SCIENCE IX THE WIIITI HOUSE 



639 



September 18, McCormack wrote Teague his objections, opening with 

 a phrase which overlooked Teague's central role in the process: 



As you recall from our recent discussions, I have several reservations concerning 

 the legislation prepared for you. * * * I am troubled by the limited scope of studies 

 ordered by the bill. * * * I do have reservations about the general tone of the bill, 

 which seems to be directed more at the limited concept of an Office of Science and 

 Technology than at the broad spectrum of options that I think should be made 

 available in an orderly fashion. 



A compromise was worked out with McCormack. Instead of requiring 

 the Office of Science and Technology Policy to make a report on the 

 new Cabinet department of STEAM, the study was written in as one 

 of the options on which the survey committee was to report. 



Although Brown's amendment sounded good on the surface, it 

 was adamantly opposed by the administration. An attempt was made 

 by the committee staff to draft compromise language. But by the time 

 the full committee was ready for its markup session, Brown had 

 seen, but did not accept, the suggested compromise. These negotia- 

 tions provided an interesting switch in the attitudes of two committee 

 members: McCormack, who had the reputation of a hard-nosed 

 ideologue who stood up and fought to the bitter end for what he 

 believed in, had agreed to an acceptable compromise; on the other 

 hand, Brown, who generally avoided fights he knew he could not 

 win and usually looked for achieving goals through constructive 

 compromise, was holding out for language beyond the point it could 

 be accepted by the White House. 



FULL COMMITTEE MARKUP MEETING 



After several delays, Teague called a meeting of the full commit- 

 tee for October 9 to mark up the bill. He arranged in advance of the 

 meeting to be dealt one trump card to drop face up on the table: A 

 letter from President Ford endorsing the September 16 version of the 

 Teague-Mosher bill. The letter arrived just in the nick of time, and 

 was dated October 8 — the day before the meeting. Teague did not 

 read the entire letter, perhaps because of the first sentence which 

 stated: 



Thank you for the prompt attention you have given to my proposal for creating 

 an Office of Science and Technology Policy in the Executive Office of the President. 



After many years of work which had been put in by the committee on 

 the subject, and after exerting considerable pressure in the spring of 

 1975 for the White House to move, perhaps the least the President 

 could have said was that this was truly a joint proposal. But Teague 

 did not take offense. He realized that occasionally Congressmen also 

 pick up other people's bills and send out press releases contending 



