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In the end, FDR and the Congress weren't able to agree on a legislative compromise. Nonetheless, President Roosevelt continued to authorize national-security surveillance. All of this predated America's entry into the Second World War.

AFTER CHOOSING TO AUTHORIZE SURVEILLANCE, President Roosevelt faced angry legislators (similar to Senator Specter and others today) who called for disclosure of the surveillance program's details in order to inform the legislative debate. FDR decided that Congress was not entitled to, and could not be trusted with, such information. He thus refused to comply.

Attorney General Jackson spelled this out in an April 30, 1941 letter to Rep. Carl Vinson, Chairman of the House Committee on Naval Affairs. Jackson reviewed the history of presidential refusals to disclose national security information, beginning with President Washington's 1796 refusal to disclose the details of treaty negotiations. Jackson warned that to provide such information to Congress would enable congressional personnel to leak details to the public, thereby tipping off targets and embarrassing informants. He said that disclosure would "prejudice the national defense and be of aid and comfort to the very subversive elements against which you wish to protect the country." And despite the fact that Congress was attempting to pass legislation pertaining to that very program, Jackson concluded that information regarding the surveillance "can be of little, if any, value in connection with the framing of legislation or the performance of any other constitutional duty of the Congress."

Jackson recognized that the president and Congress face different responsibilities, making agreement between the two branches difficult on such weighty, heated, time-sensitive issues. The Constitution gives the president the responsibility to act quickly and decisively to defend the national security. Congress, freed from such responsibility, could indulge other preoccupations. At one point, Jackson wrote Rep. John Coffee that "I am confident that if you and any of the other liberals in Congress sat in my seat and were held to some degree of responsibility for the perpetration of acts of sabotage and espionage in this country you would feel differently about the wire tapping bill."

AND SO IT GOES TODAY. In the coming weeks, Senator Specter and others may threaten to withhold funds from the NSA or block nominations (such as General Hayden's nomination to head the CIA). The prerogatives of spending cuts and nominations blocks are within the power of the Congress, just as defense of the national security is committed to the president. President Bush can only hope that cooler heads prevail among House and Senate majorities. But in pursuing his own course of action, President Bush should keep in mind -- and cite as justification -- the example of the opposition party's greatest hero, President Roosevelt.

topics:
Constitution, Supreme Court, Military, NATO