1981 Jimmy Carter - FBI Charter Act of 1979

Since 1976, the Federal Bureau of Investigation has been running under set of guidelines outlined by Attorney General Edward H. Levi in 1976 along with piecemeal legislation and executive orders, leaving significant leeway to the prerogative of its own leadership.  Often, the FBI has become a tool of the executive branch, sometimes at the request of either Senate or House committees.   In 1979, in responding to massive controversial intelligence activities of both the CIA and the FBI into the anti-war movements uncovered in 1974, President Jimmy Carter proposed the FBI Charter Act of 1979 to "govern all the investigative and law enforcement functions of the Federal Bureau of Investigation". The proposal never became law.

On December 22, 1974, the New York Times ran a sensational headline: 

"HUGE C.I.A. OPERATION REPORTED IN U.S. AGAINST ANTIWAR FORCES, OTHER DISSIDENTS IN NIXON YEARS".
In the Times report, Seymor Hersh reported that the CIA conducted a massive and illegal domestic intelligence operation under the Nixon administration to infiltrate antiwar and other dissident groups in the United Sates.   The article claimed that files on least 10,000 American citizens were maintained by a special unit directly under the Director of the Central Intelligence agency, Richard Helms.  Seymor reported that one program code named 'Operation Chaos' had begun in 1967 under President Lyndon Johnson to investigate collusion of the anti-Vietnam War movement with foreign governments.   Operation Chaos was expanded under Nixon before being terminated by the CIA in 1974.   In response, the US Senate created a committee to investigate these operations known as the Church Committee.  It was chaired by Senator Frank Church, a Democrat from Ohio.  The committee held public hearings about abuses by the each of the intelligence agencies including both the CIA and the FBI.  The Church Committee hearings revealed sensational revelations of CIA assassination plots and civil rights violations.

In response to the Church Committee findings and similar findings from the Pike Committee formed in the U.S. House of Representatives, Attorney General Levi issued a set of guidelines in 1976 called the FBI Domestic Security Investigation Guidelines.  These guidelines were a landmark in oversight of the FBI which operated with very little oversight since 1924 when J. Edgar Hoover was first appointed FBI Director.   While, these guidelines were a major step forward, they did not have the full force of law as they would under a Congressional act.  To shore up and strengthen these guidelines, President Jimmy Carter proposed the FBI Charter Act of 1979.  Carter described his proposal in a special message to the Congress on July 31, 1979.  Carter told Congress that his proposal would "govern all the investigative and law enforcement functions of the Federal Bureau of Investigation" and "would bring together in one statute the authorities and responsibilities that the FBI now exercises as a matter of custom and practice."  According to his address, the FBI has been running on no more than a one-paragraph 1908 law that gave little restriction to the actions of the bureau, allowing controversial actions such as those directed to Martin Luther King Jr, and others sensationalized by the Church Committee hearings.  This was no surprise to Congress, since Carter had called for a clear and binding charter for the FBI during his campaign.   Carter expressed the need to recognize the vital function that the FBI services, but also wanted the public to be assured that they are acting properly under the law.

Included in Carter proposal were a number of guidelines including the following.

1. "[T]he investigative power of the FBI should be limited to the detection, prevention and prosecution of federal crimes. This will prevent the unrestricted accumulation of information concerning individuals not suspected of criminal conduct."
2. Balance the "true needs of law enforcement and the civil liberties guaranteed by our Constitution"
3. Required that "facts and circumstances that reasonably indicate" a criminal violation exist before an investigation can begin.

In January of 1981, President Carter took a moment to urge Congress to give the  FBI Charter Act some early attention.

"The Congress must give early attention to a number of important bills which remain. These bills would: 

• •strengthen the laws against discrimination in housing. Until it is enacted, the 1968 Civil Rights Act's promise of equal access to housing will remain unfulfilled; 

• establish a charter for the FBI and the intelligence agencies. The failure to define in law the duties and responsibilities of these agencies has made possible some of the abuses which have occurred in recent years; 

• establish privacy safeguards for medical research, bank, insurance, and credit records; and provide special protection for election fund transfer systems."

The Charter was introduced in both the House and the Senate, but no full vote was taken and the charter never became law.  Without a full charter, the FBI has continued to operate under the Guidelines issued by Attorney General Levi in 1976.  In 2015, the agency had more than 12,000 employees working on counter terrorism and counterintelligence plus an additional 7,000 working on intelligence.   Without a legislative charter, the FBI's mandate has grown to cover a wide range of national security matters including organized crime, public corruption and civil-rights violations.  The guidelines and procedures are defined by an piecemeal collection of congressional acts, executive order sand the prerogatives of its own leadership.  Without a well-defined charter the FBI has often been charged with overstepping its bounds, especially when it becomes a tool of the executive branch often at the request of the Senate and house committees.

References

Presidency.ucsb.edu. (2018). Jimmy Carter: The State of the Union Annual Message to the Congress. [online] Available at: http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=44541 [Accessed 27 Sep. 2018].

Presidency.ucsb.edu. (2018). Jimmy Carter: Federal Bureau of Investigation Message to the Congress Transmitting Proposed Legislation.. [online] Available at: http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=32676 [Accessed 27 Sep. 2018].

Council on Foreign Relations. (2018). What Is the FBI’s Role in National Security?. [online] Available at: https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/fbis-role-national-security [Accessed 27 Sep. 2018].

Hersh, S. (2018). HUGE C.I.A. OPERATION REPORTED IN U.S. AGAINST ANTIWAR FORCES, OTHER DISSIDENTS IN NIXON YEARS. [online] Nytimes.com. Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/1974/12/22/archives/huge-cia-operation-reported-in-u-s-against-antiwar-forces-other.html [Accessed 27 Sep. 2018].

Tourek, M. (2018). Attorney General Levi Issues FBI Domestic Security Investigation.... [online] Today in Civil Liberties History. Available at: http://todayinclh.com/?event=attorney-general-levi-issues-fbi-domestic-security-investigation-guidelines [Accessed 27 Sep. 2018].

Tourek, M. (2018). Senate Creates Church Committee to Investigate Abuses by.... [online] Today in Civil Liberties History. Available at: http://todayinclh.com/?event=senate-creates-church-committee-to-investigate-abuses-of-americans-rights [Accessed 27 Sep. 2018].
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