Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Daniel Patrick "Pat" Moynihan (March 16, 1927 – March 26, 2003) was a four-term U.S. Senator, ambassador, administration official, and academic. He was first elected to the United States Senate in 1976 by the citizens of New York as the nominee of the Democratic Party and re-elected three times, in 1982, 1988, and 1994. He declined to run for re-election in 2000 and was succeeded by Democrat Hillary Clinton. Clinton began her campaign for the Senate at Moynihan's farm in upstate New York. Moynihan supported her bid for his Senate seat.

Commission on Government Secrecy

In the post Cold War era, the 103rd Congress enacted legislation directing an inquiry into the uses of government secrecy. Moynihan chaired the Commission. The Committee studied and made recommendations on the "culture of secrecy" that pervaded the United States government and its intelligence community for 80 years, beginning with the Espionage Act of 1917, and made recommendations on the statutory regulation of classified information.

Related Topics:
Cold War - Espionage Act of 1917

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The Committee's findings and recommendations were presented to the President in 1997. As part of the effort, Moynihan was able to secure release from the Federal Bureau of Investigation its classified Venona file, documents on the FBI's joint counterintelligence investigation with the United States Signals Intelligence Service into Soviet espionage within the United States. Much of the information had been collected and classified secret information for over fifty years.

Related Topics:
Federal Bureau of Investigation - Counterintelligence - Signals Intelligence Service

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After release of the information, Moynihan authored Secrecy: The American Experience, where he discussed the impact government secrecy has had on the domestic politics of America for the past half century, and how myths and suspicion created an unnecessary partisan chasm.

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