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US Senate - Church Committee Hearings [1975]: COINTELPRO, FBI Abuses — Transcript

by Ambakisye-Okang Dukuzumurenyi | PhD · 8,235 words · 1,262 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

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0:00[Music]
0:02[Applause]
0:10so the war was brought home and the
0:13techniques of destruction that had
0:16become involved in the fight against
0:18communist intelligence services or Nazi
0:21intelligence services overseas were by
0:24the admission of the man who was in
0:25charge of these programs brought home
0:27and used against the American citizens
0:29and there is no better example of that
0:31than the language and the activity used
0:35against the so called black nationalist
0:38hate groups which I remind you again
0:40included such nonviolent and gentle
0:43movements as the Southern Christian
0:44Leadership Conference and the new left
0:47[Music]
0:55[Music]
1:01from Washington impact presents a
1:05special report on the United States
1:06Senate's investigation of the FBI now
1:10here is impact correspondent Paul Duke
1:13good evening the Senate Intelligence
1:15Committee opened its hearings today on
1:17the domestic surveillance activities of
1:19the FBI the session produced several
1:22shocking disclosures that the FBI may
1:25have tried to persuade civil rights
1:27leader Martin Luther King to commit
1:29suicide because it regarded King as a
1:32dangerous man at the agency spied on a
1:34women's liberation group believing it
1:36might be subversive in some fashion that
1:39it freely employed the tactics of
1:41snooping sabotage and other forms of
1:44skullduggery in harrassing Civil Rights
1:46Black Liberation and leftist groups in
1:49the process illegally tapping telephones
1:51printing false information using fake
1:54press credentials even sending out phony
1:57letters to try to break up marriages all
2:00of this came out in today's testimony
2:02shedding a great deal of documented new
2:05light on FBI management under J Edgar
2:08Hoover a House committee also
2:10investigating the bureau heard a former
2:13FBI agent testified today that the
2:16agency has now become as he put it a
2:18degenerate dictatorship from which
2:21public support is being rapidly
2:23withdrawn we've long heard about the FBI
2:27in peace and war and tonight we hear
2:30about the FBI in trouble for the next
2:33hour we'll show you videotaped
2:35highlights of today's four and 1/2 hours
2:38of Senate testimony will also provide
2:41commentary by two men who have closely
2:43followed the FBI's activities
2:46Sanford Unger Washington editor for The
2:49Atlantic Monthly whose book on the
2:50agency will be published soon and
2:52Nicholas Horak investigative reporter
2:56for The New York Times today is hearing
2:59climaxed six months of investigation by
3:02the committee the catalogue of abuses
3:04was given by chief counsel fao schwarz
3:07and assistant chief counsel Kurt
3:09smothers who took the unusual way of
3:12sitting in the witness chair to tell
3:14what they had
3:14found here is how it went as Committee
3:18Chairman Frank church began the hearing
3:20there has never been a full public
3:22accounting of FBI domestic intelligence
3:25operations therefore this committee has
3:28undertaken such an investigation its
3:33purpose is not to impair the FBI's
3:35legitimate law enforcement and counter
3:37espionage functions but rather to
3:40evaluate domestic intelligence according
3:42to the standards of the Constitution and
3:44the statutes of our land
3:47if fault is to be found
3:50it does not rest in the Bureau alone it
3:54is to be found also in the long line of
3:57attorneys general presidents and
4:00congresses who have failed who have
4:04given power rather and responsibilities
4:08to the FBI but have failed to give it
4:11adequate guidance direction and control
4:16information is a powerful resource one
4:20of the FBI's most significant features
4:23is its system for efficient processing
4:28filing and retrieving of the data it
4:32gathers the potential dangers in this
4:36system are obvious today we are here to
4:40review the major findings of our full
4:42investigation of FBI domestic
4:44intelligence including the Cohen tel
4:46program and other programs aimed at
4:49domestic targets FBI surveillance of
4:53law-abiding citizens and groups
4:55political abuses of FBI intelligence and
4:59several specific cases of unjustified
5:02intelligence operations these hearings
5:07have one overriding objective the
5:10development of sufficient information
5:12for Congress to legislate appropriate
5:15standards for the FBI after the
5:18senator's opening statement Schwartz and
5:20Smothers began their presentation of the
5:22FBI irregularities detailing the broad
5:25surveillance activities of the bureau
5:27mainly in the 1960s and giving some
5:30notable examples in the area of what
5:36they characterizes the new left an
5:39example of the overbreadth of the
5:44requirements for information laid on the
5:46field can be found in the document
5:49that's at 13 - one of your books and in
5:55this document the director of the FBI
5:58issued an instruction to all special
6:01agents of the bureau as to the kind of
6:04information that he wanted them to
6:07collect and report on now the number of
6:11items in the report
6:13are in letters from a through R and
6:17numbers under each one of those entries
6:20I will just refer to a couple of the
6:26specific examples of what the FBI agents
6:29are required to report into the field in
6:31the area of finances who are the
6:34so-called angels for the group in the
6:37area of publications describe all the
6:39publication's in the area of religion
6:43the policy of what the organization
6:45relating to its approach to religion and
6:48any vehement statements made against
6:51religious bodies by leaders conversely
6:54any statements of support for the
6:56movement by religious groups or
6:57individuals in the area of political
7:00activities any and all political
7:03activities in which so-called new
7:05leaders are involved and details
7:09relating to their position taken on
7:11political matters including efforts to
7:12influence public opinion the electorate
7:14and government bodies in the area of
7:17Education all information concerning
7:20courses given together with any
7:23educational outline and together with
7:25what is the assigned or suggested
7:27reading in the area of so-called social
7:30reform all information on activities in
7:33connection with demonstrations aimed at
7:35social reform whatever that may be
7:38in the area of labor all information
7:42including all activity in the labor
7:44field with respect to the public
7:46appearance of leaders the identity of
7:49any leader who makes a public appearance
7:51on radio and television and who appears
7:53before groups for example labor church
7:56and minority groups and in connection
7:58with such appearances the identity of
8:00the group sponsoring the speaker and a
8:03succinct summary of the subject matter
8:04discussed in the area of mass media
8:08influence of the new left on mass media
8:10and any indications of support of the
8:14new left by the mass media a wholly
8:17comprehensive listing of everything
8:20those people thought or did on any
8:23subject you can imagine they're having a
8:25concern with taking the as a next
8:28example of the how the intelligence
8:33desire seeks out information of scarcely
8:41relevant to subjects that we had thought
8:45the bureau was concerned with in the
8:48area of women's liberation report after
8:50report about meetings of women who got
8:53together to talk about their problems
8:55now how the bureau got this information
8:57is not entirely clear but it's
8:59apparently by informants so we have
9:02informants running all over the country
9:04checking up about when housewives are
9:06talking about in their efforts to decide
9:09whether women should have a different
9:11role in this design reports on
9:15particular women who said why they had
9:17come to the meeting and how she felt
9:19oppressed sexually or otherwise reports
9:22on such important matters as the release
9:24of white mice by women at a protest
9:28demonstration reports on such other
9:30important matters as the women's
9:32liberation movement is interested in
9:35zapping the Miss America pageant at
9:37Atlantic City by protesting the
9:40standards and well whatever they
9:44protested Atlantic City
9:46and my favorite example in the Baltimore
9:53women's liberation movement in a
9:56document which was sent not only to the
9:57FBI this one's a tab five point four not
10:01only to the FBI but to three military
10:03agencies for some reason a document in
10:07which there's a long discussion of the
10:09origins aims and purposes of the group
10:11its location its pamphlets and in
10:14concluding on the purposes of the group
10:16comes up with such important findings as
10:19they wanted a purpose and that was to
10:21free women from the humdrum existence of
10:23being only a wife and mother they wanted
10:25equal opportunities that men have in
10:27work in society and so forth nothing to
10:30do with violence nothing to do with
10:32these labels of subversion and extremism
10:34and what's the conclusion on the
10:36document quotes will continue to follow
10:39and report the activities of the women's
10:40liberation movement not all of the
10:43information collected by the agency was
10:46stashed away in some musty file much of
10:49it was turned over to White House aides
10:50and much of it was used for political
10:52purposes it was an invocation in the 64
10:55Democratic convention that violence may
10:57erupt and the bureau was called upon to
11:00supply information regarding the
11:03potential for violence
11:04I assume 11:00 to assist local law
11:08enforcement officials in addition to
11:12that after infiltration of various
11:16groups the challenged plan of the
11:20Mississippi to the Mississippi
11:23Convention the plans of those who are
11:25challenging the official delegation were
11:28developed by the FBI and submitted to
11:32the White House through a White House
11:34staffer the plans of dr. King the plans
11:41of Corps the plans of snick with respect
11:43to activities at the convention were
11:45also communicated both as a related to
11:49efforts to disrupt as well as general
11:52political strategy at the convention
11:55this was accomplished really through a
11:57complete infiltration of these groups
12:00and when it became apparent as in the
12:03case of the Mississippi challenge that
12:06it might be politically expedient to
12:08have some information to discredit the
12:09group the FBI provided that also by
12:13providing some bookkeeping data on the
12:16organization and its funding sources we
12:22see the same kind of unofficial
12:24dissemination occur after the critics of
12:28the Warren Commission began to surface
12:31and the White House is a bit concerned
12:35about these persons who are criticizing
12:37the Warren Commission the FBI is
12:40directed here to gather information on
12:43those persons information which extended
12:46to their personal lives indeed down to
12:49an including sex activities the
12:54name-check process was often used as a
12:58basis of getting a clearer fix on people
13:03who had began to criticize the
13:05administration in several cases we've
13:11identified news correspondents major
13:14networks apparently at one point another
13:17are in the White House's
13:18iron was were the subject of name checks
13:21the number of reporters for major
13:24newspapers many of the names there pop
13:29up immediately after revelations or
13:32accusations about misconduct or the
13:35activities of the White House we even
13:40got to the point where the name check
13:42process was used as a basis to gather
13:47the views or information on private
13:50citizens who have objected to Vietnam
13:52policy and this information was
13:54subsequently distributed to persons who
13:57may be in a position to point up adverse
14:00information in the individual
14:02background this took the form for
14:04example of going to political figures
14:06and saying to those figures if you have
14:09an occasion to comment upon so-and-so
14:11you might want to have this information
14:14we will talk a little more about that
14:17when we come to Cohen tell Perl
14:19activities the use though in a political
14:23arena virtually covered the spectrum in
14:26one case we reduce information regarding
14:29the FBI's reported efforts to influence
14:32the Speaker of the House regarding a
14:34prominent civil rights figure using
14:37information that have been gained
14:39through various investigative techniques
14:41and accomplishing this unofficial over
14:44lunch kind of dissemination a footnote
14:48on the 1964 Democratic convention a
14:52technique which was used there was the
14:55furnishing to the FBI of false press
14:57credentials by one of the major networks
14:59which the FBI then used in order to
15:02insert itself as a bogus newsman into
15:07legitimate discussions of political
15:10persons and protest groups and acquire
15:13information concerning their plans
15:15pretending to be a reporter and in fact
15:18acquiring it for the purposes of the
15:20bureau and transmission to higher
15:23authority
15:24now turning to Cohen tail Pro Cohen tail
15:30Pro is a abbreviation of the words
15:34counterintelligence program COINTELPRO
15:40is the name for the effort by the bureau
15:45to destroy people and to destroy
15:48organizations or as they used the words
15:51disrupt to neutralize and in pursuit of
15:54this goal
15:55FBI agents used a wide range of weapons
15:58disseminating this information creating
16:00animosities and generally spreading
16:02havoc among the target groups one of the
16:06other
16:08techniques utilized was to destroy the
16:14job or family life and family life was a
16:17particularly opportune targeting the
16:21bureau's view and played on some fairly
16:26tender sensitivities without mentioning
16:30the name reflected therein if you looked
16:31at tab 9 - 4 of your books you will see
16:37the bureau's report on a COINTELPRO
16:42effort against a white female who was
16:49involved as an officer in what is
16:51defined as a local black activist group
16:56the way to discredit or neutralize this
16:59leader was to take attention away from
17:03activities of the group by creating
17:06another kind of distraction the
17:09distraction read as follows
17:11dear mrs. blank look man I guess your
17:19old lady doesn't get enough at home mr.
17:22blank I'm sorry letters to her husband
17:23or she wouldn't be shuckin and jivin
17:26with our black men in action you dig
17:30like all she wants to integrate is the
17:32bedroom and us black sisters ain't going
17:35to take no second-best while men so lay
17:39it on a man or get her the hell out of
17:42life it's signed a soul sister
17:48particularly effective technique as
17:51reflected by the memorandum it did
17:53succeed in distracting her Bureau agents
17:57were told to attack the new left by
18:00disinformation and misinformation and I
18:03will give you 6 quicks examples of what
18:06was done pursuant to that program there
18:09was a body called the national
18:10mobilization committee to end the war in
18:12Vietnam at the time of the Democratic
18:16National Convention in 1968
18:19the that body attempted to obtain
18:22housing in Chicago for demonstrators who
18:25would come to the convention the FBI
18:27local office in Chicago obtained 217 of
18:31those forms and filled them out with
18:33fictitious names and addresses of
18:35persons who purported falsely to have
18:38houses in which the demonstrators could
18:40say the tactic had its design defect
18:44because according to FBI documents the
18:48persons who went out to look for these
18:50houses made quotes long and useless
18:52journeys to locate the addresses and the
18:55effort to find housing was cancelled
18:57what effect that had upon the attitude
18:59of the persons who were there in Chicago
19:00and what contribution that made to what
19:03happened thereafter I suppose we'll
19:05never know
19:06precisely the same tactic and program
19:09was carried out by the bureau with
19:11respect to the 1969 presidential
19:13authorization where they again filled
19:16out false housing forms to confuse and
19:19disrupt efforts by persons coming to
19:21Washington to find places to stay during
19:24those same 1969 inauguration ceremonies
19:27the Washington field office of the FBI
19:30discovered that persons who were
19:32attempting to coordinate and control the
19:36demonstrations there were marshals and
19:39this committee has examined an executive
19:41session mr. Eagle crow who was
19:44responsible for coordinating law
19:46enforcement at that demonstration and he
19:49has told us that the marshals of the
19:52demonstrators were very useful and
19:54helpful group of persons in order to
19:58keep the demonstration orderly now what
20:00did the FBI do they found out what
20:04citizen band was being used for
20:06walkie-talkies and they used that
20:08citizen band to supply the marshals with
20:11misinformation and pretending to be a
20:13unit of the National mobilization to end
20:15the war in Vietnam countermanded the
20:18orders issued by the
20:21movement in 1967 there was a rally in
20:26Washington protesting the Vietnam War a
20:29newspaper in New York City indicated
20:32that its contribution to this rally was
20:36to be the symbolic act of dropping
20:42flowers on the Pentagon and the
20:44newspaper put an ad in the newspaper
20:46asking for a pilot who could help them
20:48do that the Federal Bureau of
20:50Investigation answered the ad and it
20:53kept up the pretense that it was a
20:54genuine pilot up to the point when the
20:56publisher of the newspaper showed up
20:58with 200 pounds of flowers and there was
21:00no one there to fly the plane the
21:03committee lawyers giving us a broad
21:05rundown of the FBI abuses Nick Hawk and
21:09Sandy Unger I am impressed by the
21:12enormity of what the FBI did and one
21:15comes away from today's hearing with a
21:18feeling that nothing was sacred with the
21:21FBI
21:22is that true sandy I think that's right
21:23Paul I think that in the 1960s
21:26especially when the FBI really got
21:28carried away with some of these things
21:30and just went to such extremes this
21:32wasn't all they they opened a case on
21:34every member of the SDS they
21:36investigated communes they investigated
21:38any any changes that they could find in
21:41social patterns and lifestyles and I
21:44think that in part the FBI and mr.
21:47Hoover especially felt that a whole
21:49lifestyle was threatened they had they
21:51had to get hold of these things and and
21:53set it straight again put the country
21:55back the way it was and I think they
21:57thought they could do that what also
21:59detects a rather subtle shift in
22:01emphasis it seems to me they started out
22:03first of all investigating for
22:05anti-communist activity then they
22:08investigated the Ku Klux Klan then it
22:11was the anti-war dissenters and then we
22:14come down to investigations of women's
22:16liberation movements I think they based
22:18a lot on their own personal mores and
22:20the attitude to the men who ran the
22:22bureau sandy points out one of the
22:24things that we found reading documents
22:26from the Socialist Workers Party these
22:28kind of letters and all they were often
22:30based on very
22:32naive sexual mores they would send
22:34letters to people who are quite
22:36liberated sexually expecting them to
22:38have horrible results and they became
22:40humorous subjects the men sending them
22:42were very provincial and viewed things
22:45in quite a different context they're
22:46sort of out of step with the time but
22:49the enormity of what they did I think is
22:50characterized by the box looms I guess
22:52maybe you shared in that when the
22:55freedom of information began to have
22:57releases we got literally box loads of
23:00paperwork which meant hundreds of agen
23:02sitting down making reports on perfectly
23:05innocuous subjects 500,000 persons since
23:081959 having their names filed in some
23:11dossier somewhere in senator Mondale
23:14made the observation today that the FBI
23:16has done a very good job in many ways of
23:19being the chief law enforcement agency
23:21in this country and then how could they
23:24turn around and engage in the very
23:25activities that they were set up to
23:27combat I think all the way some of us
23:29evolve was that out of this great
23:31concern before World War two that the
23:33FBI had to do something to to prevent
23:37the intelligence gaps that had occurred
23:39during World War one in the United
23:40States and I think once these tactics
23:43were accepted having been done once and
23:46and the FBI had it accepted by whom
23:48though well I think that during World
23:50War Two for example the FBI had a
23:52positive intelligence gathering role in
23:54Latin America they went to Latin America
23:56and they pose as reporters as as
23:58businessmen as stockbrokers and they
24:01they pulled all this kind of stuff at
24:03that time as part of their affirmative
24:05mission and I think once they were doing
24:08it for what seemed to be the national
24:10interest of good cause it becomes that
24:11much easier to do these things against
24:14other people and next it was the
24:16Communist Party and once it was accepted
24:18for the Communist Party I think it was
24:20an easy jump for attorneys general for
24:22presidents to say go ahead and do what
24:23other people I think the general public
24:25accepted him I can remember as a child
24:27one of my great heroes with how the FBI
24:29handled the German American Bund we
24:31thought of the Bund is a very great
24:32danger in school we were told it was and
24:35they infiltrated classical fashion by
24:37the way and know exactly what they
24:38didn't go into a brawl
24:39well how do you this organize them how
24:41do you think the general public feels
24:43about the litany of
24:45abuses which has been outlined today in
24:48which we're seeing tonight and the fact
24:50that the FBI for example would print up
24:52a fake newspaper that it would use a
24:54commercial network NBC for example to
24:57obtain fake credentials at a political
25:01convention are these the kinds of things
25:03which you feel the American people
25:05endorses I think that remains to be seen
25:08Paul obviously the the one one
25:11indication may be whether there's some
25:13feedback to members of Congress now and
25:14there's some meaningful oversight over
25:16the FBI in the future if FBI oversight
25:19is left now in the hands of the
25:22subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary
25:23Committee headed by Senator Eastland one
25:25of the best pals of the bureau and I
25:27think it's it's not going to move much
25:28forward well certainly there is a mood
25:30for reform in Congress but we've had
25:32those moods before and they've always
25:34petered out in any event the most
25:37dramatic testimony today involved the
25:39surveillance of Martin Luther King the
25:41committee staffers described in detail
25:43attempts to discredit and to destroy
25:45King to try to turn his followers
25:47against him even to find another idol
25:50for black Americans Martin Luther King
25:53was and is a national hero to millions
25:56but to J Edgar Hoover he was a dangerous
25:59man who would wreck the country by
26:02January of 62 mr. Hoover has already
26:05typed dr. King as no-good Hoover is
26:10particularly disturbed after in 1963 it
26:16became clear that the concept of
26:20non-violence was gaining adherents a
26:24inherence to be made even more clear by
26:29the time the march on Washington came
26:30around this development of the concept
26:35of non-violent confrontational
26:37nonviolent protests was seen as a threat
26:40it's a law enforcement and something the
26:43bureau was indeed unhappy about this was
26:47aided apparently by what the bureau
26:51regarded as dr. King's direct attacks
26:55on mr. Hoover and the bureau and the
26:59public controversy was pretty much
27:02full-blown at the time in 1963 when the
27:09mr. Sullivan who should be able to give
27:13us some assistance on this matter
27:16communicates to mr. Hoover a plan for
27:20dealing with dr. Martin Luther King
27:26quoting from a memorandum the plan here
27:30is to completely discredit dr. King by
27:33quote taking him off his pedestal and to
27:38reduce him completely an influence in
27:45its effort to reduce dr. King and
27:48influence to take him off his pedestal
27:49and to change if you will his image
27:57before the masses we began to see we
28:02began to get some insight into the
28:04thought process of the FBI at this time
28:09the thinking was that this would not be
28:12a terribly difficult task the memo
28:15indicated for example that this can be
28:19done and will be done obviously
28:23confusion will reign particularly among
28:25them they grow people the Negroes will
28:28be left without a national leader of
28:30sufficiently compelling personality to
28:32steer them in the proper direction so
28:35the FBI decided that if they were going
28:38to take King off this pedestal there was
28:41a part of their task to find and bring
28:44into prominence they knew quote National
28:47Negro leader after the march on
28:51Washington there was an acceleration he
28:54was defined because of his speech in
28:57that demonstration in Washington as the
29:00most dangerous and effective leader in
29:02the country and there was a
29:03paper battle between within the bureau
29:06as to how best to attack him then he was
29:07attacked after Time magazine named him
29:11as man of the year again the bureau
29:13finds that reprehensible believes it
29:15must attack and destroy when he was
29:18given the Nobel Prize again they seek to
29:22discredit dr. King with the persons who
29:25welcomed him back from that award when
29:28he began to speak out against the
29:30Vietnam War there's a new crescendo of
29:33efforts by the bureau to discredit and
29:35destroy dr. King when the Poor People's
29:38Campaign took place once again
29:41they go after dr. King and their
29:44activity to go after dr. King didn't
29:46even cease when he died because as
29:49Congress began to consider the question
29:53of whether or not dr. King's birthday
29:55should be named and maimed made a
29:58national holiday the bureau developed
30:02plans to call in friendly congressman
30:04for off-the-record briefings concerning
30:06King in the hopes that those congressmen
30:09could keep any such bill from being
30:11reported out of committee the period
30:17surrounding the march on Washington and
30:19directly following it is particularly
30:21revealing a report was written for the
30:24director by his chief intelligence
30:28officer reporting that the Communist
30:31Party in fact for 40 years had been
30:35trying to control the Negro movement and
30:39that had always failed and that its
30:41efforts in connection with the march on
30:43Washington were infinitesimal this was
30:47not accepted by the director of the FBI
30:50he found that thinking wrong
30:54unacceptable and said that it must be
30:57changed and it was changed and then we
31:01find paper coming in in which the
31:03lower-level people in the FBI apologize
31:05for having misunderstood matters
31:07and on they go with this effort to
31:10discredit and start they do the bugs on
31:15dr. King
31:16the FBI sought to prevent the Pope from
31:20meeting with dr. King it intervened with
31:24a cardinal prevent Pope the Pope from
31:26meeting with dr. king
31:27it did and when the Pope despite despite
31:31that effort did meet with dr. King the
31:33FBI documents record the adverb
31:38astounding must have been posted on was
31:40it it was in 1964 and now someone's got
31:48to help me in there who was the Pope
31:50well was it Pope Paul in any event that
31:54effort didn't work the paranoia the
31:57belief that American citizens couldn't
32:00deal themselves with dr. King is
32:03indicated by this story at one point
32:06Governor Rockefeller was planning a trip
32:08to Latin America and the bureau felt
32:12that it had to approach governor
32:13rockefeller so he could be he was
32:16planning to see dr. King before going so
32:19that he could be warned of what a great
32:21danger dr. King was this effort went on
32:24and on and on each time that he was
32:26doing something important there was an
32:28effort to discredit him each person who
32:31the bureau felt could give further
32:34credit further for the recognition to
32:37dr. King an effort to stop that from
32:39happening the bureau went so far as to
32:42mail anonymous letters to dr. King and
32:45his wife which were mailed shortly
32:49before he was awarded the Nobel Peace
32:51Prize and finishes with this suggestion
32:58King there is only one thing left for
33:00you to do you know what it is you have
33:03just 34 days in which to do it this
33:05exact number has been selected for a
33:07specific reason it has definite
33:09practical significance it was 34 days
33:11before the award you were done
33:14I can interrupt that was taken by dr.
33:20King to mean a suggestion for suicide
33:22was a nightmare is Danny senator well
33:31that's a matter of dispute it was found
33:33in the files of mr. Sullivan who was the
33:37assistant director of the FBI and was
33:38heavily involved in these programs
33:40he claims that it's a plant in his files
33:43and that someone else in the Bureau in
33:45fact wrote the document the document
33:48which was found is a draft of the letter
33:50which was the anonymous letter which was
33:52actually sent is there any dispute that
33:54the letter did in fact come from the FBI
33:56we've heard no disputed then one thing
34:03that is very clear is we examined the
34:06King information is that the FBI has not
34:10only presumed to know an awful lot about
34:14the movement which dr. King headed but
34:17that many of its fumbling efforts many
34:20of its failures to convince people that
34:22dr. King should be discredited was born
34:26out of the ignorance and if you will the
34:29very clear racism at large then in the
34:32agency a particularly revealing aspect
34:37of the bureau's approach to the question
34:41even at a time when they were examining
34:43the so-called Negro question is
34:47evidenced by the response to a
34:51memorandum which then attorney general
34:53Kennedy wrote mr. Hoover mr. Kennedy
34:56wrote a memorandum asking mr. Hoover how
34:58many Negro special agents he had mr.
35:03Hoover wrote back
35:04we don't catalogue people by race creed
35:06or color and now reading for mr.
35:09Sullivan's transcript on the point it
35:13was assumed by mr. Hoover that this
35:14would take care of mr. Kennedy mr.
35:17Kennedy came back another very nice
35:18letter
35:19that's a little auditory attitude you're
35:21commended to have it but I still want to
35:24know how many Negro special agents do
35:26you have so we were in trouble it so
35:30happened that during the war he had five
35:32Negro chauffeurs so he automatically
35:35made them special agents did not matter
35:38whether they finished college or high
35:39school or grammar school or had a law
35:41degree so now we wrote back and said we
35:44have five then mr. Kennedy came back and
35:48said this was atrocious at the time
35:49according to mr. Sullivan
35:51the FBI have fifty five hundred special
35:53agents out of that number fifty five
35:57hundred and you only have five Negro
35:59agents mr. Solomon again of course we
36:02did not say in that memorandum that none
36:04of them conducted investigations they
36:06were just drivers
36:07this is 1961 any wonder that the FBI was
36:12later presumptuous enough to feel that
36:15it could determine the next new national
36:18Negro leader part of the problem is they
36:21attempted to translate the tactics used
36:23first against the Communist Party
36:25against virtually every perceived enemy
36:27as the bureau looked across the
36:30landscape and decided who should be
36:31neutralized discredited or destroyed
36:35some incredible testimony today before
36:37the Senate Intelligence Committee about
36:39FBI efforts to intimidate the late
36:42Martin Luther King and Nick hurich after
36:46looking at this testimony today I still
36:48find it unbelievable that a man of dr.
36:51King's stature would be subjected to the
36:53kind of harassment which which did occur
36:55why was he such a target well their main
37:00reason I suspect was that King had the
37:03audacity to criticize Jagger Hoover he
37:06went to Washington and in a speech said
37:09that they had not sent enough northern
37:12agents at his agents were the northern
37:14background to the south to deal with
37:15civil rights that the southern
37:17conservative agent was in cahoots with
37:20the police there and that these
37:21investigations as you recall there were
37:23murders and other things going on
37:25we're not being done properly
37:27nevertheless the reason that the bureau
37:31privately gave out for a long time was
37:33that King may have had some connection
37:35with the Communist money sources and
37:37they investigated this up one side and
37:39down the other and to my knowledge never
37:41established it they did trace out two
37:43men with some communist background who
37:45worked with him for a while but no real
37:47influence sandy was Hoover a bigger I
37:50think he was Paul I think I think that
37:52also played a role in this jagger was a
37:54man of the old south in 1954 he was
37:58absolutely devastated by the idea of the
38:00Supreme Court's decision in ordering
38:02desegregation of schools he he fought
38:05against the Bureau having a role in
38:06civil rights cases at that time time and
38:09again he declared within Bureau circles
38:11that as long as he lived there would be
38:13no black special agents of the FBI
38:15he was just determined he didn't think
38:17that black people could do the job and I
38:20think he was a genuinely prejudiced man
38:23in in the most old-fashioned way don't
38:26we have a notable irony here Hoover in
38:29attempting to disgrace Martin Luther
38:31King wound up disgracing himself well of
38:33course he did and and some of what was
38:36revealed today that he did and that was
38:39done and said on his behalf is a
38:42horrifying thing what a legacy Cooper's
38:44bigotry of course extended to Jews there
38:47were very few Jewish special agents and
38:49they had very limited hope of career and
38:51you can go through the management and
38:52you rarely find a guy who rose to a very
38:55senior job and Hoover had to be less I
38:57had to be more circumspect about that
38:59but most of his associate thought he was
39:01anti-semitic there is one interesting
39:03tidbit to the story of the so-called
39:04suicide letter that was sent to Martin
39:07Luther King I ran into one of Kings
39:10principal aides the congressman Andrew
39:13Young from Atlanta and he was telling me
39:16that that letter which was sent thirty
39:19four days before he received the Nobel
39:21Priest Peace Prize never actually got to
39:25Hoover until he had come home from
39:27Stockholm so it served absolutely no
39:29purpose this seems to be true of the
39:31number of the things that the bureau
39:33attempted to do and in some of these
39:34cases all they they had great ambitions
39:39to to scare people and to get away with
39:43things I think Nick mentioned one
39:45example before that was especially
39:46interesting oh yes they made the this
39:48talking about trying to stop the
39:49interview with the Pope as I understand
39:51it they really had no hope of doing it
39:52so the guy in Rome made a perfunctory
39:54call to the Vatican and then wrote a
39:56memo back as you know by the way this
39:58was not the first tape or not the last
40:01tape that they attempted to send to the
40:03Kings mrs. King received another tape in
40:06January
40:06Oh differently also on so-called
40:08unsavory matter I've talked to her about
40:10it she said she and Martin listen to it
40:13together and decided it wouldn't harm
40:14him but it was sent to her and I hope
40:16that she'd bring pressure on him by
40:18several agents in Washington but she
40:20didn't she did not there's another
40:22bizarre thing to which is equally
40:24unbelievable to me to the FBI truly
40:27believe that they could replace Martin
40:29Luther King with a leader of their own
40:31choosing I think the FBI and some of
40:33these circumstances Paul was a very
40:35naive about what it could accomplish I
40:38in many cases for example in
40:40investigating organizations that
40:42classified as being in the new left they
40:44really thought of people as having
40:45membership cards and membership lists
40:48and that you could you could just if you
40:50just found out about everybody you could
40:51take care of it the way you once could
40:53the Communist Party and I think probably
40:55the FBI thought that if it got out in
40:59the public certain negative things about
41:01Martin Luther King that there would be a
41:04spontaneous turning away from him people
41:06would reject him and somehow turn to
41:08someone else that they could manipulate
41:09this again it it was a matter of trying
41:12to organize and control social change in
41:14the country a role that is obviously a
41:17very unusual one for a law enforcement
41:18agency to take on of course the other
41:20problem here is that underlings
41:21exaggerate when you put a pressure on an
41:23underling you tell him to do something
41:24he he'll report back he nearly did it
41:26and that's what happened time and time
41:28again as I understand it field agents
41:29would get these ridiculous commands and
41:31write some memo back that they attempted
41:34to do it or they
41:35you know success well of course to a
41:37large extent the FBI's troubles are an
41:39outgrowth of its expanded role in
41:41helping to preserve internal security in
41:43this country as we all know the Bureau
41:46was originally set up as a
41:47crime-fighting agency but in 1939 in the
41:50directive by President Roosevelt it
41:52assumed a new task of seeing that the
41:55country's internal security was
41:57maintained in the face of a growing
41:58threat from fascism and communism in
42:021939 the FBI had an established an index
42:10called the security index which was a
42:14list of individuals both aliens and
42:16citizens I'm now quoting on whom there
42:19is information available to indicate
42:21that their presence at Liberty in this
42:23country in time of war or national
42:25emergency would be dangerous to the
42:27public peace and safety of the United
42:28States government the documents which
42:32notified all FBI offices of such lists
42:35and to prepare names indicated that the
42:39bureau should make certain that the fact
42:42was making such investigations does not
42:44become known to individuals outside of
42:46the bureau nevertheless the Department
42:50of Justice was then informed and in 1941
42:56the Department of Justice commenced to
42:58work with the bureau on classifying
43:00persons as to degree of dangerousness in
43:031943 however the Attorney General then
43:07in office mr. Biddle wrote a memorandum
43:11for J Edgar Hoover in which he
43:16instructed J Edgar Hoover to get rid of
43:20the lists and to stamp on each document
43:24in which a person had been given a
43:26classification for the purpose of being
43:28locked up the following legend this
43:31classification is unreliable it is
43:33hereby canceled and should not be used I
43:37turn e general Biddle
43:38I told J Edgar Hoover that after full
43:42reconsideration of these classifications
43:44I am satisfied that they serve no useful
43:46purpose
43:48there is no statutory authorization or
43:51other present justification for keeping
43:54a custodial detention list of citizens
43:56the department fulfills its proper
43:58functions by investigating the
44:00activities of persons who may have
44:03violated the law it is not aided in this
44:06work by classifying persons as to
44:07dangerousness now within a few days of
44:12that instruction very flat instruction
44:15from the Attorney General the director
44:18of the FBI indicated to all FBI agents
44:25that the instruction in effect indicated
44:30that the instruction should not be
44:31carried out he told them that what they
44:36should do is simply to change the label
44:38on the files from quote security man to
44:41clothes security matter and Hum quotes
44:45custodial detention and he instructed
44:49the agents of the FBI as follows that
44:51the bureau will also continue to prepare
44:55and maintain security index cards and
44:57this was for the same purpose of knowing
44:59who the bureau might lock up and he
45:01further instructed them the fact that
45:04the security index and security index
45:06cards are prepared and maintained should
45:08be considered as strictly confidential
45:09and should at no time be alluded to in
45:14investigative reports are discussed with
45:15agencies or individuals outside the
45:17bureau other than representatives of the
45:21military intelligence agencies who were
45:23going to be let in on the secret in 1948
45:29there was a new Attorney General in
45:31office and he contrary to attorney
45:36general Biddle who had instructed that
45:38this be turned off the new Attorney
45:40General in 1948 instructed the FBI to
45:45prepare an emergency detention program
45:48following something called the Attorney
45:50General's portfolio this included plans
45:54to suspend the writ of habeas corpus it
45:57included
45:58ultimately plans for a master warrant of
46:02arrest whereby on the signature of the
46:04Attorney General and only that signature
46:07and without reference to the courts
46:09thousands of people could be locked up
46:12have they continued to maintain these
46:17files for lockup purposes the key
46:22question is your last three words
46:23senator they have continued upon the
46:28agreement of the Department of Justice
46:30to maintain the same files the numbers
46:36have now been reduced to 1200 persons
46:39the name has been changed to something
46:44called the administrative index what
46:46purpose that serves and whether it still
46:49is used as a reserve list of persons to
46:53lockup I think we're going to have to
46:54ask the bureau and I can't give you a
46:56definitive answer well all of this has
47:00involved the FBI's domestic intelligence
47:03activities and some people have
47:05challenged the right of the FBI to
47:07engage in such activities sandy you're
47:11something of a legal scholar does the
47:13FBI have the authority in this area well
47:16thank you for the compliment public and
47:19more limited credentials I think that
47:21it's safe to say they do not have legal
47:23authority for specific tactics or
47:26specific intelligence investigations
47:29there is no law which says the FBI shall
47:32investigate a certain category of things
47:36in the intelligence area there is
47:38however every year since 1926 I believe
47:41in the annual appropriations bill for
47:45the Justice Department including the FBI
47:46a phrase which indicates that they may
47:50carry out any investigations that the
47:51Attorney General directs and that has
47:53long been considered a general mandate
47:55also is that too broad in Europe and
47:58well it's very broad I mean it could be
48:00interpreted to
48:01to permit almost any investigation and
48:04depends which attorney general what what
48:06his particular concerns are there is
48:08also still on the record this series of
48:12executive orders that President
48:13Roosevelt issued in 1939 when earlier
48:16one actually in 1936 another one in 1939
48:19renewed during the war renewed again by
48:21President Truman in a vague sort of way
48:23and again in some respects by President
48:25Eisenhower and in these executive orders
48:27from time to time the word subversive
48:30appears so that there is a kind of
48:32general mandate for the FBI the specific
48:36laws like the Internal Security Act of
48:381952 Smith Act are no longer really
48:40valid or on the books well how could you
48:42enact new laws Nick to guard against
48:45future of the abuses of the kind that
48:47we've been watching tonight I think one
48:49of the things that's going on in the
48:51Senate is they be they believe that the
48:53FBI is probably the proper place to put
48:55that and that sounds strange to put
48:57domestic intelligence activities rather
48:59than create for example a separate agent
49:01separate agency they're very wary of
49:03certain European examples where the
49:06agency that does counterintelligence
49:08become so secret it's like the CIA
49:10that's hard to control so what I think
49:13they want to do is to set up a role in a
49:17charter for the FBI and to work out a
49:22reporting function because a great deal
49:23of what they'd done was illegal so it's
49:25obviously silly purse to pass new laws
49:26it's illegal to write a forged letter to
49:29someone trying to extort them out of out
49:32of a government program
49:33well we always come back here it seems
49:35to me to a basic question and that is
49:37how all of this could have happened if
49:40the White House had done its job if the
49:42Justice Department had done its job if
49:44Congress had done its job and of course
49:46that leads to an even more basic
49:48question of whether all of these
49:50branches of government and agencies will
49:52do their job in the future
49:54well exactly Paul I think that one of
49:56the lessons of the testimony today and
49:58the material that's been coming out is
50:00that not any present up to the current
50:03time issued an order to the FBI and said
50:05stop doing these things
50:07not a single president from from
50:09Roosevelt on not a single Attorney
50:12General went that far now rather Clarke
50:15did ask them to cut back on some tactics
50:17but at the same time you were
50:18assume that the presidents knew about
50:20most of these activities well some of
50:22this material and and that the bureau
50:25was presenting that they were obtaining
50:27from illegal wiretapping and break-ins
50:29and some of the things that they were
50:31reporting back people would have had to
50:34be wearing blinders and earmuffs and and
50:37being out of their offices to avoid
50:40having at least some inference of what
50:43was going on and I think that that on
50:45Capitol Hill there were many people who
50:47wanted this to go on certainly certain
50:50parts of these activities the House
50:51Appropriations Committee I think was
50:53delighted with and and endorsed and as
50:55as Nick pointed out in our discussion
50:57earlier in at certain times the temper
51:01of the times was in favor of some of the
51:03things the girl was doing I also think
51:06to come back on this point about whether
51:08they knew I frankly don't think that
51:10hurried men in the White House really do
51:12know I watched 100 memos go by we're
51:14going to see that later in the
51:15assassination report which they're
51:16meaningless and so they must think then
51:18and imagine what the FBI is doing and if
51:20it's not doing anything so that it jumps
51:23up at them they won't stop it and I
51:24think Hoover was a master of presenting
51:26his agency so you couldn't tell them the
51:29enormity of what he was doing I believe
51:31of course some people knew and realized
51:33mr. Rooney is supposed to have no very
51:36great deal about what I don't think they
51:38can be excused though for not reading
51:39the paper that was for not having
51:41somebody read the paper that was coming
51:43their way but I on this question of
51:45whether there was a proper time it was
51:48not only time but the man's instincts
51:50the Johnson White House seemed to be
51:52very willing to let the FBI do say how
51:55does all of this affect the reputation
51:56first of Hoover and second the FBI
51:59I think Hoover is there obviously some
52:03people Paul who will always think that
52:05jancker Hoover was a hero and in some
52:08respects they will have some good
52:10material to go on he cleaned up an
52:12investigative agency that was very
52:13corrupt he he inaugurated federal action
52:18in the area of criminal investigation
52:20that was not being handled by the states
52:22but I'm afraid that in many other areas
52:25his reputation has suffered a great deal
52:27and and
52:28probably suffer more I think in our
52:30generation that Hoover is reputation and
52:32unfortunately is quite discredit to say
52:34unfortunately because there were
52:35valuable periods but he is discredited
52:37in anybody who grew up from 1960 on in
52:41college or but I think it's far more
52:44worrisome of what the a as you point
52:46what's the FBI's reputation how do you
52:48bring young men into to enforce the law
52:51to an agency that breaks the law
52:54routinely doesn't that rather eat away
52:57at their sensitive integrity I think
53:01it'll take time for some of these things
53:03to change so one of the big problems
53:05were left with of course is rebuilding
53:06the reputation of the FBI well for most
53:09of the hearing the members of the Senate
53:11committee sat silently listening to the
53:13documentation of abuses from staffers
53:15Schwartz and smothers one senator said
53:18he regarded the FBI wrongdoing is more
53:20serious than the CIA wrongdoing all were
53:23stunned and appalled by the disclosures
53:26and at day's end
53:27several gave vent to their feelings I've
53:30been told for years
53:33by among others some of my own family
53:39that this is exactly what the bureau was
53:42doing all the time and in my great
53:45wisdom and high office
53:48I assured them they were
53:56on pot this just wasn't true
54:00couldn't happen they wouldn't do it
54:10what you described is a series of
54:12illegal actions intended squarely to
54:20deny First Amendment rights to some
54:22Americans that's what my children have
54:26told me was going on now I didn't
54:29believe it the trick now as I said
54:34mature it is for this committee to be
54:39able to figure out how to persuade the
54:43people of this country that indeed it
54:45did go on and how shall we ensure that
54:51it never happened again and I would hope
54:55as we lead to the strengthening of the
54:57FBI and the criminal field we impose
55:00very clear and unquestioned emmitt so
55:05that this kind of unrestrained illegal
55:12secret intimidation and harassment of
55:17the of the essential ability of
55:20Americans to participate freely in
55:24American political life shall never
55:25happen again
55:27seems to me that we have moved away from
55:29concern by the bureau for actual actions
55:35that might be violent or might be
55:38criminal toward action toward ideas that
55:43might be unpopular or may not be
55:45acceptable to some people within the
55:48bureau or perhaps within the
55:51administration
55:52the FBI has never had a statute clearly
55:56defining its authority
56:01and after all these many years this is
56:03the first serious congressional
56:05investigation of its activities and we
56:10have seen today the dark side of those
56:12activities where many Americans who were
56:18not even suspected of crime we're not
56:24only spied upon but they were harassed
56:30they were discredited and at times
56:36endangered through the covert operations
56:43of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
56:49such revelations place the serious
56:53responsibilities upon this committee to
56:57see to it that that can't happen again
57:03to which we can only paraphrase the
57:05words of Justice Brandeis who said the
57:08government must always be the teacher if
57:10the government breaks the law then every
57:12man is encouraged to break the law and
57:14the result is anarchy tomorrow
57:17the FBI gives its side as the Senate
57:20hearings continue and Public Television
57:23again will provide the highlights
57:25tomorrow night until then for Nicholas
57:28Herrick and Sanford Unger
57:30I'm Paul Duke saying good night
57:35[Music]
57:55[Music]
58:08[Applause]
58:08[Music]
58:15[Music]
58:19[Applause]
58:24this program was produced by impact a
58:27division of WETA
58:28which is solely responsible for its
58:30content and was funded by public
58:32television stations the Ford Foundation
58:34and the Corporation for Public
58:36Broadcasting
58:42[Music]

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