Lobby Scores Reagan ‘Secrecy Obsession’

A liberal citizens lobby assailed the Reagan Administration Thursday for an “obsession with secrecy” and said a new opinion poll shows that 68% of Americans believe “the government is not open enough.”

In a 142-page report, People for the American Way criticized the Administration for issuing more than 280 “secret laws,” increasing the Pentagon’s “black budget” for secret projects to at least $22 billion, binding millions of federal employees to secrecy contracts and reversing a 30-year trend toward fewer classified documents.

The organization, which spearheaded opposition to the Supreme Court nomination of Robert H. Bork, particularly denounced the “extraordinary power” of the Office of Management and Budget. It decried the agency’s authority to decide which government publications are released, to set up information collection policies for all federal agencies and to rewrite federal regulations and studies.

‘Health Risks Perpetuated’

Because of OMB actions rejecting proposed regulations, “health risks have been perpetuated, the workplace has become less safe and government resources for citizens have been eliminated,” People for the American Way charged.

The group called for:

--Keeping Congress and certain federal agencies better apprised of covert intelligence activities.

--Requiring the President to inform Congress of national security decision directives, or “secret laws” such as the one issued by Reagan governing clandestine arms sales to Iran. The directives, signed by the President, order changes in U.S. foreign policy and no notification of other branches of government is required.

--Returning to pre-Reagan policies designed to reduce the number of documents stamped “top secret” or “confidential.”

Pre-Publication Review

--Changing Reagan policies that require government employees, federal contractors and federally funded university researchers to sign lifetime pre-publication review contracts.

--Reducing both the power and staff of OMB.

“The secrecy system, as it has been nurtured by the executive branch over the last 40 years and with special zeal over the last seven years, is the indispensable ally and instrument of the Imperial Presidency,” Harvard historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. wrote in a preface to the report.

He said the government has, under the guise of preventing sensitive disclosures to foreign governments, used secrecy to cover up “the embarrassments, blunders, follies and crimes of the ruling regime.”

Accompanying the report were results from a recent national poll on secrecy issues commissioned by the group and conducted by the Roper Organization.

Openness Important

More than 90% of those surveyed said they believe that openness in government is important for people to be able to participate as citizens; to prevent waste, fraud and abuse; to produce better laws and policies, and to help Congress better perform its oversight functions. A majority (60%) said they want their government to “aggressively work to open the flow of government information to the public,” while a minority (30%) would rather “continue current policies.”

The survey respondents also opposed efforts to cut back information available under the Freedom of Information Act (67%), regulations allowing censorship of the writings of current and former federal employees (60%), and the increase of documents classified as “secret” (59%).

However, the public appears to be more willing to accept restrictions on information when military operations are involved. When asked about “news blackouts on military operations, such as the invasion of Grenada,” 51% approved of them, while 44% did not.