enforcement Administration up to what

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we would normally pay our investigators and they in effect.

will lend him to us for the difference. They are willing

to enter into an agreement with us where they will waive any

supervisory rights over him and promise not to take any

reprisals against him, which you see I am raising with you

the following potentiality. If we hire a Federal employee,

or we have someone who is presently connected with the Federal

establishment, are we potentially getting into a conflict of

interest situation? Since he is going to be looking back

into the Federal Establishment?

Our intent is not to use him as it impacts on the FBI or

the Department of Justice. Our intent is to use him primarily

if not exclusively in the CIA investigation. I think what

potentially might be a conflict of interest actually cuts two

ways. It is possible for us to say that ifve ultimately

ended up in some way criticising the Department of Justice,

the presence of Leaps on the staff may indicate the objec

tivity of what we did.

To make a long story short, it seems to me this employ-

ment raises an issue that is differentthan all of the other

employments and the Chairman thought that it would be useful

if I bring it to your attention.

I might also at this time ask if Gary Cornsell, who

knows Harold Leaps, could say a few words.

The Chairman. Mr. Cornwell.

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Mr. Cornwell. Just to give you a little more detail

about his background, he is 54 years old, he has been a

special agent with Drug Enforcement, or whatever

it has been

called, over the years, since 1960. Between 1960 and 1966

he was assigned to Kansas City and worked primarily on drug

investigations there and rose from a special agent to a group

supervisor and ultimately during the period of 1966 to 1968

he was inspection agent in charge in the St. Louis office.

He then went back to Kansas City and I knew him during

the years of '70 to '72 when he was a representative to the

Kansas City strike force and worked organized crime cases

noteonly involving narcotics but other types of offenses,

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In 1972 he was assigned to Pakistan as a country attache

which in effect means that he was in charge of our efforts

over all of the drug activity in that country. After 1974

he went to LEAA where he was the drug programming manager,

in Kansas City, and in 1976 he was transferred to Washington

and since 1976 he has been DEA's reprsentative to Interpol.

I am not only familiar with his personal abilities from

having worked with him, I think I am fairly familiar with his

reputation in the lww enforcement community, and I think that

based upon that we can say with some assurance that the

problem, the ptoential problem is not a practical one, in

other words, we don't see any problem in his in fact complete

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loyalty to this investigation, pursing the leads and coming

up with the facts nor do we see anything about the projections

as far as ability to accomplish what we need in the CIA

field. He has received numerous commendations over the years

from DEA and Secret Service, FBI, in cases he has worked for

them or relating to both DEA and Secret Service or FBI

offenses, and we have, like Bob said, tentatively worked out

with tEA the fact that they would loan him to us.

He is making about $35 now and in December will be making

$40,000 as DEA representative to Interpol, and in effect what

we would be doing is paying what we can pay, they pick up

the difference.

Mr. Blakey. I might say, if I can say one last thing.

Probably the most difficult facet of what we are going to do

is facing the CIA and the interwoven and complicated and two

people acting in different roles and files and double agents

and the works, and we really looked for the most qualified

person we could find to do that kind of international con-

spiracy bureaucratic type of investigation, and frankly,

Harold comes up as the best guy we could find to do what I

think will probably be the toughest piece of investigative

work we can do.

But we didn't want to suggest that we hire or work with

a Federal agent until we brought that issue to the Committee's

attention.

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The Chairman. Perhaps it would be good if either one or

both of you would address yourselves to the question of the

individual himself and as to whether you feel he would have

reticence or any hesitance at all in terms of the conspiracy

aspect:

If he found CIA was involved, what type of reaction would

you get from him?

Mr. Blakey. He would eat them alive.

Mr. Cornwell. I consider the same thing from my personal

experience with him and the one thing that stands out in my

mind about him is the repeated instances in which he has

shown his inclination and willingness and ability to follow

the investigation to investigate wherever it leads, in spite

of and in fact the pressures from his own agency over the

years to do the contrary.

As I am sure all of you are somewhat familiar, DIA has

been occasionally if not frequently criticized, and probably

justifiably so, for a buy and bust type of attitude. Harold

Leaps has over the years pursued the investigation wherever

it led into the conspiracy fields in spite of the fact that

his own superiors have opposed him. So I have no hesitation

in saying there wouldn't be any reticence on his part.

The Chairman. How often did he actually work the St.

Louis area while he was Kansas City strike force chief?

Mx. Cornwell. The system we had there was an office

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in St. Louis. Which covered that half of Missouri.

Mx.

Leaps was the special agent in charge in St. Louis during the

years '66 through '68 and thereafter returned to Kansas City

where he was the strike force representative, the representa-

tive from DEA to the Kansas City Organized Crime Strike Force

during the years !70 to '72. We covered the other half of

Missouri plust a number of other states.

The Chairman. I see.

Mr. Dodd.

Mr. Dodd. No questions.

The Chairman. MI. Eithian.

Mr. Fithian. No questions.

The Chairman. Mr. McKinney.

Mr. McKinney. Has the blunt question ever been asked

whether he worked for the CIA or not?

Mr. Cornwell. I think the blunt question has not been

asked but I think we have talked around with him on this

subject matter and I know himwell enough where I am quite

confident in saying he has not been an employee of the CIA

but we can certainly ask the question bluntly.

Mx. McKinney. Since we are in executive session, I can

say this sort of thing as a Congressman; there are several

reports that sit in this room and reports on this Committee

who say never worked for the CIA either and yet I am of the

exact opposite opini-n and just the only thing I would question

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is not your judgment or the gentleman's honor, having been

sent to Pakistan an lan active assistant counsel, these are the

CIA's most favored subworkers and it is just something I

bring up and I would feel a great deal more comfortable if

that question were asked bluntly and have a blunt answer

received back.

Mr. Blakey. I can say two things came up. The question

was not bluntly asked, frankly because in the context of the

conversation it didn't occur to me. He has been involved in

prosecution of CIA agents for drug traffic, which is wholly

inconsistent with his role as a possible CIA agent.

Secondly, the question he asked me was before he would

gree to come on, he wanted to know how serious we were about

pursing a conspiracy allegation that would deal with a govern

ment agency such as the FBI or the CIA, and he said if the

investigation takes me there how well do I stand up, and my

answer was I wouldn't have taken the job if I thought the

Congress wasn't serious about it.

Mr. Mckinney. I don't think it is inconsistent at all.

that CIA should prosecute another one.

Mr. Blakey. We can ask and indéed -

Mr. Mckinney. I have no objection. We go by your judg-

ment on the personnel. I think that is a question I would

like to have asked. The gentleman has traveled to foreign

nations and has worked in American consulates and now has

become a representative to Interpol, and my mind works in

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very devious ways after seven years in this town. These

gentlemen have been here a lot longer and they have no objec-

tion so I go with their judgment and yours.

The Chairman. Mr. Sawyer.

Mr. Sawyer. No questions.

The Chairman. You want to actually take --

Mr. Blakey. I wanted to bring it to your attention and

if you had serious reservations about it we would do something

different. If you have no serious reservations about it we

will make an effort to determine whether he has any CIA

connections, and if it is negative, and we are satisfied with

thät answer we will move to hire him post haste.

The Chairman. I thnk you can be guided by the response

you received here.

Mr. Blakey. There is one last matter that should be

taken up with the Committee. In connection with the notice

annoucing this meeting I circulated a memorandum that had

attached to it a letter that I received from Robert Coke,

dated October k, 1977, which dealt with the issue of whether

the Department of Justice would permit the FBI to do a

security background check on staff members preliminary to a

decision as to whether they would have access to classified

documents of the Committee.

As you know, the current memorandum of understanding

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with the @Department on that score apparently only authorizes

the FBI to do background investigations of the Committee

staff members, not the personal staff members, and the

letter pretty much speaks for itself. The Department says

they cannot do it, and frankly, will not do it unless a new

arrangemett is worked out.

I remember the second issue we left at the meeting in

which we set up our security rules to October 15, I think it

was, where we would work for awhile without having the

personal staff members of the Committee members having access

to the classified material until now as trial period, then the

matter would be brought back up to you.

Well, I guess the matter is brought back up to you and

I really await your instructions as to what you want us to

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MI. Fithian. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I have not been inconvenienced by this matter and my

staff member who already has 1400 other things to do is not

at all offended. I can see, however, when we get down to

about ten months from now, or ll months from now, in prepara-

tion for the final public hearings; I would want very much tọ

have the staff person, my own staff working with me and work-

ing with whomever of the Committee.

What kind of problem do you foresee at that time?

Mr. Blakey. This has been posed to me by some staff

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members on Congressman Burke's staff as well, the issue being

assuming no staff members have access furing the course of

the investigation, what bout staff members at the time of the

final report or final hearings? I think that is a wholly

different issue. At that time, it seems to me the staff

member could play an important role in working with you and

frankly, being the kind of independent sounding board you

need before you make decisions at the end evaluating the

process. Unless something comes to me overnight in the coming

weeks it seems to me that is the kind of issue that will be

handled at that time by working out some access and it

probably would not be ricessary to, Jim Wolf, correct me if

I am wrong, without security clearances, because I think we

could do that at that time, at the end, making any disclosure,

authorized disclosure by the Committee to Committee staff

members for the purpose of preparing for the final hearings.

We certainly could control very carefully the nature of

the disclosure that we think they needed to know in the final

report and the full Committee would be aware of what was being

disclosed. That seems to me to be the kind of controlled

disclosures would not present the problems that I think might

be presented by agency trust and even day to day conduct of

the investigation. I hope that answers you.

Mr.. Fithian. I am not sure it does but it addresses

the subject.

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Mr. Dodd. Congressman Edgar, I know had a deep interest

in this and I am sorry he isn't here. I presume he has a

thousand different things to do. He did have some real con-

cerns about this from a workload standpoint and I know he

would like to be heard on the thing and I was not in agree-

ment with him the last time we went over this thing and I am

pretty much in the same position, I think there is work that

staff can do without necessarily having to get into the

classified area.

Mr. Blakey. That will increasingly be less so. I see

from here on, at least on the Kennedy side, classified being

more of what we do touching on the cissified and increasingly

be impossible to separate the two out.

Mr. Doda. Really?

Mr. Blakey. Yes. We are almost in that stage now.

It

is true we will have a Warren, we will have the Warren

Commission hearings in November, I hope, which will not

involve much classified material..

Mr. Dodd. Yes.

Mr. Blakey. But the ongoing investigation itself I

hopw is going to be deep into CIA files, as deep with the FBI

files with classified information being out and I would think

that it would be a real problem if staff members were not

cleared. We had to worry about who is present and who had

access to what piece at the time. I think we are better

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off with the blanket

rule.

MI. McKinney. I read your letter, this is one of the

problems we are coming up against, it is like a stone wall.

Too much other water has gone over the dan since this morning

and three different Committee hearings and a few things on

the floor. and so on.

What is the implication, are they sayind

they won't do it?

Mr. Blakey. I think that we will have to really fight

with them to do a security investigation of a Congressman's

personal staff.

Mr. McKinney: I could only give you my knowledge of

Senator Weicker's exparience on the Watergate Committee

related to what you have seen trying to hold a meeting here

this afternoon. I think that the average Congressman sitting

at this desk is probably expected to read Gone With the wind

once and a half a week, that is just to keep track of where

the hell we are at, for getting the Select Committee on

Assassinations.

When the Committee was first established, as the new

Chairman will probably remember, we had a horrendous fight

brewing on our hands about whether or not each Committee

member should have a staff member on the Committee, even if

that staff member were picked by the Chief Counsel, S, Y, Z,

and we didn't even know the guy -- here, Mr. Mckinney$is

your guy. I see us moving into a real problem area trying

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to close this thing down in time. Mr. Preyer is on so many

other committees that it is hard to count and myself and

Mr. Devine, and Chairman Stokes, everyone.

Mr. Blakey. We will be making an effort with Charlie

Matthews to have him see you at least once a week and Charlie

will be then in the position of knowing everything that is

going on on both King and Kennedy.

Mr. McKinney. That is fine and dandy, as I am delighted

Charlie announced himself briefly, but I am also very well

aware of the fact that I have got a great many doubters sit-

ting over in the big room. I will have

a lot of doubters

sitting on the thing writing for the Washington Post and the

Washington Star who think we are a bunch of whirley heads

anyway, for their own personal reasons. I think we are going

to need an area of expertise, so I will only say two things.

I would like to see this fight go on, number one, while we

are progressing, Mr. Chairman, not connit ourselves with

having to fight together to see if we gan get them clearances,

but, number two, I think that very seriously as we come to

the end of the thing and they are going to put a tremendous

burden on you, lacking that, I think you are going to have

to be prepared to almost have someone like Jim or somebody

assigned to every single member of this Committee.

Mr. Blakey. When we get down to the end.

Mr. McKinney. Normally sitting right back there, and

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I am known for nothaving a committee member sitting behind

me. This is a Select Committee with great complications.

don't know any way I am going to be able to keep on top of

it.

.H.

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Mr. Blakey. I think when we get down to the public

hearings in the end to have our staff which fully knows it,

and knows the ins and outs of it, we can begin setting up the

final hearings where specific roles and witnesses are assigned

to various members, this staff is your staff in terms of teams.

I have no problem with that at all. In fact, that is the way

it should be. In fact, this staff is your staff and I don't

think that as a personal member; your personal staff member

could ever catch up and be fully conversant with what we are

doing and the depth of what we are doing in such a way as to

be helpful to you.

Mr. McKinney. Well, my fear is just only as I expressed,

we are never going to catch up, it could become a real problem

because unfortunately this Committee will be judged, just as

the issue whether you take testimony with or without a

Congressman, this Committee will be judged on what the Congress

does and how they perform in the final end. I think it is a

real problem, I don't think anybody outside of this job under-

stands the job. My wife, I have been in this for seven years

and she still doesn't understand it. It is that simple.

It is a job in which we are totally generalists, and the only

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way we can come in with any specificity is when we have a

staff member. I can come across as an expert on loan guaran-

tees, only because David Carren, who sits here day after day

behind this table when I am running all over the place.

Mr. Blakey. I would hope when we have the final public

hearings that you will all have a staff of five or six people

who would fully prepare you and we hope to sit down as a staff

and as a committee and say this is what we think the final

hearings ought to look like as we prsent it to you and we

would hope you would make an effort to specialize and then we

can in fact fully prepare you. I have to say frankly, if I

may digress, personally, I was very impressed with the ability

of this Connittee, first of all, the comnitment to attend the

Ioran Hall meetings. I was surprised to see all of us,

virtually all of you were there and I was pleasingly surprised

at the quality of the interrogation by the Congressmen, in

fact,some of you, if you want to work with the staff full

time, you may be my.

guests.

Mr. Mckinney. The weekends are free.

There are a lot

of us that might take the opportunity.

Mr. Blakey. So by comparison to the other body, I have

no problems with the ability of this Committee to handle its

own on our final hearings. If we set them up right and the

preparation is done, this Cormittee will look good.

Mr. Sawyer. Well, I might say I much prefer frankly what

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the Chief Counsel has suggested. I had sort of visualized that

at some point in time or maybe several different times, when

things began to gel I would have the privilege of sitting

down with a group of people that had first hand knowledge.

I spent the last number of years of my life getting

briefed by guys who have done all the work and I have learned

how to get briefed pretty fast, but I like to ask questions,

and if it was filtered secondhand through a member of my

staff I would have no confidence whatever in the reliability

of what I am getting;, So I just understood without really

ever asking anybody the questiontthat this staff would in

effect be my staff as to the extent I wanted to sit down with

them and learn what I am talking about and I think I can do

it en fairly fast order and that is the only way I can get it

because the questions I would have, the person I am dealing

with second hand wouldn't know the answers to and maybe had

not thought to ask, and that is much the way I prefer to do

it. I have no need to have my staff involved.

The Chairman. Mr. Preyer.

Mr. Preyer. No questions, I feel like Mr. Sawyer on

that. I think we all have different ways of approaching

things.

The Chairman. Mrs. Burke.

Mrs. Burke. The only thing I was concerned about is if

when we are not available sometimes it would be helpful if we

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have a staff person who was present to report to us. It gets

to be almost I think too difficult for a member of the Com-

mittee staff to have"tö"run around to our offices and try and

catch us between votes and all those things to be able to

keep us up to date on things that are happening.

Mr. Blakey. Mr. Matthews.

Mr. Matthews. I don't mind that at all.

Mrs. Burke. No, it just gets to be almost such a really

burden, I think.

Mr. Blakey. We have Charlie. I shouldn't say he has

nothing to do. What he has to do is to learn what is going

on in our shop and to make it available to you full time, and

there is no way that any single member of our staff would

ever be able to catch up to what he has because he has nothing

else to do. So I think if you are willing to use him and can

use him he will know more about both investigations on all

occasions than any member of our staff could reasonably be

expected to learn.

The Chairman. Anything further -- do you want -

Mr. Blakey. Unless we hear to the contrary.

The Chairman. I think you got the consensus here. I

don't think there is any formal action that has to be taken.

Mi. Blakey. Let me raise with you some tentative plans

so that you can kind of block in but not block in surely for

your calendars what is in our heads. We have, I think we

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probably need to have one additional full Committee meeting

before you go home, assuming you are going home the 27th.

The Chairman. You know something we don't know.

Mr. Sawyer. I heard the Minority Leader address that at

a meeting at 8 o'clock this morning. It ended up he knew

as much as the rest of us and was. of the opinion no one else

does.

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MI. Blakey•

We should have, assuming the 27th, one more

full Committee meeting, and I think it would probably be

nett week sometime, probably Friday morning. The purpose of

it would be to set up a series of immunity gugestions. There

are really three areas where we may want to suggest that to

you. One deals with a matter that Bob Lehner is currently

working on on the King side, dealing with a man named Randy

Rosen. We can more fully brief you on Mr. Rosen in a moment.

second is a follow up set of hearings on the Kennedy side

pursuing some of the things that Loran Hall laid out for us,

including Mr. Trafficante. It seems to me for several

reasons, some of which is some billing and having to do with

the Cormittee as an institution, Trafficante is an

outstanding witness who has taken the Fifth, we ought to i

decide what we are going to do about him. Mr. Hall has

clearly given us leads pointing towards that Bayo raid and

the possible involvement in it of the CIA. We should pursue

that.

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Indeed, Gary and I are over the weekend were worried

about whar we would do in this area and we were going up now

an investigative plan which tentatively contemplates three

days of hearings in the last week of October, the 25th, 26th

and 27th. So we would have in all the people that are alive

out of that raid and perhaps some CIA and FBI people. The

exact "names are not finished but we certainly should have that

finished by next week and come back to you with some immunity

orders in that regard.

We also have on the King side one issue of what is

euphamistically called close surveillance. We have an inves

tigator now that we would like to put into a situation of

close surveillance and I want to have to you a memorandum

both of facts and law that you will have and opportunity to

read for a little while before next week so you will know

what is coming. Those two things to be taken up next week,

probably Friday, contemplating at least three days of

hearings in the end of October, 25, 26 and 27.

Then in November we would like two sets of hearings on

the Warren Commission report, November 8, 9, and 10, 15,

16 and 17.

Mr. Mckinney. One suggestion. The Majority Leader

called and asked me to go on a trip on the llth of November,

which makes me feel that the Majority Leader and Minority

Leader are leaving on the Ilth of November, which makes me

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feel the 8, 9, and 10 of October would be screamers around

here, I mean November, if we are going to be in session.

Jim Wright and John Rhodes are leaving on a trip on the llth.

It makes me feel we are going to be in session until the

l0th. I find if you try to do anything the last three days

we are in session forget it, you might as well pack it in.

If you plan to bring anyone in from out of state the last

three days around here we don't go to bed or do anything.

Mr. Blakey. All I can do is raise it with you tentatively

and your schedule obviously controls and blows it out of the

water.

Mr. McKinney. I was going to suggest the Chairman con-

fer with the Leadership of the House and try to get a firmer

idea so we will all be on stronger ground.

Mr. Blakey. We had tentatively scheduled, that would be

six days on the Warren Commission and the Institution.

There is a task force currently working on the Warren Commis-

sion as an institution, and we are identifying the key

personnel in the warren Commission, primarily the Committee

counsel and some FBI and some CIA personnel. We want to come

in and have them explain to us how they do it, particularly

having them explain to us under oath candidly how they did

it. And we probably need as many as six days.

Mr. Dodd. Could I make a pitch for the 24th and 25th and

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Mr. Blakey. The 24th of November is Thanksgiving.

Mr. Dodd. There goes that pitch.

Mr. Blakey. We figured we would do it the two weeks

before Thanksgiving.

Mi. Dodd. I meant October.

MI. Blakey. October?

Mr. Dodd. YOu were talking about those dates.

Mr. Blakey. The 25th is UN Day, UN Day and Veterans

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Mr. McKinney. We are off the 24th.

MI. Dodd. I have the Secretary of Agriculture coming

up for two days on the 26th and 27th right in the District.

Mr. Sawyer. The l5th and l6th and 17th of November are

absolutely out as far as I am concerned.

(Discussion off the record)

The Chairman. Do you want to have any discussion of the

Committee relative to what we discussed in terms of visita-

tions of the scened?

Mr. Blakey. Sometime betweenthe time Congress goes out

of session and comes back in January, I would like to see

all members of the Committee go to Memphis and to Dallas, and

I can't vouchlyet for Memphis because I haven't been there,

but I just came back from Dallas and no matter how many

photographs you see, and no matter how many diagrams you see,

the place is different when you see it in real life. It is

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closer. The dimensions are not the same as they appear to

be in Sabuto film or all the drawings you have seen and

whether he did it or not has a different degree of credibility

depending on whether you stand in that window and look down

Houston Street and down Elm, whether you walk frankly where

he apparently walked. It is alleged that he walked near his

house and where Triplett was shot and the Texas Theather.

To go there and see it is to have a different attitude toward

it than to read the books on it, and I really mean sometime

in December you people should go, slip out of here quitetly

and go, but you should see dallas, and Bob will have to tell

me about Memphis; but I think you should see Memphis, too.

Mr. Dodd. That might be around after the first of January.

We don't come back until almost the end of January depending

upon when we leave.

Mr. McKinney. The 17th.

MI. Dodd. They are talking about moving that date

further up depending upon how long we are in at this end.

That is what I heard the other day..

MI. Blakey. The other thing, when January starts, we

are tentatively scheduling in our head for January, February,

and March, April and May,. will be hearings all the time, like

every single week, and we hope to use the month of December

as preparation for these hearings.

Mr. Dodd. That is one thing I was hoping to touch on,

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talk about dates. I feel very strongly about having covering

questions that have already been pretty much established. I

felt the other day thät I probably could have cut down con-

siderably the amount of questions I asked had I already known

an awful lot had been covered. That is what I was getting

at a few days before, that with the background information

to assist in questioning process, and while the memorandum

was helpful, Bill Triplett, I think, spent four days with

Loran Hall and probably covered an awful lot of things I can't

speak for the other members, but I felt maybe had already been

covered, cleared up one way or the other.

Mr. Blakey. I have to say I think we are feeling for a

way to do this.

MI. Dodd.

Yes.

Mr. Blakey• We láterally have. The Congress has not

done this kind of an investigation before and the kind of

role that staff should play and the kind a Congressman should

play and the degree to which you people are going to partici-

page, I think we are writing a clean slate. One example of

it Bob is

going to bring up in a minute, we have Randy Rosen

on the King side and he is in prison now on an unrelated

charge and the answer for a prosecutor bringing a person

before a grand jury is get a writ of havea corpus ad

testifandum, you go and get it and talk to him, it turns out

we are not a prosecutor when we go to look to see if we can

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get a writ of habeas corpus, it turns out the legal authority

is not there. So that again, what we are trying to do is take

something that was designed for the purpose and do something

a little different with it, and I think that the best I can

ask you to do is bear with us, we will try to in the months

and weeks ahead to see if we can't work this out so we find

the proper and useful role for the various people. We are

going to have to develop a way to do this.

Mr. Sawyer. Would it be possible to get a US DA or an

assistant from the Justic Department to get it for us and

bring him here?

Mr. Blakey. The interesting thing is it is a civil

proceeding and the Federal District courts don't have juris-

diction beyond 100 miles. So technically they have no juris-

diciton over Virginia prisons.

Mr. McKinney. We can all go there.

Mr. Blakey. That is a little more complicated and the

hearings next week, he may be transferred to a prison in Ohio

and it may well be the place to interview him is in Ohio

rather than there, and particularly it makes it more conven-

ient. So I thought there was no problem, bring him up and

get a writ, until my lawyer tells me that there is no such

thing as a writ to testify before a Congressional committee.

The Chairman. I will work it into my district schedule.

Mr. Fithian. I just wanted to suggest in this long

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range scheduling that you are doing that there would be a

tremendous advantage to us as a committee if you zero in on

some real key witnesses that you are going to have before the

Committee, if this is going to fall in that January period.

If we could get some days before the Congress comes back in

when we as a Committee could come back in and work continuously

without bells, without other things. I think ifve have some

of those days available, if we come upon those days, then the

toughest and most complicated witnesses, or whatever, we ought

to try to possibly schedule them on those days. So many

times a person is doing something that ought to be pursued

right there and then not give them 15 minutes to regroup and

the bills

go off and we

go off and vote and we come back and

the stmosphere has changed.

Mr. McKinney. I could agree more. I think during the

recess if we come to some conclusions there is going to be

enough of us here before and after the Christmas holidays,

we can make some hay, make some ground work on this thing,

and I don't see any other time to do it.

Mr. Fithian. Or reverse it, that is the advantage to us,

to get everything. I don't think that a Congressional

Committee really ought to find itself repeating questions

that some other members asked 30 minutes ago when you were on

the floor voting or some such thing. Is there any way you

can do that? I have wrestled mentally with this probablem

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in all committees in the three years I have been here. It

is always the same. I will sit there, you have 50 people

from the public flying in all over the country sitting

around, some member will come in a hour after the hearings a

are underway and raise the question that was answered clearly

45 minutes ago. It just doesn't have any class.

Mr. Blakey.. There are clearly ways we can do that. One

of them is to figure out what the witness's general areas are,

to break them down into specific areas and then to take up

those areas one by one and have the Comnittee know beforehand

which areas are going to be taken up so that then the staff

begins a little discussion on a narrow area and then the staff

stops. It is set up for you, you will have a briefing memo-

randum before you come in outlining the broad areas, and then

which areas are going to be taken up in which order so that

when, if you come in late, because you have been at a vote

or a different committee you should be able to be tole we

have gone through areas A, B, C, we are on area D., and these

are the three points that have been covere-d. What happened

the other day that was wrong was we went all the way through,

then we went back to the Committee. We should have gone --

Mr. Fithian. I wasn't criticizing that, Iwas thinking

of a better way of being

more effective as a committee and

think what Stushäs suggested is really the key to it. If we

can find some days before we take up a session then that is

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all we are doing, we can cover more ground and complete more

of our efforts than you can stringing it out over eight or

ten weeks of squeezing it in between when the Appropriations

Committee meets or when the Agriculture Committee is doing

this of that or we are on the floor.

The Chairman. Anything further?

Okay.

Mr. McKinney. I was going to suggest tothe Chairman and

Chief Counsel if we can come up with anything earlier, we are

suggesting dates, the sooner the better. I think it would

be appreciated. I don't plan to go anywhere very far but I

find myself going to Boston, here and there and all over the

place.

Before we load up on that I think it would be nice to have

dates.

Mr. Blakey. I wanted to raise with you the general

dates and I would suspect by the end of next week, if we can

tentatively schedule a meeting for Friday, if that is all

right with you, we can come back with the dates concrete.

The Chairman. Fürndah them to the Committee prior to

that time so they will have a chance to mull over them.

Mr. Fithian. What other dates are you talking about in

November?

Mr. Blakey: These are all the dates. A full Committee

meeting next Friday the 2lst, three days of hearings in

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RG: 233

ENTRY:

BOX:

TAB #:

COPIES/ PPS.

/CLASS.

1010710471

file no,

014662

pp. 61-65

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restricted. Restrictions on records in the National Archives are stated

in general and specific record group restriction statements which are

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because it contains:

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