706 HISTORY OF THE COMMIT!! 1 ON SCIENC1 AND TECHNOLOGY 



The decisions of the select committee were not very difficult to 

 make on the issue of expanding the jurisdiction of the Science Com- 

 mittee It was either a case of adding to the responsibilities, or phasing 

 out the committee completely, and nobody suggested the latter course. 

 Instead, additional duties were transferred in the interests of logic, 

 sound substantive reasons, and the successful interchanges between the 

 principals and the staffs involved. Dr. Sheldon's constant presence 

 then helped seal in and protect the decisions. 



SW1GERT MOBILIZES THE TROOPS 



Swigert did not relax his efforts. He bombarded his Task Team 

 Leaders with memoranda early in January 1974, offering a number of 

 alternative subcommittee alignments assuming the December 7 rec- 

 ommendations were put into effect. Of course, there was still a long 

 way to go before the Boiling committee resolution eventually went 

 to the floor of the House, where, as we shall see, it was defeated in 

 favor of a less thorough structural reorganization of Congress. Never- 

 theless, Swigert lined up his troops and made the telling point that the 

 months ahead carried the potential of vast benefits for the future of 

 the committee. Swigert insisted that carefully-laid plans were necessary 

 to take full advantage of the opportunities. 



Meanwhile, the Boiling committee began its public markup ses- 

 sions on February 4, 1974. Officially, these markups were termed "Open 

 Business Meetings." Right out in the open, the five Democrats and 

 five Republicans went through the text of the December 7 draft, 

 ratifying certain sections, making some changes, freezing the language 

 as they went along, and occasionally taking votes when issues stirred 

 differing opinions. A clue as to how various Boiling committee mem- 

 bers felt toward expanding the Science Committee jurisdiction was 

 contained in some of the comments made by Representative C. W. 

 Bill Young (Republican of Florida), a member of the Armed Services 

 committee, who fought against giving the Science Committee over- 

 sight over military R. & D. The colloquy went like this, with Boiling 

 and Dr. Sheldon defending the jurisdiction: 



Chairman Bollino. The intent there is to give them a look at and a hope that 

 they will be able in a nonlegislative way to help coordinate the kinds of things that 

 go in a variety of different places in R. & D. Do I have that correct? 



Dr. Sheldon. That is correct. * * * 



Mr. Young. I want to make sure that we are not making this a super committee 

 over and above the Armed Services Committee or the other committees we are talk- 

 ing about. 



HOW NOT TO ELIMINATE RUMORS 



This process of discussion had only been under way a few days 

 when Swigert felt compelled to dispatch a rather peremptory memo- 



