Opinion ID: 409582
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Privilege questions raised by the present appeal

Text: 43 Turning to the facts of the present case, we find the state secrets privilege involved in two of the errors urged by appellants. The first concerns the district court's refusal to compel the defendants to answer interrogatories and produce documents relating to the conduct of Operation CHAOS. The second concerns the court's dismissal of plaintiffs' claims for relief based on the CIA's admitted submission of watchlists to NSA, on the ground that any interception of plaintiffs' communications was privileged. 44 As reviewed above, the government refused to respond to interrogatories or produce documents disclosing either the identities of plaintiffs who were subjected to CHAOS surveillance or the means of such surveillance. The claim of privilege was asserted in both the public and classified in camera affidavits of Stansfield Turner submitted in his capacity as Director of Central Intelligence. Appellants urge that the claim of privilege was defective in several respects and that the district court's denial of their motion to compel discovery was therefore an abuse of discretion. 45 As the government argues, appellants' only objections to the district court's upholding of the privilege are procedural. Since that ruling resulted in maintaining the secrecy of the information sought, it is scarcely surprising that appellants have not chosen to contest the sensitivity of the information on its merits. Even had they the means and the desire to do so, our task would be no different, for the standard set down in Reynolds is itself purely a procedural framework for testing claims of privilege. 46 Reynolds set forth three threshold requirements for claims of the state secrets privilege: that there be a formal claim of privilege, lodged by the head of the department which has control over the matter, after actual personal consideration by that officer. 345 U.S. at 7-8, 73 S.Ct. at 531-532 (emphasis added; footnotes omitted). It is undisputed that these requisites are met here. Beyond this, the court must be satisfied from all the evidence and circumstances, and 'from the implications of the question, in the setting in which it is asked, that a responsive answer to or an explanation of why it cannot be answered might be dangerous because injurious disclosure might result.'  Id. at 9, 73 S.Ct. at 532, quoting Hoffman v. United States, 341 U.S. 479, 486-87, 71 S.Ct. 814, 818-819, 95 L.Ed. 1118 (1951) (discussing privilege against self-incrimination). 47 We hold that the district court acted well within its discretion in finding the Director's affidavits adequate to establish the reasonable danger of injury. We think that the additional showings appellants would require by analogy to claims of exemption under the Freedom of Information Act 55 are both unnecessary and unwise. 48 Appellants' attack on the showing made by the CIA to justify the privilege with respect to CHAOS information is three-fold. First, appellants argue that the Director's public affidavit was too vague to establish the privilege. Second, they contend that the court's reliance upon the Director's in camera affidavit improperly deprived them of an opportunity to litigate the privilege question. Third, with particular regard to the refusal to produce (and the redaction of) CHAOS documents, appellants argue that the government should have been compelled to supply a more detailed explanation of each withholding and redaction than the letter-and-number code provided. These contentions are considered in order. 49 1. The value of rules for determining the adequacy of the sort of affidavits involved here varies inversely with the breadth of such rules. As the court in Reynolds recognized, it is the circumstances in which a demand for information is made and the implications of the (demand) in the setting in which it is asked, 345 U.S. at 9, 73 S.Ct. at 532, that will provide the commonsense guide to resolving the adequacy question. We think that the Director's public affidavit, read against the background of the widespread public disclosures about the conduct of Operation CHAOS on the one hand and the undeniable sensitivity of our diplomatic relations on the other, alone suffices to satisfy the requirements of the privilege. 50 It is evident from the descriptions of the CHAOS program found in the Rockefeller Commission and Senate reports that the CIA's conduct of Operation CHAOS extended to the surveillance of foreign citizens both here and abroad. It relied upon the cooperation of foreign intelligence services, and upon the information supplied by CIA agents who were undercover both here and abroad. The Director's public affidavit, while necessarily unspecific, set forth the grounds requiring secrecy in this context. 56 51 It is self-evident that the disclosures sought here pose a reasonable danger to the diplomatic and military interests of the United States. Revelation of particular instances in which foreign governments assisted the CIA 57 in conducting surveillance of dissidents could strain diplomatic relations in a number of ways-by generally embarrassing foreign governments who may wish to avoid or may even explicitly disavow allegations of CIA or United States involvements, or by rendering foreign governments or their officials subject to political or legal action by those among their own citizens who may have been subjected to surveillance in the course of dissident activity. 58 52 Similarly, the identities of CIA operatives who contributed information to CHAOS (both those hired by CHAOS itself and those attached to other departments within the agency) are self-evidently the sort of information which if disclosed could harm national security or diplomatic interests. Without considering the risk to the individuals involved, 59 it is obvious that the exposure of one who acted-and indeed may still be acting-as a CIA operative here and abroad 60 would pose a threat to our diplomatic and military interests. See Military Audit Project v. Casey, 656 F.2d 724, 749 (D.C.Cir.1981). Information that permitted one of the appellants to determine that he, she, or it had been the subject of surveillance might also be sufficient, when combined with knowledge of the individual's other activities, to identify CIA operatives as having participated in activities abroad that were heretofore assumed free of such involvement, or as having had access to information previously assumed to have been secure. 61 53 Appellants argue that some of the matters apparently claimed to be privileged are in fact matters of public knowledge, and therefore that the privilege claim must be assumed to be overbroad and suspect. They point to the extensive body of literature revealing such information in books by former CIA officials which have been screened and approved by the CIA prior to publication. 62 This published matter offers little support for the contention. In Halkin I, we held that (t)he government is not estopped from concluding in one case that disclosure is permissible while in another case it is not. 63 We need not even go that far here. Particularly in view of the fact that disclosure of an overseas CIA station's existence is a far cry from disclosure of the activities carried on by that station (and whether they were carried on with the knowledge, acquiescence, or active participation of local intelligence agencies), 64 we see no inconsistency in the CIA's position. We reject, as we have previously, the theory that because some information about the project ostensibly is now in the public domain, nothing about the project in which the appellants have expressed an interest can properly remain classified or otherwise privileged from disclosure. Military Audit Project v. Casey, 656 F.2d 724, 752 (D.C.Cir.1981); cf. Hayden v. National Security Agency/Central Security Service, 608 F.2d 1381, 1388 (D.C.Cir.1979) (prior release of material did not bar agency from asserting FOIA exemption). 65 54 2. Because we find the Director's public affidavit adequate to support the district court's decision to uphold the claim of privilege we need not reach appellants' contentions regarding the in camera affidavit. Specifically, we need not consider appellants' claim that the court should have required a more complete articulation of the Director's claim on the public record in order to permit full adversary development of the issue of its adequacy. Compare Philippi v. CIA, 546 F.2d 1009, 1013 (D.C.Cir.1976) (requiring fuller public submissions) with Military Audit Project v. Casey, 656 F.2d 724, 751 (D.C.Cir.1981) (In national security cases, some sacrifice to the ideals of the full adversary process are inevitable.); Hayden, 608 F.2d at 1387-88; and Halkin I, 598 F.2d at 7. Appellants offer no reasons to suspect the Director's public affidavit of bad faith or inaccuracy. Cf. Allen v. Central Intelligence Agency, 636 F.2d 1287, 1298 (D.C.Cir.1980) (FOIA suit). Therefore, although the claim of privilege could in this instance have been upheld without reference to the in camera affidavit, the district court was free to satisfy itself of the credibility of the public affidavit by resort to the in camera submission. Cf. Salisbury v. United States, 690 F.2d 966 at 973-974 n.3, (D.C.Cir.1982) (examination in FOIA action of in camera affidavit where public affidavit was adequate to support claim of Exemption 1). 55 3. Appellants are of the view that a claim of the state secrets privilege with respect to documents must be justified in accordance with the same procedures and the same ultimate burdens that obtain in cases seeking disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act. They contend that the refusal of the CIA to produce CHAOS documents or more fully to explain the redactions made in those which were produced violated these requirements. We disagree. 56 Appellants contend that the withholdings and deletions here should have been justified by a showing of the type required in FOIA cases by Vaughn v. Rosen, 484 F.2d 820 (D.C.Cir.1973), cert. denied, 415 U.S. 977, 94 S.Ct. 1564, 39 L.Ed.2d 873 (1974). Vaughn mandates that government agencies claiming one or more of the statutory exemptions from the FOIA submit a relatively detailed analysis in manageable segments that correlate(s) statements made in the Government's refusal justification with the actual portions of the document sought to be withheld. 484 F.2d at 826-27 (footnote omitted). The customary means of complying with this mandate has been for the government to submit a Vaughn index itemizing each instance of claimed exemption, describing the document involved, and stating the specific exemption(s) asserted to apply. The index may be supplemented with representative exhibits illustrating the nature of the documents and the context of redactions made, and in some cases with in camera submissions which make evident the need for confidentiality. 57 We take note at the outset of the substantial effort already made by the Director in the case to provide the kind of specific explanation contemplated by Vaughn and its progeny. As stated above, the redactions made in documents provided in response to plaintiffs' request were usually accompanied by coded explanations indicating the type of information deleted. 66 The district court specifically found, in accordance with the language of Reynolds, that further explanation of the reasons for withholding information is not required, nor is it by and large possible, in the context of the present suit. 67 We agree with appellees and the district court that further justification was not called for. 58 First, the discovery sought here takes place in a context different from the statutory system of mandatory disclosure established by FOIA. Although the scope of civil discovery may well exceed the scope of FOIA-mandated disclosure in some instances, the nature of the decision to withhold information in the case of a claim of the state secrets privilege fundamentally differs from the decision to claim a FOIA exemption. The most important difference is that the claim of the state secrets privilege is a decision of policy made at the highest level of the executive branch after consideration of the facts of the particular case. The Reynolds requirements compel that it fulfill these requisites. Consequently, the risk of permitting relatively unaccountable invisible bureaucratic decisions as to the national security value of information (specifically, the decisions to classify information that trigger FOIA Exemption 1 68 ) to bar disclosure of information on a wholesale basis is not presented in a state secrets case. 69 59 Second, the unique status of national security information under both FOIA and general civil discovery practice militates against requiring broader disclosure here. In their zeal to impose the requirements of Vaughn indexing beyond the FOIA context, appellants largely ignore the purposes Vaughn itself sought to serve. 60 A Vaughn -type index of the withheld documents and redactions involved here would in fact serve little purpose. The raison d'etre of the Vaughn index is to permit a fuller adversarial examination of the justifications for withholding information which is presumed by statute to be available to the public. In cases where there is frequently doubt as to whether documents meet the threshold requirements of the asserted exemption-e.g., the investigatory record compiled for a law enforcement purpose threshold of Exemption 7 or the medical or personnel files or similar files threshold of Exemption 6 70 -the Vaughn index permits the court, with the assistance of the requesting party, to determine whether the information qualifies for exemption. However, as Vaughn itself recognized, where the only question is whether information has been deemed by the executive to be so sensitive as to pose a risk to national security were it disclosed, a more detailed statement of the characteristics of the withheld information would serve no useful end. The executive's resolution of the issue in favor of secrecy terminates the inquiry under FOIA just as it does under the state secrets privilege. See Vaughn, 484 F.2d at 824. 61 The innovation in Vaughn of the indexing requirement that now bears its name was, as that opinion will show, a response to cases other than those in which an actual executive determination of the need for secrecy had been demonstrated. Id. In this case, the information is of a sort the factual nature of which was not disputed. Id. Consequently, the rationale in Vaughn for imposing an indexing-and-explanation requirement-that the documents sought do not indisputably fit within one of the exemptions to the FOIA, id.-has no application to the information in the case at bar. In short, appellants argue for the expansion of the procedure that has no bearing in the first place on this case. 71 The district court was on solid ground in refusing to compel production of documents on the basis of the Director's claim as asserted in the public affidavit without resort to any more detailed justification.