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S.555 contains provisions under which members of the public may file complaints alleging violations of financial disclosure requirements or ethical standards. We believe that such provision in legislation is unnecessary. The Office of Government Ethics has the power to investigate and, of course, private citizens may bring to the attention of that Office alleged violations of financial disclosure requirements or ethical standards. Under the Ethics in Government Act, the Office of Government Ethics is specifically given the authority and responsibility to monitor and

investigate compliance with the financial disclosure requirements on the part of employees, as well as Government agencies. Unlike S.555, the Ethics in Government Act clearly gives the Director of the Office the authority to order corrective action on the part of agencies and employees, an authority which we consider essential for effective enforcement of the provisions of the Bill.

In that regard, I note that S.555 provides for a subpoena power. That power appears to be limited to the audit provisions of the Bill and is granted to the Comptroller General. In our view, subpoena authority is unnecessary when dealing with the Office of Government Ethics in the Civil Service Commission and Federal Government

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employees and agencies.

Under long established personnel

rules adopted by the President, the Office of Government Ethics would have the authority to make inquiries of Government employees including inquiries which would result in the production of such documents or other materials as could be obtained via subpoena. Moreover, to grant the

Comptroller General subpoena power over the records of the President would again create sharp separation of powers questions and raise severe constitutional issues.

Finally, S.555 would require confidential financial

disclosure by certain lower level employees in the Executive Branch. The Government in Ethics Act does not contain a specific provision requiring the filing of such statements but does reserve the President's authority in the area. We do not believe that the provisions contained in S.555 are either necessary or desirable. Blanket coverage of all employees at GS-13-15 and many employees below those grades is unnecessary to carry out the purpose of raising standards of conduct in Government. The question of which employees at these levels should file confidential

financial statements should be left to the Executive Branch of Government wherein input from the respective agencies who are closer to the actual operations of

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employees at this level may be fully considered.

The

Ethics in Government Act of 1977 would permit such Executive Branch monitoring in this area.

It is our view that the Ethics in Government Act of

1977 is a significant advance. We recognize that it is just a first step and that experience may well prove that further modifications in the program are needed. For this purpose, the Office of Government Ethics is specifically given the responsibility, together with the Attorney General of the United States for evaluating the need for changes in rules and regulations and conflict-of-interest statutes. We visualize this responsibility as an on-going one which will include, among other things, review of the operation of the Ethics in Government Act of 1977 itself, as well as such areas as penalties associated with conflict-of-interest statutes, clarification of severance pay laws and regulations, etc.

I appreciate very much the courtesies which your Committee has extended to me and the opportunity of appearing before you today.

Senator CHILES. Our next witness will be Judge Edward Tamm, chairman of the Review Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States.

Good afternoon.

Judge TAMM. Good afternoon.

TESTIMONY OF EDWARD TAMM, CHAIRMAN OF THE REVIEW COMMITTEE, THE JUDICIAL CONFERENCE OF THE UNITED STATES

My name is Edward Tamm. I am a judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, and the chief judge of the temporary Emergency Court of Appeals.

I appear before you this afternoon as the chairman of the Review Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States.

The Judicial Conference of the United States has not had an opportunity to comment upon the provisions of S. 555. However, last year the Judicial Conference of the United States considered a very similar bill, then recorded as S. 495, and recorded its opposition to this bill insofar as it applied to the judiciary because the Judicial Conference of the United States felt that such filing requirements were not necessary because of the program then being carried on by the Judicial Conference of the United States.

Similarly, Mr. Carl H. Imlay who is sitting next to me here, the General Counsel of the Administrative Office, testified last year before the House Judiciary Committee, again expressing the view of the Judicial Conference of the United States that this type of statute was not necessary for Federal judges.

Why does the Judicial Conference take this attitude? It is because since 1970, since Warren Burger became the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, the judiciary has operated a system requiring all Federal judges, all U.S. magistrates, and all bankruptcy judges to file each 6 months a public report of extrajudicial income which is filed not only with the clerk of the court in which they serve, and which thereby becomes a matter of public record, but a copy of each report must be filed with me as the chairman of the Review Committee.

This report requires judicial officers to report their total income. for all extrajudicial services performed by them, including lecturing, teaching, writing, serving as trustee, executor, or director, and all other services performed by you.

The report form requires each judicial officer to file a report of all gifts and bequests. It requires him to record his excess expense_reimbursement and to identify all positions held by him during the reporting period, which means the positions as chairman of the board of a hospital, or educational institution, or anything else of that kind.

Since this program has been in operation, I have personally reviewed more than 10,000 of these public reports.

I believe that the Review Committee has corrected a number of situations which presented possible difficulties, and at its March meeting this year the Judicial Conference has extended this program

so that it now will include all officers of the Federal Judicial Center, all officers of the administrative office of the courts, all clerks of the courts, all probation officers, all financial clerks, and all employees of the judiciary in grade 15 or above.

I have heard some of the testimony today about why your proposed legislation applies to employees in grade 16. We have a number of employees within the judiciary who may be in a position to influence decisional matters that are not in grade 16.

We have financial clerks who handle all of the financial affairs of the Clerk's Office. We believe that they should be required to report their gifts, their sources of outside income, and so on. These reports, as I say, are reviewed by the Review Committee.

We have, and I think this answers a question that you asked a previous witness, an Advisory Committee on Judicial Ethics. Whenever we have problems displayed by the reports, as soon as we get complete information we refer the matter to the Advisory Committee which then interprets or evaluates the conduct upon the basis of the Code of Judicial Ethics.

We have a Code of Judicial Ethics which is basically the Code of Judicial Ethics adopted by the American Bar Association 2 years ago. It has been necessary for us to amend it in some respects to make it applicable to judges who serve during good behavior.

We have a Committee on Canons of Judicial Ethics which is charged with the duty of revising the Code of Judicial Ethics if and when it is necessary for such revision. For example, we revised the code as it applies to Federal judges within the last 2 years to provide that if a Federal judge desires to be a candidate for any public office he must resign from the bench before he seeks that office, but obviously this could not apply to State judges who are elected and must run for reelection.

The Judicial Conference of the United States does not believe that the filing requirements of S. 555 are essential because there can be no conflict of interest situations among the Federal judiciary.

The Congress has enacted a law which requires a Federal judge to recuse himself if he, or his spouse, or a member of his family living within his household owns one share of stock in a corporation. One of the great abuses heretofore has been that a judge could coerce counsel into saying, "Well, you want to waive this recusal, do you not?" Your statute prohibits any waiver of a recusal, so that there can be no conflict of interest situations.

Judges are prohibited by statute from practicing law. This is a high misdemeanor and would be subject for impeachment.

In other words, and to keep my comments as brief as possible, the Judicial Conference of the United States feels that this program which has operated successfully for 7 years is all that is required of the Federal judiciary.

To pinpoint and anticipate a possible question, the report form, the reporting requirements for judicial officers do not require statements of assets, liabilities, investments, personal property, and so on, all of which is included in your bill.

I believe that summarizes, Senator, the operations of the reporting program as it is operative in the judicial system.