Description:

For over two decades, the Federal Government opened the mail of American citizens, a policy fundamentally at odds with freedom of expression and contrary to the laws of the land. Mail opening offers the most revealing look into the inner life of the CIA and the FBI. In the instance of the CIA, their mail program was allowed to continue despite the harshest criticism of it from investigators within the CIA Inspector General's Office, and despite the fact that it was not very productive in terms of intelligence information. Moreover, throughout the 20-year period, many senior Government officials were not told of the mail openings or were misinformed about them. The Select Committee convened to explore the decision-making process within the CIA, to ascertain how valid these public allegations were.