CIA ASKING HILL TO CUT BACK PUBLIC ACCESS TO AGENCY'S FILES

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP99-00498R000100190041-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: March 14, 2007
• Sequence Number: 41
• Publication Date: February 29, 1980
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Approved For Release 2007/03/15: CIA-RDP99-00498R0001
IItTICL-
oil PAG3 .r_ THE WASHINGTON POST
29 February 1980
...By George Lardner Jr:'
Washington Post Stair writer
On June 8, 1965, a CIA. security offi
cer met with an informant in the Hil-
ton Hotel in downtown Washington to
'discuss the progress of his spying on -
the civil rights movement and espe-
cially on the Rev. Martin Luther King
Jr.
The meeting, which lasted .nearly
four hours, dealt with "highly deroga-
' tory information" involving King and
allegations, of "communist-directed. in-
filtration into the movement," accord
'Inc., to a nine-page memo prepared the
`next day for the chief of CIA's Secu
'city Research Staff.. The highly placed*
Informant, who-had "long provided in-
formation on the Negro civil rights
movement and its leaders" to the CIA,
promised to stay in touch. He empha-
sized he, did-not -want to be ",down-
graded" by,being- asked to report .to..
the FBI. .
The CIA's spying on King, which,
'produced a file including some, of his
haberdashery bills, Diners' Club. re-
ceipts and notes. listing -phone calls
and appointments, was never.. dis-
closed in the extensive congressional
or executive branch investigations of.
the agency conducted in recent years.
It has come to light solely as the. re-
sult of litigation under the Freedom
of Information Act (FOIA). _
Thousands of documents on CIA ac-
tivities-from reports on--President
Kennedy's assassination. to-controver-
sial mind-control experiments and
tither excesses---have been made.pub
lie under FOIA since' the'agency was
-effectively,brought .under the law five
'years 'ago:
` "Now the CIA is seeking to' halt' all
but the most limited discloMires. Un-
der a bill pending in both the House
-and the Senate, the agency has asked-
for' an "extraordinary-exemption ? that
.,would put- its operational and techni-
caI' files almost -completely-, beyond
--reach of FOIA. Even illegal activities,
it appears,"could.be legally covered up.
Public inquiries could -1 be.. rejected
without any -inspection' of. the:?-docu
'"ments - sought:'- Lawsuits `would be
fruitless. The. files would be immune
from court action, exceptfor individu
als seeking?recordsabout themselves..
The CIA has described the proposal
in more modest terms. According to.
'CIA Deputy' Director Frank Carlucci.
.,the bill would provide only "a limited
-exemption to protect our most sensi-
tive inform ation." He maintains that
the loss to the public from the re-
moval of :'these files from:the FO IA
-process would be minimal..'.:..
Despite such assurances,' the law
has forced the CIA to release a-great
deal of information that would still be .
buried in the agency's files if the bill
it wants had been the prevailing rule.
Some documents that have been
made public expand, or contradict.
'what the CIA reported in the 1975-76
investigations. Some deal with. issues_
that the investigators never touched,
such as the CIA's spying on Dr. King. .
(That was disclosed in an FOIA law-
suit brought by author-critic-EHarold
"Item: The CIA. told the -.Church
committee that the records for MK-
ULTRA, the agency's premier mind:
control- program, had- been destroyed-
in 1973, reportedly with concurrence'
of then-director Richard Helms.
Some 16,000;pages---of records deal-
ing with MKULTR A` and other CIA
experiments-.with::exotic drugs were'
subsequently- unearthed and; turned'
- aver.to-.John Masks, a former State.
'Department :employe and.-frequent
CIA critic, under- the Freedom of Ih:'
formation Act
Testifying' about some of the newly
ziiscovered=documents in 1977, CIA Di-
--rector Stansfield Turner said they
showed the .CIA carried out 149 pro-.
jects-involving drug testing, behavior `.
modification:.a.:nd secret- administra-
tion of mind altering drugs at 80
Weisberg-of.: Frederick, If hospitals, research'foundations and.-
Item: The Rockefeller Commission, prisons. But he? assured Congress that
appointed by-President Ford??in' 1975
to investigate ;ClA activities in. the
United'States, came' across`a prograiii
'started `1967 by the CIA's -Office of
Security "to identify -threats to CIA
personnel, projects and installations,
-especially those stemming from the
antiwar: movement on college. cam- :
-puses..... _ ;.
The commission -was. satisfied that
-the- operation ."used no infiltrators,,
.penetrators or monitors"?, and, relied'
primarily on press clippings,'. campus:
.officials and police authorities.
,Records :later 'released under;, thp~
Freedom of Information- Act about the
.program,. which the CIA. styled "Pro-
:ject Resistance,"; show that 'it '.used
confidential informants repeatedly in
.Texas, -California,;.Washington,, D.C.,
and elsewhere. The CIA file even - in-
eluded a blank '."Confidential 'Infor-
mant Identification" form for'Project
Resistance-
-Item: The Senate investigating com-
inittee headed by Frank. Church (D-
-Idaho).said.in its final.report that Pros
jest Resistance, ,which..lasted_.until
1973,..:eventualiy,,deveIo fl;;a` itation?
wide-lndex of;12;000;to;16;000_names.
But according to records later made
-put,lic under .FOIA,-=the `CIA's"Office
'of 'Security indexed 50,000 'members .
of'the California-, Peace' 7and.,Freedom~,'
Party -'alone, primarily- `college. stu-
dents ?i-n,yust:two.counties`
most completely phased out in the
mid-1960s... r-' s
According 'to Marks;:- who- : kept:'
wrote a book. on the subject, the CIA-
replaced MKULTItA - -with- another
-vide-ranging, , supersecret ..behavior
the 1970s under the agency's Office of
ered "130 boxes"- of mind control. ma-
ing to: find out what is in,.them, beyond
a few - "trivial documents" that w ere
"They've been diddling me ever
already repealed the FOIA,?at least as
erne.- ?-
? l - _
onc
. cret war in. Laos was .reflected In still'.
lion "was set down Oct. 30,_ 1969,- in a
gressionalinquiries on the issue, espe-
STAT