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WASHINGTON - Patrick Henry said it best among the Founding generation when he observed in 1787 that “The liberties of a people never were, nor ever will be, secure when the transactions of their rulers may be concealed from them.” Today is the 40th anniversary of the Freedom of Information Act, the law that perhaps more than any other applies Henry’s wise maxim to the federal government.
The FOIA was signed into law July 4, 1966, by President Lyndon Johnson after an 11-year struggle by the measure’s major supporters in Congress and the mainstream news media. The law’s major sponsor and the era’s main advocate for increasing citizen access to government was Rep. John Moss, D-Calif. A key co-sponsor for the measure in the U.S. House of Representatives was an obscure Republican congressman who is now Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld.
LBJ was at best a reluctant signer of the original FOIA. Although he said “no one should be able to pull the curtains of secrecy around decisions which can be revealed without injury to the public interest,” Johnson devoted a major portion of his signing statement to explaining why it shouldn’t be taken too far. Thus it has always been with public officials, who like to talk about democracy and the public’s right to know how its business is being conducted, at least until the transparency and accountability made possible by the FOIA strikes their particular corner of the government.
Another measure that continues the spirit and expands the scope of government transparency pioneered by the FOIA is now before Congress. It is the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act (S. 2590) co-sponsored by senators Tom Coburn, R-Okla., Barack Obama, D-Ill., Tom Carper, D-Del., and John McCain, R-Ariz. The FFATA would put virtually all federal spending within a few mouse clicks for every citizen, subject to reasonable exemptions for considerations like national security, law enforcement and personal privacy.
