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    "label": "Memorandum for the Hoey Subcommittee Sex Pervert Investigation File from Stephen Spingarn",
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    "title": "Memorandum for the Hoey Subcommittee Sex Pervert Investigation File from Stephen Spingarn",
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    "productionDates": [
        {
            "day": 10,
            "logicalDate": "1950-07-10",
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    "ocrText": "RESTRICTED\nJuly 10, 1950\nMemorandum for the Hoey Subcommittee Sex\nPervert Investigation File\nDate\nMr. Francis Flanagan, Chief Counsel of the Hoey Sub-\ncommittee, came in to see me Saturday morning, July 8, and\nspent about an hour and a half discussing the investigation\nwith me. He said that Senator Hoey had asked him to do SO.\nUNCLASSIFIED\nI went over the same ground with him that Mr. Webb,\nMr. Murphy and I had gone over with Mr. Hoey.\nMr. Flanagan apparently intends to start off with\nthe security officer testimony rather than the medical testimony.\nHe said he had talked to a lot of the doctors and that he did\nSignature\nnot think they had a practical approach to the matter. He said\nthey talked in terms of a large percentage of the male population\nhaving homosexual tendencies, whereas he was thinking only in\nterms of overt acts. I tried to give him the medical picture\nas I saw it, but I'm afraid I was not very successful.\nHe told me that from preliminary conversations with\nthe security people they were not able to produce much dope in\ndocumented instances in which homosexualism had endangered\nsecurity, except that CIA had some World War I instances of this\nalthough apparently in other countries. Despite the lack of\ndocumentation he seemed convinced that homosexualism represents\na serious security threat and my suggestion that it should be\nsquared up against other types of security threats by individuals\nresulting from normal sexual or non-sexual activity did not seem\nto impress him much.\nHe raised the question of getting names and files from\nthe agencies. I told him what we had told Senator Hoey -- that\nthis would put the matter squarely in the President's lap and we\nhoped this would not be necessary, that we would have no objection\nto the agencies furnishing statistics on the matter, which he is\nin fact already collecting. He said that Senator Mundt or other\nminority members of the Committee might be insistent on this.\nHe himself did not see how the Subcommittee could determine\nwhether the existing method of handling this problem was ade-\nquate unless they could look at some files on a sampling basis.\nIn any event, they are getting the police records of\nthe Washington Police on arrests and convictions in this field\nand will make a check to determine how many of the people in\nthis group are Government employees or have been. If any of\nthese are employed by the Government, this would seem to re-\nquire that the employing agency report to the Subcommittee how\nit has handled the particular case.\n- 2 -\nAs far as the sampling look at the files is concerned,\nI suggested only as my personal opinion the possibility that\nthe agencies might furnish memoranda summarizing individual files\nwithout mentioning any names. This would give the Subcommittee\nthe necessary information as to how the determination of homo-\nsexualism had been made and what had been done about the matter.\nFlanagan said that would probably satisfy him, but he seemed\ndoubtful that it would satisfy Senator Mundt. He suggested\nthat Mundt might say that the agencies had not given an accurate\naccount of what was in the files (which is, of course, what\nSenator McCarthy said about the loyalty files).\nFlanagan said he would keep in touch with me in con-\nnection with the investigation. I have the impression that we\nmay have some difficulties from his direction because he seems\nto have pre-judged one of the central issues that the Subcommittee\nhas to decide, namely, how serious the threat is of the homosexual\nemployees, particularly in relationship to other types of security\nthreats. Flanagan seemsstrongly committed to the position that\nthe homosexual is the most serious security threat of all, and\nhe seems to regard the fact that there is scant documentation of\nthis as an unfortunate accident. On the basis of my experience\nas a counter espionage and security officer during the war, I\npersonally am of the opinion (I believe I can cite chapter and\nverse to support it) that other types of security threats are\nmore dangerous than the homosexual, although no doubt he repre-\nsents one type.\nS.J.S.\nS.J.S.\nCc: murphy\nDawson\nmalety\nElsey - Beer- Lloyd- Hecher\nMenstast"
}