Opinion ID: 105539
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Department's Representations to Congress.

Text: In the spring of 1950, the Department of State submitted to an investigating subcommittee of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee a comprehensive report on the procedures and standards used by the Department in dealing with employee loyalty and security problems. After describing the procedures utilized by the Department in the early post-war period, the report continued as follows: . . . The policy of the Department prior to the passage of the McCarran rider was that if there was reasonable doubt as to an employee's loyalty, his employment was required to be terminated. The McCarran rider freed the hands of the Department in making this policy effective. Basically any reasonable doubt of an employee's loyalty if based on substantial evidence was to be resolved in favor of the Government. After enactment of the McCarran rider the Department did not contemplate that the legislation required or that the people of this country would countenance the use of `Gestapo' methods or harassment or persecution of loyal employees who were American citizens on flimsy evidence or hearsay and innuendo. The Department proceeded to develop appropriate procedures designed to implement fully and properly the authority granted the Department under the McCarran rider. The McCarran rider . . . was the first of a series of provisions included in each subsequent appropriation act which authorized the Secretary of State in his absolute discretion to `terminate the employment of any officer or employee of the Department of State or of the Foreign Service of the United States whenever he shall deem such termination necessary or advisable in the interests of the United States.' Accordingly, effective during the 1947 fiscal year, and each fiscal year thereafter, the Department considered the McCarran rider as an additional standard for dealing with security problems in the Department.. . . In [its] considered view the McCarran rider was subject to procedural limitations. The McCarran rider was not interpreted as permitting reckless discharge or the exercise of arbitrary whims. ..... The President's loyalty order of March 21, 1947, prescribed a comprehensive set of standards governing the executive branch as a whole. It was deemed applicable to the Department of State, as well as to other agencies. The unique powers conferred on the Department as a result of continuous reenactment of the McCarran rider led the Department to promulgate regulations which would encompass its duties and powers both under the Executive order and under the McCarran rider.  [22]