53 



than to a standing committee, the issue was never presented in a form 

 in which legislation would have been a suitable means of resolution. 

 ]\lost of the decision-points lay outside of the Congress, and were only 

 influenced by actions within the committee of Congress. 



The alternatives perceived by the Congress — that is, by the com- 

 mittee — centered on whether or not the battery additive had merit, 

 whether the vendor had been fairly treated, whether arbitrary action 

 of Government was closing the door of opportunity for small business. 

 An investigating committee assumed the primary decisionmaking role. 

 By concentrating on the case at hand, it generated pressure on the 

 executive branch to avoid repetition of the case, but afforded no 

 guidance as to how the repetition was to be avoided, or how this 

 avoidance was to be accomplished without sacrificing the protection 

 of the consumer that had led to the controversy. 



The source of the issue was an uncommonly aggressive entrepreneur. 

 The indication of the issue took the form of a complaint of unfair 

 treatment of the individual, supplemented by many letters to Con- 

 gress from many different jurisdictions. Reception of the entrepre- 

 neur's complaint was favorably motivated by a concurrent change 

 in pohtical admmistration, and by the functional commitment of the 

 membership and staff of the Senate Select Committee on Small 

 Business, to whom the entrepreneur appealed. Validation of the issue 

 to the committee derived mainly from a considerable number of 

 testimonials asserting favorable experience with the product. The 

 need for action was not well expressed because of the way the issue 

 came to the Congress: There was a tendency to lose sight of the 

 functional role of the National Bureau of Standards in a system 

 designed to protect the consumer against fraud and misrepresentation, 

 and instead to concentrate on the issue as to the merits of the product — 

 and as to whether or not NBS was competent to test it. 



The urgency of the issue as perceived by the Congress was partly 

 out of consideration for the plaintiff, whose business was in jeopardy, 

 and partly an extension of his plight to an indeterminate number of 

 other persons whose businesses might be similarly jeopardized. 

 Urgency was also contributed by the status of the Director of NBS, 

 whose resignation had been linked publicly with the controversy. 



The issue assessment took the form of a thorough investigation 

 by the committee staff of the perceived issue — by resort to a technically 

 qualified scientific laboratory — ^presumably objective and remote from 

 the issue, by collection of earher scientific findings, by numerous 

 consultations with users of the product, and by lengthy interrogation 

 of the Director of NBS. Because of the evolutionary way the issue 

 emerged, attitudes and commitments had crystalhzed around the 

 question as to the merits of the product rather than on the procedures 

 by which the protection of the pubhc against fraud and misrepre- 

 sentation was reconciled witli the protection of the entrepreneur 

 against arbitrary and bureaucratic procedures. 



Thus, various statements of the issue were made by members of 

 the committee during the hearings that had little bearing on the 

 question of what to do about it. The most substantive statement was 

 contained in Secretary Weeks' presentation at the opening session 

 of the hearmg. He noted that the NBS was the "keystone" on which 



