The Honorable Patricia Roberts Harris 
November 21, 1979 
Page Two 
The issue of industry compliance with the Guidelines is not, of course, a 
scientific one; and here, I believe, the proposed amendment to the Guide- 
lines stating the terms under which research may be registered voluntarily 
with NIH is seriously flawed. Most firms have stated their intention to 
observe the containment requirements and prohibitions of the Guidelines; 
but without NIH approval of scale-up experiments and use of new host-vector 
systems, they may not be able to proceed with important applications of 
recombinant DNA techniques. Voluntary registration provides no assurance, 
however, that all firms will register their research nor that any single 
firm will register all of its work. Thus, NIH may well be in the position 
of approving activities on the basis of partial information. By the same 
token, companies that register in good faith can have no confidence that 
discovery of unregistered activities will not cast doubt upon all NIH 
actions under the voluntary registration system. 
I intend to introduce legislation requiring notification to the Department 
of all recombinant DNA work by institutions not presently subject to the 
Guidelines, It would authorize penalties for failure to register activities. 
It would provide statutory protection against disclosure of proprietary 
information. But it would not create a full-fledged regulatory scheme. 
I hope that I will have your support of this small but essential step to 
provide a complete public record of recombinant DNA activities and permit 
development of their commercial applications. 
With every good wish. 
Sincerely, 
ADLAI E. STEVENSON, Chairman 
Subcommittee on Science, Technology, 
and Space 
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