equal opportunity problems and employment. In Illinois police community relations were dealt with. In Indiana the problems of migrant workers were dealt with, and State after State after State reported on progress it has made with citizens working of their own volition and participating with these committees.

Is it going to save money? This has to be the next question. The

answer is no.

OMB itself has said that they will not save money by eliminating these committees.

I would wager to say that when you go to a regional committee, when you go to 10 regional committees, the amount of transportation that will be involved in order to continue reaching into these various States within the regions, the length of time, the number of staff, I would wager to say we might see an increase in cost if they continue to do the job the 51 committees are doing right now.

Another question to be asked is whether we are going to improve this relationship and the contact with people, the sensitivity which has to be built in. Again I have to say no, because we are talking about regional committees as opposed to State committees.

I think people in Mississippi understand the problems there; people in Massachusetts understand their problems. They have to be sensitive to them and they are the ones best able to lay the groundwork for civil rights enforcement in those areas.

Therefore, I guess the last question is whether it helps the administration add a few committees to their list, having wiped out a few advisory committees so that they can say, "We have wiped out 40 advisory committees."

Yes; I guess you have to say that is true. However, is that the most important thing if, in fact, the committees work and if in fact there are no cost savings involved, and if in fact these committees serve the purpose with regard to the civil rights enforcement?

Therefore, I would really urge this committee to take a close look at

this.

I have introduced legislation on the House side to retain the State committees, H.R. 10501, and I would ask permission of the chairman to introduce that legislation in the text of my testimony before the committee.

Senator BAYH. So ordered.

Mr. PANETTA. I think these committees do work. There is no cost saving involved in eliminating them. Most importantly, they serve a very, very valuable role in making sure we are all sensitive to civil rights enforcement and that we can continue the progress which has been made in this area.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would be happy to answer any questions.

Senator BAYH. Thank you. You answered the main question I was going to direct to you, and this was with regard to State advisory versus the regional approach. What we are trying to do is to see to it that the Commission's civil rights effort is properly staffed and funded and that it reaches where it is needed in every community.

I am glad to see you have introduced specific legislation, and it is something this committee will seriously consider. I appreciate your taking the time to appear before us today.

Mr. PANETTA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

[The prepared statement and exhibits submitted by Mr. Panetta follow :]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. LEON E. PANETTA, A U.S. REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

Mr. Chairman, members of the Subcommittee, thank you very much for allowing me to be here today.

I am pleased that the Committee is conducting such extensive hearings on the reauthorization of the United States Commission on Civil Rights and I share your concern that the reauthorization reflects a thorough and careful study of both the performance and the need for the Commission.

Let me say at the outset that I come here as a very strong advocate of the Commission. Clearly, the effort to assure civil rights to all Americans is one of the largest and most complex undertakings of our government in its history. Numerous laws dealing with equal opportunity to vote, to live in decent housing, to hold a job, to receive quality education, to receive justice in our judicial system have been enacted. Extension of protection to women, minorities, the handicapped, the aged, has complicated and broadened the enforcement problem.

To meet this challenge, each agency of the Federal government has an office that deals with civil rights. The Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance in Labor, the U.S. Civil Service Commission-these and other bodies also make their contributions to equal rights.

Seeing this broad involvement of Federal agencies, perhaps one might reasonably ask, "Why then do we need the Civil Rights Commission? Isn't the job being done elsewhere?" That is a fair question, but I believe the answer is no, it is not being done elsewhere. Each of the agencies I have cited deals with specific instances of compliance review or alleged discrimination. As is so common in the Federal government, this leaves little time or energy for compiling information on trends, patterns, progress, new areas that need attention. This is precisely the value and function of the Commission. Moreover, the Commission has the opportunity to serve as an ombudsman or mediator in many instances, relieving or preventing tension before matters get out of hand. Because of its closeness to the local level and because of the prestige it carries as a commission of the Federal government, it has achieved an admirable record of conciliation and compromise.

But, Mr. Chairman, it is particularly because of my feeling that the Commission does reach out to the local level in a way perhaps unique in the Federal government, that I want to spend the balance of my testimony discussing the need for and the role of the State Advisory Committees.

As we are all aware, the Office of Management and the Budget and the Commission reached an agreement on November 15, 1977 to disband the state committees and move to a system of 10 regional committees. It is my understanding that the agreement followed extensive pressure by OMB to make the cut-back. Under the provisions of the Civil Rights Act of 1957, of course, the constitution of state advisory committees is optional on the part of the Commission and so OMB is not out-of-place in demanding a change. However, it is worth nothing that the Commission did formulate these committees almost immediately upon its own establishment because it did recognize the importance of state contributions to civil rights. It is also ironic that the notice of the cut-back came only a few short months after the Commission published its report "The Unfinished Business Twenty Years Later," a 221-page summary of the accomplishments of each of its 51 committees.

Mr. Chairman, before I go on to discuss some of the specific achievements of the state committees, I would like to make an observation about the propriety of OMB's policies in this area. Representatives of OMB have admitted publicly that the cut-back would not save a single dollar! What it simply amounts to is that these committees will be lost in order to add 41 committees to the grand total of committee cut-backs. But if these reductions will not save money, if they will reduce citizen involvement in our process of government, then why is it being done?

Moreover, these will, I believe, severely hamper the work of an effective agency in an important and extremely sensitive issue area. Mr. Chairman, I believe I can make these statements with some assurance. Before coming to the House, I served as Director of HEW's Office of Civil Rights during a troubled time when the effort to end discrimination in our nation's schools was often met with bitterness and hostility by many. Time and time again, once local officials were given the opportunity to work as partners with the Federal government, that bitterness and hostility evaporated. Indeed, each of us in his role as Senator or Representative has seen that process at work in diverse situations. People who are given a stake, a say, in what happens to them will respond with reason in a spirit of compromise; people who are shut out will respond with resentment and resistance.

Let me go from generalities to specifics and give you some examples of how this has worked in practice in the activities of some of the state committees. A study by the Louisiana Advisory Committee on the problem of the lack of low-cost housing in New Orleans has documented and highlighted a crucial issue which hopefully will give local officials the documentation and the back-up they need to get more assistance from the Federal government to solve this problem. In my own state of California, the state committee investigated the fact that minority students make up an unexpectedly large proportion of those in special education programs for the mentally retarded, chiefly because of their lack of good schools or familiarity with the English language severely handicapped them. This was one of the first reports to shed light on what educators have now found to be a significant problem and are presently attempting to deal with.

Equal employment opportunity has been an active concern of the Massachusetts group, leading to executive orders by Governor Dukakis to require affirmative action in the hiring by the state of women and minorities. Some years back, the Illinois committee worked with the mayor of Peoria to develop a police-community relations project to address and to a large extent quell the anxiety among minorities that they were the recipients of police brutality. Mr. Chairman, the advisory committee in your own state of Indiana has had an exemplary history. Its report on migrant workers, for example, led to the formation of a governor's task force on migrant workers that has begun to deal with the many basic problems of those workers.

I have deliberately chosen these examples to show that the activities and accomplishments of the Civil Rights Advisory Committees have not been restricted to one region of the country or to one issue or to the problems of one group over another. And I might ask each member of the Subcommittee-aren't these achievements, with their emphasis on cooperation, dialogue, working within the system, the same kind of solutions that we would seek ourselves? The same kind of mediation that we practice when representing our constituents before Federal agencies or departments or when resolving disputes within our districts and states?

Increasingly these days, we are coming to recognize that the power and influence of the Federal government must be tempered with the wisdom and experience of the people themselves. More than any other issue, civil rights calls for local involvement, local commitment. The members of the state advisory committees bring that local contact. Reading through the membership lists of the committees, I was struck by the fact that very few of the names are well known. That is as it should be. These are working committees, Mr. Chairman, not honorary ones. Are we going to take the cumulative local experience and local ties of these 861 men and women and merge them into ten giant, regional committees? Will Arizona be better at understanding Hawaii's problems than Hawaii? Will New York comprehend the issues in Vermont? Will Kentucky understand civil rights problems in Mississippi just as Mississippians do?

Mr. Chairman, I think each of us knows that the answer to these questions is no and I do not think any one of us would like another state to be involved in telling us what our own state's problems are. I would, then, urge the Subcommittee to report out the reauthorization of the Commission with the provision for mandatory reinstitution of the state committees. I might in closing note that I have introduced a measure in the House to do just that and I would hope that you would all join in that effort. I believe each of our states and our constituents would be given the voice in the resolving of civil rights matters to which they are deserved.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee.

[EXHIBIT No. 8]

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF LEON E. PANETTA

Born in Monterey, California on June 28, 1938; graduated from Monterey Union High School, where he was Student Body President; received his B.A. (Magna Cum Laude) in 1960 from the University of Santa Clara and his L.L.B. and J.D. degrees in 1963 from the University of Santa Clara Law School where he was editor of the Law Review; 1964 to 1966, Frst Lieutenant, U.S. Army, Chief of Operations and Planning, Army Commendation Medal; from 1966 to 1969, Legislative Assistant to U.S. Senator Thomas Kuchel of California; from 1969 to 1970, Director of the U.S. Office for Civil Rights at the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare; 1970 to 1971, Executive Assistant to the Mayor of New York City; 1971 to 1976, Partner, law firm of Panetta, Thompson, and Panetta, Monterey, Calfornia; 1973 to present, member of the Board of Trustees of the University of Santa Clara Law School; founder and former member of the Board of Directors of Monterey College of Law; 1974 to 1976, Legal Counsel to the Carmel Valley Property Owners Association, and former Legal Counsel to the NAACP; member of the Parish Council of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Church; former Vice-President of the Carmel Valley Little League; author, “Bring Us Together," Lippincott, 1971; received NEA Lincoln Award, 1969, and Lawyer of the Year award, 1970; elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, 1976; serves on House Committees of Agriculture and House Administration; voted Chairman of the 95th New Members Caucus (House Freshman), 1977; married to Sylvia Marie Varni, three children.

95TH CONGRESS 2D SESSION

[EXHIBIT No. 9]

H. R. 10501

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

JANUARY 23, 1978

Mr. PANETTA (for himself and Mr. BEDELL) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary

A BILL

To amend the Civil Rights Act of 1957 to require the constitution of advisory committees within each of the several States. 1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 3. That this Act may be cited as the "State Civil Rights Com4 mittees Act".

5

SEC. 2. Subsection (c) of section 105 of the Civil Rights

6 Act of 1957 (42 U.S.C. 1975) is amended

7

8

9

10

(a) by striking out the word "may" the first time

it appears and inserting in lieu thereof the word "shall"; (b) by striking out the word "such" the first time

it appears;