HEARING BEFORE A SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE COMMITTEE ON STANFOR VERSITY DEC 1957 BOCOMENT DIVISION INTERSTATE AND FOREIGN COMMERCE EIGHTY-FIFTH CONGRESS FIRST SESSION ON RIGHT OF ACCESS BY SPECIAL SUBCOMMITTEE ON LEGIS- BOARD FILES AND RECORDS OCTOBER 17, 1957 Printed for the use of the Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce SPECIAL SUBCOMMITTEE ON LEGISLATIVE OVERSIGHT MORGAN M. MOULDER, Missouri, Chairman JOHN BELL WILLIAMS, Mississippi JOSEPH P. O'HARA, Minnesota JOHN W. HESELTON, Massachusetts BERNARD SCHWARTZ, Chief Counsel-Staff Director II CONTENTS Durfee, Hon. James R., Chairman, Civil Aeronautics Board... Ozment, Oral D., Assistant General Counsel, Litigation and Research, Stone, Franklin M., General Counsel, Civil Aeronautics Board- Durfee, Hon. James R., October 10, 1957....... III RIGHT OF ACCESS TO CAB FILES THURSDAY, OCTOBER 17, 1957 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SPECIAL SUBCOMMITTEE ON LEGISLATIVE OVERSIGHT The special subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 2 p. m., 1334, New House Office Building, Hon. Morgan M. Moulder (chairman of the special subcommittee) presiding. Mr. MOULDER. The committee will be in order. This hearing has been called to require the Civil Aeronautics Board to show cause why the Special Subcommittee on Legislative Oversight of the House Interstate and Foreign Commerce Committee and its staff should not have full and free access to all the files and records of the Board. The Civil Aeronautics Board has met the subcommittee's investigation into the Board's operations with a refusal to turn over certain specified documents. This hearing will cover the three following subjects: One, the influences that led up to the issuance by the Civil Aeronautics Board of staff notice No. 333; the alleged legal authority which the Board asserts to justify its position; the action which the subcommittee will take if the Board persists in its refusal. This is the first attempt by an independent agency, which is an arm of the Congress itself, to lay down the ground rules for an investigation by a congressional committee of the agency's activities. Such an attempt is without basis in precedent or law, and must be strongly resisted both by the Congress and the public which it represents, if effective functioning of congressional investigatory power is to remain unimpaired. At this time, I will ask our chief counsel to make a brief statement on the law concerning the controversy involved. Mr. SCHWARTZ. Mr. Chairman, pursuant to the authority delegated by House Resolutions 99 and 191, the Special Subcommittee on Legislative Oversight has been engaged in an investigation into the operation of certain independent regulatory agencies of the Federal Gov ernment. The purpose of the investigation has been, in the words of the Speaker, to go into the administration of the laws to see whether or not the laws as intended by the Congress were being carried out or whether they were being repealed or revamped by those who administer them. The staff of the subcommittee has been met at the outset by a refusal on the part of the Civil Aeronautics Board to allow it to 1 |