“13-00000 ARRB 0007 aa TUE 14:38 EAX 202 724 0457 -6- III. The Mechanics of Declassification Declassification involves more than appropriate standards for the release of information. It also calls for the establishment of effective mechanisms to move records through the ”
“13-00000 @009 ARRD -8- is essential for completing its work. Third, the legislation should incorporate a statutory provision that, at a certain point in time, records will presumptively be opened unless the agencies are able to articulate specific and persuasive reasons ”
“13-00000 0008 AKKE -7- and the circumstances surrounding the creation of records. It is important that an agency with supervisory responsibility over declassification have the authority to obtain the information it needs to accomplish its work. Third, as with the referra”
“referral process: (a) establishing joint-declassification sessions where several agencies convened at the Review Board offices (or sometimes at another site) and declassified records; (b) hand-carrying records from one agency to another and having them declassified on-site; an”
“13-00000 Even the high-level executive branch officials who are members of the Interagency Security Classification Appeals Panel have been flummoxed by the . difficulties in coordinating the declassification of information controlled under the Atomic Energy Act. This is part”
“statute.1The statute creating the ARRB provides that after it has made a finding with regard to documents obtained or developed solely within the executive branch, the President has the sole and nondelegable authority to require the disclosure or postponement of such record ”
“security breech. Previously withheld information from the Church Committee hearings and from the Presidential libraries declared relevant by the ARRB will be titillating and may stimulate FOIA requests, but the variance from FOIA rules was not a legal justification for withh”
“13-00000 V D by either the History Staff, the Historical Review Program, or more recently by the Publications Review Board -- pursuant to the personal manuscript standards to allow declassification or the creation of an unclassified version. By deeming or marking a given a”
“agency does not want to release information that inhibits other agencies from releasing information. Like the COMMO example from Illustration 1 above, the perception of unwillingness to open records is sometimes greater than the need to keep records closed. Second, the Revie”
“the natural disinclination to release information that has been painstakingly acquired. Ultimately, secrecy becomes a habit and declassification is mired in lack of attention and inertia. There is, however, an important and encouraging message that comes out of the Board's exp”
“construing such law, or common law doctrine that would otherwise prohibit" the disclosure of information subject to the Act. ARCA § 11(a). This language, taken with the provisions discussed below which limit the intelligence sources and methods that may be protected and set a”
“legal requirement to presume release, backed up by an independent review, resulted in the opening of documents that clearly would not have been released under other programs. However, the Act and the Review Board created by the Act imposed un realistic deadlines, inflexible”
“the approach that I have described for historical declassification. Although the task force will have to explore the difference between current documents that often are requested under FOIA and 30-year-old documents that are placed into the historical review program, our inte”
“intercepts of communications related to Cuban military alerts after the assassination. It was originally unavailable to the public in any form and was exempt from declassification. After Board action, the important information has been released. Illustration 9. See Exhibit G.”
“13-00000 ARKD 004 -3 - categories of information exempt from release (although the clear articulation of such categories is important), but the allocation of the burden of proof to the ■ party that seeks to exempt information from release. Because these four points are I”
“the Review Board. The initial cost can be recuperated in the long run. When an independent agency, such as the Review Board, has the authority to set the agenda (by establishing timetables), sponsor joint declassification sessions, require the production of evidence, and ens”
“ultimately withdrew its appeals and negotiated with the Review Board for resolution of the issues. Without exception, every formal determination ultimately made by the Review Board has prevailed and records have been released in accordance with Board decisions. It has now been”
“these papers declassified and released, and to open what remains classified to outside, non-governmental review. It is against this background that, in response to the committee’s request, I cite our few technical reservations about the mechanism established by the joint reso”
“of information subject to the Act. ARCA § 11(a). This language, taken with the provisions discussed below which limit the intelligence sources and methods that may be protected and set a strict procedural scheme by which information is to be reviewed under the ARCA, effective”
“preserving secrets. In order to facilitate declassification, S. 712 requires agencies to articulate their reasons for initial classifications and for exemptions from declassification. For example, Section 4(c)(2)(A) would require the agency to "provide in writing a detailed j”
“13-00000 8 communications intercepts might not be the same as those for searching the much less voluminous files of CTA stations and: headquarters divisions. The Board could try, however, to ensure comparative uniformity in the diligence of searches. The Board could try a”
“national security protected, and the intelligence services' duty to safeguard those secrets and the sources and methods that produce them. nlOO - - - • • • - • • • - -Footnotes- - - • - - - nioo. See DuVal, supra note 14, at 580-91. - • - - - - - - • - • - • - -End Footno”
“13-00000 SECRET SUBJECT: The JFK Declassification Experience Develop and keep updating written guidelines, including those for coordinating third-agency documents Establish early what is already in the public domain., Take a fresh look at the "official release" philosoph”
“upon the President’s authority and flexibility to manage the classification and declassification programs. Legislating in this area can be perilous, given the great deference traditionally given to the President in the areas of national defense and foreign affairs. 4”
“has officially been over for several years now, we still face the challenges of adapting the inherited structures of that era to the present day. Fixing the classification system is foremost among those challenges. It is only natural that any significant changes to the status”
“are both sensitive to the genuine secrets of the agencies, but who also are skeptical and demanding of proof. Second, the independent entity should have the power to set reasonable timetables by which an agency must complete the declassification review (or referral review). ”
“13-00000 protects too many documents by classifying them as SECRET and TOP SECRET."1 In other words, concern about excessive government secrecy is not simply’the province of “special interest” groups; it is shared throughout the general public. Reducing government secrecy t”
“known to the public, ignorance of what has already been declassified and released, and counterproductive stonewalling these factors have caused trouble and will cause more trouble as the "Information Age" matures. 22. (C) In 1976, then DDI Ed Proctor wrote to the DCI, citing”
“release each issue are discussed below. information obtained from a technical source. ‘ In response to the FBI's overarching argu B. Post-appeal decisionmaking. After fur ment that disclosure of the information ther negotiations, the Review Board and the would reveal sensi”
“system, with its limitations on classification and its emphasis on declassifying information as soon as it is prudent to do so. 3”
“C outlines declassification procedures for classified records retired to the National Archives.) c. NARA's professional archivists will bring this collection under control (as they have done with the 4000 cubic feet of disorganized OSS records that CIA has retired since 1984), so”
“13-00000 On the one hand, it seeks to reduce the permitted level of secrecy within our Government, and to make available to the American people hundreds of millions of pages of historically valuable documents that no longer require protection in the interest of national s”
“13-00000 • • APR 04 '97 10:05AM P. 18/44 PAGE 18 i 56 Md. L. Rev. 1, *15 n90. The legislative history and congressional discussion of the need for the Board can be found in H.R. Rep. No. 102-625, pt. 1, at 6; H.R. Rep. No. 102-625, pt. 2, at 7 (1992); H.R. Rep. No. 103-587”
“13-00000 @005 404 AKKB -4- covered other topics. Finally, an officlai said: "I don't see why it can't be released. This is an issue for COMMO [COMMO is the Communications Office.] Someone ask COMMO whether it cares.” COMMO was subsequently asked - and it had no objection ”
“the final decision maker on declassification; second, the independent declassification entity should be informed, committed, and skeptical; third, in order for declassification to be successful, there must be internal institutional incentives to declassify information; and ”
“13-00000 SECRET SUBJECT: THE JFK DECLASSIFICATION EXPERIENCE 3. Considerable skepticism in the public, the media, and, unfortunately, the Congress results from the in-house conclusion that denial is justifiable in the absence of "official acknowledgment" of Executive Bra”
“the number of documents made secret and shortening the number of years they remain classified. nl36 The primary element of the order is the automatic. declassification without review of most documents that are twenty-five years old or older. nl37 Previously, documents had rem”
“security classified records with a view to their declassification and public disclosure, in whole or in part, at some time in the future. ’ a) Can you describe what prior experience you have had, if any, with using or examining security classified records of the Federal Gover”
“13-00000 submit some of the relevant records, he or she has authority to question the agencies and to* use the subpoena power of the Review Board to obtain any additional records. The Executive Director, assisted by employees of the Review Board and, if deemed necessary, d”
“13-00000 . . APR 04 '97 10:07AM P.24/44 PAGE 24 2 56 Md. L. Rev. 1, *20 wants to review for possible release, but it does not have the resources to do so. nl30 For more than fifty years, the Department followed a scheme of classification that might best be called "classif”
“any relevant material. I have made no public statements. a) Can you describe what prior experience you have had, if any, with using or examining security classified records of the Federal Government? From 1968 to 1969 I served as an officer in the United States Army, a pos”
“13-00000 disclosure of certain classified information, including the JFK Assassination Records Collection Act (P.L. 102-526) and legislation concerning the State Department’s . Foreign Relations of the United States series (P.L. 102-138). In addition, Congress has granted it”
“13-00000 Attached is a copy of the Australian Demarche on U.S. legislation on declassification. This was given to the U.S. Ambassador to Australia, Ambassador Perkins,by Philip Flood, then Director of the Office of National Assessments (ONA) in September 1995. This demarc”
“13-00000 appropriate solution.15 2. A National Declassification Center The proposed National Declassification Center is a response to the fragmented quality of declassification policy, and to the inadequacy of executive branch oversight, which the Secrecy Commission descr”
“13-00000 . , APR 04 '97 10:06AM P. 19/44 PAGE 19 56 Md. L. Rev. 1, *16 [hereinafter Effectiveness of Public Law 102-526]. The presumption was always to be in favor of opening a document rather than postponing it, thus making postponement the exception rather than the rule ”
“to protect from release the the information at issue even when there has been widespread public discussion on the issue in question.- 6. be (S) In this case, should there by a question raised as to the classification status of documents on the political program referred to ”
“13-00000 The fact that agency classification policies often cannot withstand scrutiny even within the executive branch points to the root of the problem. The problem is not that classifiers are dishonest or acting in bad faith; in general, they are doing a thankless job the ”
“13-00000- CHAPTER 5: THE STANDARDS FOR "REVIEW: REVIEW BoaRD "common LAW” individual who has provided or is currently nation records contain information that providing information pertaining to national reveal many of the FBI's foreign counterintel security matters, the dis”
“13-00000 hearings and subpoena records and witnesses. The Review Board would have final say as to the release or non-release of all materials, except that in the case of Executive branch materials, the President would have the authority to supersede the Board's determinati”
“13-00000 0012 10 policies. I believe the procedure just outlined could be applied much more widely. A statute could declare that all government records more than thirty years old would become public unless e originating agency showed specific cause for continued non-disc”