NOTICE
This is a transcript of a tape-recorded interview conducted for the Harry S. Truman Library. A draft of this transcript was edited by the interviewee but only minor emendations were made; therefore, the reader should remember that this is essentially a transcript of the spoken, rather than the written word.

Numbers appearing in square brackets (ex. [45]) within the transcript indicate the pagination in the original, hardcopy version of the oral history interview.

RESTRICTIONS
This oral history transcript may be read, quoted from, cited, and reproduced for purposes of research. It may not be published in full except by permission of the Harry S. Truman Library.

Opened May, 1983
Harry S. Truman Library
Independence, Missouri

[i]

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Interview Transcript …………………………1-227
Bibliography……………………………………228

[1]

TOLAN: Is there anything that is of particular interest to you?

FUCHS: Oh, yes, I think anything you have about the Navy Department work with the Truman Committee.

TOLAN: My experience as liaison officer between the Truman Committee and the office of the Chief of Naval Operations did not start until August 11, 1943. My Naval service began February 13, 1943. After Pearl Harbor, I worked with the War Production Board, San Francisco, until volunteering for Navy.

Senator Truman was named Chairman of the Committee March 1, 1941 and resigned when he became Vice-Presidential candidate August 3, 1944.

[2]

So, I was liaison officer for just about a year while Senator Truman was still the Chairman.

For the following year, until my departure in September 1945 to join the staff of the Office of War Mobilization and Reconversion under Mr. John Snyder, Senator Mead chaired the Committee.

There is little that I can tell you about Navy liaison before my appointment. It seems that there had been four different systems to cover the Committee and all had met with general dissatisfaction. Career naval officers or civilian aides to Secretary Frank Knox had found the assignment risky to their standing in the Navy or too onerous and unrewarding. Organizationally, Congressional investigation had been the task of the Judge Advocate General's office. This arrangement had been formalized by Secretary Knox, December 16, 1942. Apparently it simply did not work well. Investigating Congressmen, Senators or Committee staff people would telephone, write or visit Navy offices, shore establishments, or factories to make formal or informal inquiries. Too often, the Secretary or Under Secretary, and sometimes the Chiefs of Navy bureaus or

[3]

offices would find themselves summoned to Capitol Hill to give testimony, much to their surprise. They had to appear voluntarily for if they refused there was always the threat of subpoenas being issued with attendant bad publicity.

FUCHS: Congressional authority to issue subpoenas to compel testimony was somewhat limited, wasn't it?

TOLAN: Traditionally, subpoena power was limited by the necessity of obtaining passages of a House or Senate resolution granting that power in connection with a specific investigation. Senator Truman's "Select Committee to Investigate the National Defense Program" was authorized to issue subpoenas by Senate Resolution 71, passed February 13, 1941.

By 1943 a number of standing committees had asked for, and had received, subpoena authority. Thus, they could issue subpoenas either as a full committee, or acting as a subcommittee. Often committees or subcommittees thereof would authorize their Counsel or Chief Investigator to subpoena witnesses and compel the production of records simply by a phone call to

[4]

the committee or subcommittee chairman. In 1943 our office tried to get a total of all the Congressional subpoena powers potentially being waived at us from Capitol Hill. We counted about 53 separate groups, select committees, joint committees, standing committees (those empowered to report legislation) and all the various special subcommittees.

Admiral Lewis L. Strauss in his book Men and Decisions writes of his experience with a subpoena issued by the Chief Investigator of the House Naval Affairs Committee in the summer of 1941. It was a bolt out of the blue.

FUCHS: Who was Admiral Strauss at that time?

TOLAN: He was General Inspector of Ordnance. He was a Lieutenant Commander, a former partner of Kuhn, Loeb & Co., in New York, and a Naval Reservist since World War I. He had been called to active duty in 1941 and assigned to the Bureau of Ordnance. Chief Investigator Edmund Toland (no relation) of the House Naval Affairs Committee evidently had some suspicion that Strauss might have a conflict of interest due to his

[5]

banking background. It turned out to be the kind of fishing expedition that the Truman Committee always avoided.

FUCHS: The issuance of a subpoena was very threatening, wasn't it? What did Commander Strauss do?

TOLAN: Subpoena power was threatening but the ultimate sanction was being held in contempt of Congress and being fined or imprisoned or both. This is how Admiral Strauss tells the story: "Late one afternoon two young men with credentials identifying them as attaches of the (House Naval Affairs Committee) arrived at my office and presented a demand for the contents of my desk and my files. As this was before we were at war and quite late in the afternoon, counsel for the bureau had left for the day and no one was in the office of the Judge Advocate General of the Navy. Under protest, therefore, I surrendered what the subpoena called for, although the only items in my desk were some undeposited Navy salary checks and several letters from my wife. The files were too voluminous for the two agents to carry off, so they

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were sealed in place.

In the course of conversation while they did this, the two young men mentioned the fact that they were Army Reserve officers who had been borrowed from the War Department by Counsel for the Naval Affairs Committee. They were thoroughly disgusted by their assignment. Subsequently, I learned that the Military Affairs Committee borrowed naval officers for similar surveillance of the War Department. The following morning I walked into the office of the Under Secretary of War and expressed my indignation at this practice. Judge Patterson agreed that it was outrageous to have officers of one service to police the other, and promptly recalled the two officers in question from the Naval Affairs Committee. I heard nothing more of the inquiry. The House Committee had found nothing to disturb it. My personal correspondence was returned intact. Captain Albert G. "Chuck" Noble was then my immediate superior and when word reached him of the incident, he sent me a note. 'You should have called me at home,' he wrote. 'I would have gotten a few Marines and chucked these fellows out of the window.’”( Lewis L. Strauss., Men and Decisions, Garden City, New York, Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1962 ,. pp. 150-51. Strauss later served both Presidents Truman and Eisenhower as a member and Chairman of the Atomic Energy Committee.)

[7]

FUCHS: How would your office have handled Commander Strauss' predicament when you were committee liaison?

TOLAN: Well, first of all, during wartime the two investigators would have been stopped by the Marine security guards at the Navy Department front door. Commander Strauss would have had notice that they were coming. Secondly, under Chief of Naval Operations order dated September 19, 1943, the two men would have been directed to the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations for clearance by our office. Third, I would have told them that civil process could not be served on a Navy officer or enlisted man without "permission to come aboard," which means Captain Noble would have had to grant permission to the subpoena of his subordinates. ( On March 26, 1944, Chief Investigator Bertram R. Gross served subpoena powers on two Navy officers who were cost inspectors at Alabama Drydock and Repair shipyard. The officers called me at my hotel in Mobile, Alabama. I told them to send the subpoenas back to Gross, and called Gross and told him that the Committee would have to have permission of the commanding officer under whom the men were serving. I then called Senator James E. Murray, Chairman of the investigating subcommittee of the Senate Military Affairs Committee and asked to see him in his room. I told him the men were prepared to testify voluntarily, would bring all their records, that the subpoena was totally unnecessary, and the reasons why I had aborted the attempt to serve the officers. Needless to say the subpoenas were withdrawn. Bertram Gross, later on in the war, was the able draftsman of the Contract Settlement Act of 1944 C55 Stat.649). It was the general law covering the termination of war contracts. After the war, Gross became a member of President Truman's Council of Economic Advisors.)

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Fourth, I would have called Chief Investigator Toland or Chairman Vinson of the House Naval Affairs Committee and would have told them that it was not necessary to issue a subpoena, that the Officers of the Navy were always willing to transmit records or give testimony without a subpoena.

FUCHS: What about the Secretary of the Navy's order setting up your office? What did it provide?

TOLAN: I have a copy of the order. It was our charter. As you can see, it was addressed to the entire Navy. We became the clearing house for all congressional investigating committees. The Secretary drew a tight knot. As far as I know, there was no slippage. The order was clear, final, and it worked out in practice. If you don't mind, it might be appropriate to copy the full text into my statement at this point.

Op-50F-DR
Serial 2650-F

NAVY DEPARTMENT
WASHINGTON

2 November 1943

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From: The Secretary of the Navy
To: Chiefs of Bureaus and Offices, Navy Department
Commandant, U. S. Marine Corps
Commandant, U. S. Coast Guard
Commandants, All Naval Districts
All Shore Stations

Subject: Requests for Information from Congressional Committees, procedure for handling.

Reference:
(a) SecNav ltr JAG:mm, dated 16 December 1942

(b) VCNO l ltr Op-50F-DR Serial 450-F, dated 29 September 1943.

1. To enable the Navy to give the most complete and effective service possible to the various Congressional Committees authorized to conduct investigations pertaining to the Navy, a section for clearing Committee inquiries has been established by the Chief of Naval Operations.

2. All requests for information received from the various investigating Committees of the U. S. Senate and U. S. House of Representatives or their staff members, either to the bureaus and offices of the Navy Department, or to Navy field activities, shall be forwarded to the Chief of Naval Operations, who will see that necessary action is taken on such requests.

3. This directive shall not alter the procedure which has been heretofore followed with regard to requests from Congress for the Navy Department's comment on pending legislation.

FRANK KNOX

DISTRIBUTION: 6, 7, 8
l0b, c, d, e, f, g, i, j , k.
1, m, n. s, u, x, bb, cc;
11, 12, 14a, b, c, d, e, s, t.

FUCHS: I notice in the first paragraph of the order your

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activities were limited to "Congressional Committees authorized to conduct investigations pertaining to the Navy."

TOLAN: Yes, we became the control mechanism for all Navy investigations by the Congress. What was not disturbed was the Secretary's reliance on the Judge Advocate General Rear Admiral Thomas L. Gatch, to have constant cognizance of everything that Capitol Hill was doing. All the officers and civilians doing Hill work, or by appointed representatives, gathered at the Judge Advocate Generals office (Admiral Thomas Gatch) for a 7:30 a.m. meeting almost daily. If I was traveling, Lt. Abbott, or Captain Kennedy attended, and as I recall, we never missed a meeting. Admiral Gatch would call on each of us in turn, to give a report of our concerns and especially of any possible conflicts with other liaison personnel.

FUCHS: Who made up this interdepartmental group?

TOLAN: In addition to the Judge Advocate General, who presided, Commander Earl Chesney from the Bureau of

[11]

Supplies and Accounts -- the Bureau which controlled all appearances before Senate and House Appropriations Committees; W. John Kenney of the Office of General Counsel (which handled preparing reports on pending legislation such as proposed bills to authorize Navy expansion); our office (OP50F), and sometimes as many as ten other officers who may have had special problems with Capitol Hill at that moment.

Commander Chesney had a staff located in the House Office Building which handled congressional correspondence, plus a myriad of appeals for Navy service by various individual Representatives and Senators.(Commander Chesney was later located in the East Wing of the White House in the office of Naval Aide to President Truman.)

FUCHS: When did you hear about the reorganization of congressional investigations liaison, and your selection to join the new office?

TOLAN: The last week of July, 1943, I had been ordered to New York Navy Yard, Boston Navy Yard and Hartford, Connecticut. (See Exhibit "A". The Office of Procurement and Material, Contract Distribution Branch, was in EROS, Executive Office of the Secretary, under UNSECNAV James Forrestal). Since I had entered the Navy there had been almost constant travel to Navy Yards and other shore establishments expediting contract redistribution to small business.

[12]

When I returned to Navy headquarters, Lt. Commander Kennedy called me to his desk. He had a peculiar gleam in his eye. He said, 'Lieutenant Tolan, you are about to join the real Navy, and I hope you appreciate fully what that means. Where you are going you will hardly see another Reserve officer -- everybody will be Regular Navy, Academy graduates."

I asked, "Where could that be?" It seemed pretty clear it wouldn't be in Washington.

He said, "You and I are going to be ordered to a new section of the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations. That's Admiral Ernest J. King and Vice-Admiral Frederick J. Horne, you know."

"Besides," he continued, "we will have to get some additional help. We'll be handling the Truman Committee and all other investigations. In order to overcome the reluctance of Navy people to cooperate, we will be asking help for the line Navy, CNO. Everyone is going to listen. Our approved complement is 23 officers, but I don't think we will need that many."

So, on August 11, 1943, I received orders to move and did so the following day.(See Exhibit "B," copy of orders changing duty.) We didn't start to

[13]

do any real work with the other Navy offices until after Admiral Horne, Vice Chief of Naval Operations signed his letter to all hands on September 29, 1943. Secretary Knox's letter of November 2, 1943 reconfirmed the entire reorganization.

But we started to work with the Truman Committee as soon as we moved. Commander Kennedy had me spend about two days on Capitol Hill scouting out our new assignment.

FUCHS: What did Commander Kennedy tell you he wanted?

TOLAN: Well, I found out later that he was about to have a heart-to-heart conference with Vice-Admiral Horne about how he planned to put CNO in the investigating committee business -- how he proposed to get these committees off the Navy's back. He asked me to find out two things, 1) What made the Truman Committee so powerful, and 2) How we could keep Secretary Knox and Under Secretary Forrestal from being asked, repeatedly, to testify before the various committees so they could concentrate on winning the war. Committee appearances took too much time, and even more time in preparation for the hearings.

[14]

FUCHS: Where did you go, and what did you report?

TOLAN: I went to Capitol Hill to acquaintances that could be relied upon, many of whom worked or had worked, on the staff of various committees. My findings were that the Truman Committee staff were extraordinarily competent and that the Senate members of the Committee were, for the most part, devoting a great deal of time and attention to work on the various Truman subcommittees

Many of the people I talked with claimed that the Truman Committee Senators had an unique cross-section of other important committee assignments. Since the other committee work was mainly on standing committees of the U. S. Senate, the legislative bodies, they could influence proposed changes of law. (A special investigating group like the Truman Committee could not report legislation.) It seemed very likely what the Truman reports advocated would wind up promptly as new laws, emerging on the Senate floor from the standing committees

When I returned to the office with a copy of the current Congressional Directory it was an easy task to dictate a report for Commander Kennedy to take to

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Vice-Admiral Horne. The list of important standing committee assignments of the various Senators on my list was impressive. They could not only investigate our mobilization for war, they could influence appropriations, authorizations of war plants and munitions, and enact controls over Navy operations.

The Truman Committee had everything it needed to be effective, especially on Senate Appropriations and Senate Military Affairs.(See Exhibit "C" Truman Committee assignments to important standing committees.)

FUCHS: How did you respond to the request for a plan to keep Secretary Knox and Under Secretary Forrestal off Capitol Hill?

TOLAN: Commander Kennedy supplied that answer. He ordered OP50F staff to practically live on Capitol Hill, get to know every member of the committees and each of the staff. Most of all OP5OF should set up a system to anticipate investigations, analyze their inquiries, visit naval installations in advance of proposed Committee field trips. In fact, his proposal was to get out in front of the committees and clean things up

[16]

before formal hearings or the issuance of subpoenas summoning Navy personnel. He added additional instructions, "If we know enough about a committee inquiry, we should be able to persuade then to question Bureau Chiefs, or Department heads. In that event, they'll get a better answer from someone immediately responsible. The thing they won't get by not having Secretary Knox or Under Secretary Forrestal, is widespread publicity. That may be a problem with some committees but I don't believe it will be with Senator Truman."

FUCHS: How did this turn out?

TOLAN: As you are aware, it was a logical and sound plan. Chairman Truman avoided embarrassing the Armed Services. He always gave them a chance to clean up their act, particularly when they took blame if the blame was theirs. In great measure we were helped by his personal respect for Secretaries Knox and Forrestal. Oh, we got off the track in a couple of cases. On those two occasions we wound up in extensive hearings, subpoenas by the dozen, and even speeches about our

[17]

troubles on the floor of the United States Senate. ((a) Corrigan, Osburn & Wells, executive committee hearings, May, June, July & August 1944. Public hearings, March, May June 1944.
(b) Norfolk Navy Yard, Manpower utilization, Congressional Record, Monday, January 22, 1945. p. 383 et.seq.)

FUCHS: What was done about staffing OP5OF? I believe you said you were authorized a complement of 23 officers?

TOLAN: Yes. Well, after Commander Kennedy set up the office with one executive secretary who had extensive Navy experience, then we had the Bureau of Personnel send us four WAVE yeomen (maybe "yeopersons" in today's language); I recommended getting Lt. John W. Abbott from sea duty in the Armed Guard.

Commander Kennedy then made the rounds of all Navy Chiefs of the various Bureaus. He told the various Admirals, "I want to be able to reach you on a moment's notice. Will you please designate one of your staff, someone in wham you have complete confidence, to work with OP5OF and give our requests top priority?" That move really gave us several extra men. Rather than being located in our office, they were in critically important offices throughout the Navy. They had immediate access to the Admirals.

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They could use their Commanding Officer's power to see that we got prompt and accurate answers. They could, when needed, attend the early morning meetings in the Judge Advocate General's office. (Among that group of officers, the ones most frequently relied upon by OP50F were:
(a) Lt. Minor Hudson, Counsel to the Chief, Bureau of Yards and Docks, Rear Admiral Ben Moreell;
(b) Lt. Comdr. Frank C. Nash, Counsel to the Chief, Bureau of Ships, Rear Admiral E. L. Cochrane;
(c) Lt. Edward Fillion, Special Asst. to Chief, Bureau of Aeronautics, Rear Admiral D. C. Ramsey;
(d) Lt. Alfred C. Wolf, Special Asst. to Chief, Shore Establishment Division, Rear Admiral C. W. Fisher;
(e) Lt. E. Kensen WAVE, Special Asst. to Chief, Bureau of Ordnance, Rear Admiral W. H. P. Blandy.)

FUCHS: When were you and Commander Kennedy joined by Lieutenant (j .g.) John Abbott?

TOLAN: Lieutenant Abbott was an Armed Guard officer on the S.S. Monterey, a large troop transport. This vessel was so fast it could outrun German submarines. Abbott liked his duty. He said, "Jack, you hardly ever see a steak here in Washington. Aboard ship I can have steak three times a day."

On my recommendation, Commander Kennedy had him ordered down to Washington from New York when the Monterey was in port. They were both professional newspaper reporters before joining the Navy, and hit

[19]

it off perfectly. Commander Kennedy, upon completion of the interview, had orders cut for John Abbott to report to OP50F, Washington. (See Oral History Interview with John Abbott, the Harry S. Truman Library, Independence, Missouri, December 1970, pp. 3 et.seq. Abbott's recollection was that he came on duty in 1944. However, I distinctly remember his presence during the Canol hearings, which took place in September, October and November, 1943.) I didn't know it at the time, but our OP50F team was assembled. It remained Kennedy, Abbott and Tolan until September 1945. Early in 1945 we were sent additional help, Commander Eugene C. Carusi. He had been a Navy Beachmaster on Omaha Beach when our forces hit the coast of France in 1944. The second day of the landing, while still on the Beachhead, Commander Carusi took a spent 20 mm bullet through the chest. They despaired of his life, but almost miraculously, he survived. After months of recuperation he was sent to OP50F.

Commander Carusi was a native of Washington, D.C. His family was highly respected. By the time he arrived, Commander Kennedy had been promoted to Captain, U.S.N.R. Both Kennedy and Carusi were members of the prestigious Metropolitan Club. However, they really saw very little of each other as Captain Kennedy was in North Africa, the Middle East, the European Theater and the Pacific Theater of Operations

[20]

FUCHS: Perhaps at this point, now that your team has been assembled, you could summarize anything you might have on the biographical background of the "players" that helped its effectiveness

TOLAN: Well, let's start with Captain Kennedy. John A. Kennedy was an award-winning reporter and eventually publisher of the Washington Times-Herald. He came to our office already familiar with congressional investigative procedures. He was a trusted Hearst Publishing Company executive. He had been assigned by William Randolph Hearst to many important and confidential positions. He had been Mr. Hearst's legislative lobbyist to win approval in various Western States for the construction of Boulder Dam.

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Kennedy was an extremely alert and sophisticated person. He had more contacts, almost, than the Capitol Hill telephone switchboard. Secretary Knox was a Chicago Hearst executive, and a longtime personal friend. He knew Kennedy to be a most competent political analyst, and seemed always to follow his advice no matter who else held contrary opinions in the Navy Department. Captain Kennedy, for his part, confined his advice to political matters. So, OP50F always had the ear of the Secretary, if needed.

Kennedy was a highly organized individual. There wasn't a frivolous bone in his body. His power of steady concentration when faced with perplexing problems -- particularly personality problems -- always amazed me. He would sit in front of a clean desk, sometimes, and just think quietly for over an hour on his next move. I don't believe I ever saw him do anything, including appearing at a hearing, travel with the Committee, set up a guest list for a social gathering, or play golf, without having given thought to the occasion in advance.

Captain Kennedy started Truman Committee liaison

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when already acquainted with the Chairman. He owned radio stations at Charleston and Parkersburg in West Virginia and had a luxurious home in Charleston. Mrs. Kennedy was the great-granddaughter of the late Senator Davis of West Virginia -- a founder of Davis, Elkins University. One of the most important Senators on the Committee, and also on the Military Affairs Committee, was West Virginia Senator Harley Kilgore. 1t would be almost an understatement to say that Captain Kennedy had the confidence of Senator Kilgore. There was a warm personal relationship. He soon earned the respect and friendship of almost every other member of the Committee.

Captain Kennedy was a skilled public relations professional. That is just exactly what the Navy needed on Capitol Hill.

Captain Kennedy also had recent experience which had clearly indicated to him that the National Defense effort was in serious trouble. I believe he had hopes the Truman Committee might put the public opinion whip to ineptness in both the military and civilian organizations, although he kept any such opinion to himself.

After Pearl Harbor, Captain Kennedy was appointed

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West Virginia State Director of the War Production Board -- a field office operation which would foster grave doubts as to Washington central office competence.

After being commissioned a Lt. Commander in the Naval Reserve, he was sent to Philadelphia. He ran into Secretary Knox on the golf course while, of course, he was in Navy uniform. Knox ordered him to Washington. He was assigned to the Contract Distribution Branch, Office of Procurement and Material, Executive Office of the Secretary. He reported to civilian Frank Folsom but actually he was working for James Forrestal, Under Secretary of the Navy.

In "giving small business the business" as he called the activities of the Contract Distribution Branch, he had already set up his own liaison with the Senate Small Business Investigating Committee under Senator James E. Murray of Montana. I was working with him then. When OP50F was created we were preparing a special hearing for the investigating committee. I'll talk more about this as we go along with our interview.

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FUCHS: Lieutenant John Abbott also had newspaper experience, didn't he?

TOLAN: Yes, Abbott was a journalism graduate from Marquette University, He had worked several years covering the California legislature, for both the United Press and Associated Press. He knew Capitol Hill intimately. After coming to Washington, he had been Chief Investigator and report editor for my father, Congressman John H. Tolan of California, Chairman of the House Committee Investigating the Interstate Migration of Destitute Citizens and, later, the so-called Tolan Committee Investigating National Defense Migration.

Lieutenant Abbott was a skilled writer and editor. We had many reports of the Truman Committee given to us for review, in advance of publication. This kind of a rush job was very little challenge to his talents. He was sorely needed by OP50F and the Navy. He eventually wound up in Secretary Forrestal's immediate office as a public relations aide.

Lieutenant Abbott made friends readily. This ability gave us a great deal of needed information from

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Committee staff members as to what was ahead for the Navy. Sometimes it was good news, but more often it was distressing information. Early tip-offs gave us time to get at the problem in advance of formal committee action.

FUCHS: I understand you were a lawyer by training.

TOLAN: Yes, I am a member of the District of Columbia Bar. My Juris Doctor degree is from Catholic University of America in Washington. I also took part of my legal education at the University of California and Georgetown University Law Schools. Like Captain Kennedy in West Virginia, I volunteered for Navy service when I was District Manager for Production, War Production Board, San Francisco.

Let me share with you some of my background which was helpful in defending the Navy during various congressional investigations. First, I knew the geography of the country and was at ease making travel arrangements for the committees. After graduation from St. Mary's College, California, I went to work in a bank. Then I became Secretary to a Regional

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Sales Manager (11 Western States) for the Johns-Manville Corporation and accumulated a thorough knowledge of the Far West. My father was elected to the 74th Congress in November, 1934, the same year Senator Truman won his first election.

Every family member had been involved in the congressional campaign. In December 1934 we drove to Washington. I had wanted to start law school. So, in January, I started taking evening classes at Georgetown University and worked days helping in my father's office.

During primary and general election battles, I left law school and shuttled back and forth from Washington, D.C. to Oakland, California.

Although we had local leaders on our election committees, my mother, Mrs. Alma Tolan, ran the campaign headquarters offices. My job was to write the literature, banners and billboards. Also, I wrote the press releases, helped raise money, and, when the meeting schedules became really crowded, I spoke for my father at political meetings.

Senator Truman had only one reelection campaign

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in those years before the war. Senators have a six year term. Congressmen run every two years. My father had three tough primary battles, and three final elections to win during those same six years. He was elected from a traditionally Republican district. Congressman Tolan was the first Democrat elected in 50 years.

So, I went back to Capitol Hill in Navy uniform. It helped me to understand, from experience, how, every day, 96 Senators and 435 Representatives were thinking of their next test at the polls -- survival. Elections always interrupted a number of things. It took six years for me to complete my legal education.

Third, I knew the legislative process. When working on the House side my father had me draft proposed legislation. He believed it was a valuable adjunct to law school. I often brought my work for review of the House Legislative Counsel. When the bills were referred to Committee, sometimes my father would arrange with the Committee Chairman for me to give testimony supporting the proposed legislation. This was unusual, but he seemed to delight in

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assigning me this kind of challenging task. Many of the investigations we had to face in OP50F were conducted by standing committees or subcommittees of the House and Senate. Their hearings were conducted to assemble the facts on proposed legislation. To prepare witnesses for the Navy one had to read and understand the proposed legislation. That training was very useful. In tandem with background information about the individual Senators or Congressmen who might be questioning the witnesses, we frequently influenced the shape of proposed laws. In support, we could always call on Navy lawyers from the Judge Advocate General's Office, the Procurement Legal Division (H. Strove Hensel and W. John Kenney), and various counsel in the bureaus.

FUCHS: What was your investigating committee experience. That was a special type of committee, wasn't it?

TOLAN: Yes, in the Senate they are called "special" committees. In the House they are called "select" committees. They can recommend statutory changes. They can hold hearings, subpoena witness, make official reports on the various subjects they are

[29]

directed to study, but they can't report a bill to the floor for enactment. Essentially, they are a temporary body set up by Senate or House resolution. On the other hand, standing committees, the ones that report proposed legislation are generally permanent. They are established when each body adopts rules of procedure.

Early in his career, my father was appointed by Speaker William Bankhead to the Select Committee to Investigate Pension Plans. The Chairman was C. Jasper Bell of Missouri [the same man who crowded Harry Truman out of the chance to run for the House of Representatives in 1934).

This investigating committee went after Dr. Francis Townsend and his Townsend Pension Plan organization. My father befriended Dr. Townsend, an elderly, gentle, and sometimes naive Californian. After much personal abuse by the Committee, Dr. Townsend was held in contempt of Congress, tried and convicted in the U. S. District Court, and jailed. National sympathy for the Doctor escalated. In a sense, President Franklin Roosevelt overruled the Committee and the House. He gave Dr.

[30]

Townsend a pardon and set him free.

I never missed a hearing of the Bell Committee if my law school class schedule would permit my attendance.

FUCHS: Then there was the Tolan Committee?

TOLAN: Yes, the Tolan Committee is really another historic committee. Its work ran quite parallel to the Senate Truman Committee. The Tolan Committee made its final report in January 1943.(See Exhibit "D”, House Report No. 3, 78th Congress, 1st Session, "Final Report of the Select Committee Investigating National Defense Migration," January, 1943, 'United States Government Printing Office.)

If you don't mind, I would like to come back to the Tolan Committee later on in this statement when I discuss how it worked closely with Senator Truman's committee. The findings and recommendations of the two committees led one writer to say, "The Tolan Committee was the House equivalent of the Truman Committee.”(Donald H. Riddle, The Truman Committee. New Brunswick, New Jersey, Rutgers University Press, 1964. p. 9)

I had three years of close working experience with the Tolan Committee. I had drafted the original authorizing resolution in December 1939. After a lot

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of hard work by my father, the committee was approved on April 22, 1940. By the time I was assigned to the Truman Committee staff director, Dr. Robert K. Lamb, had completed his work on the House side and was staff director of the "Special Senate Committee to Study and Survey Problems of Small Business Enterprises" (Murray Committee).

The point is that the three officers in OP50F, on being assigned to the Truman and other investigating committees, were not strangers to Capitol Hill. We were prepared to go to work but we couldn’t possibly have known about the thousands of miles of travel and the hundreds of hearings and staff conferences we were to face.

As intended by official orders, OP50F, the Clearance Section, was a communications bottleneck between the Congress and the Navy. That put us "in the middle." Only at times could we satisfy both sides. Captain Kennedy certainly put us in a position where we had to know what was going on. Each of the several investigating committees agreed with the Captain and the Secretary of the Navy that they would address or telephone requests, first to our office. A constant stream of letters and phone calls started at that moment. We got quick responses. Consequently, with a few exceptions, our

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service function was satisfactory.

FUCHS: How well did you get to know the Senators on the Committee?

TOLAN: We got to know them very well, especially during Committee travel. Trips by rail were funded by the Committee. Trips by air were on military transports supplied alternately by Navy and the Army Air Force. Captain Kennedy traveled with the Committee in North Africa, Lt. Commander Abbott circumnavigated the world in 1945. I went with the Committee through the Caribbean, Panama Canal Zone, Bermuda, Azores, France, England, Germany, Italy and North Africa. Every time we left Washington, we had to obtain travel orders from the Bureau of Naval Personnel. I'll attach a series of these orders showing our continental and overseas destination.(See Exhibit "E", attached. Official Travel Orders.) The orders show thousands of miles of travel to almost every state, and many repeated trips to military and naval bases.

After mid-1943, Senator Truman cut down somewhat on his Committee travel. Captain Kennedy and I were with him on one trip to Seattle. I left the party at Seattle and so did Senator Truman. The Wallgren subcommittee went on with Captain Kennedy to Kiska and Attu in the outer

[33]

Aleutian Islands.

The most traveled Truman Committee members with whom I became closely acquainted were Senators Mead, Kilgore, Ferguson, Ball, Brewster and Tunnell.

Unless we were attending public or executive committee hearings we seldom had Washington contact with the Senators. But our work with the staff members of the committees was constant.

FUCHS: Did you have much contact with Senator Truman?

TOLAN: If you had to see Senator Truman, personally, you would be in some kind of deep trouble. As I will tell you as we go along, there were various social and official contacts. But I avoided a crisis with staff where I would have to go over their heads to the Senator. Sometimes, at the opening or closing of executive committee hearings, which were usually held in a small committee room in the Senate wing of the Capitol, we might have a brief word or two with Senators. As you well know, once Senator Truman got to his office in the early morning, he was all business. He had to be. Besides seeing Missouri constituents and answering correspondence, he had more standing committee meetings than he could attend, let along the study and work involved

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in the hearings and reports of the Special Committee to Investigate the National Defense Program.

My warmest personal relations with the Senators occurred during travel, as I have mentioned. If Senator Truman had traveled more, it would have been Captain Kennedy's inclination to have made those trips. Anyway, if I had a real problem, I would have approached Senator Truman through Harry Vaughan or Matt Connelly.

FUCHS: I would like to hear more about Hugh Fulton and the rest of the staff. Before we go into that, tell me about some of the Senators who were most helpful to the Committee and Senator Truman.

TOLAN: Well, because of the years in my father's office, I arrived for work with the Truman Committee already acquainted with quite a few Senators. Of course, there were Senators Hiram Johnson and Sheridan Downey from California; Senators Carl Curtis and (later) John Sparkman who had served on the Tolan Committee in the House.

Senator James Mead had been a Representative from New York for some time before being elected to the Senate. My brother, George Tolan, and I got acquainted with him

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playing paddle-ball in the House gymnasium. We used to work out with him two or three times a week before he left the House.

The Truman Committee worked by subcommittee. Senator Mead was a very frequent subcommittee chairman. That meant, with Senator Truman's acquiescence, that he conducted the hearings in specific areas of investigation, and authored the subcommittee report to the full Committee membership, At that point Senator Truman would iron out any differences among the other Senators, and staff would put the report in final shape for presentation to the United States Senate. As a kind of reward for the subcommittee chairman's hard work, the final Senate report of the full Committee would be printed with the subcommittee chairman's name as the author. Usually that Senator would rise on the floor of the U.S. Senate and present the Truman Committee report, summarize the findings in a speech. Other interested Truman Committee members, and very frequently Senator Truman, would join in the ensuing debate.

Senator Mead had a fine talent for Senate debate. His speeches were well organized and very persuasive. I liked him. A year after I was assigned as Navy

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liaison to the Committee, he succeeded Senator Truman as Chairman. Senator Truman felt he had to resign when he became a candidate for Vice President. Although it came to be called the "Mead" Committee, and Rudolph Halley succeeded Hugh Fulton as Counsel, the Committee did not make a fresh start, by any means. For another year, when I left to work with the Office of War Mobilization and Reconversion, the Senate Committee to Investigate the National Defense Program was still working on hearings, studies and reports which had been started under Senator Truman's chairmanship.

FUCHS: Senator Kilgore filed quite a few reports, didn't he?

TOLAN: Yes, Senator Kilgore conducted many hearings and filed many Committee reports. He was from West Virginia, as I have said. That made him Captain Kennedy's territory. Also, Lt. Abbott had known him from the Tolan Committee liaison. But he was so active, all of us got to know him extremely well. As in the case of Senator Mead, Senator Kilgore

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contributed substantially to the Committee's reputation, and, as far as that was concerned, to Senator Truman's renown.

Kilgore, as were Truman and Wallgren, was on the Senate Military Affairs Committee. Many of the reports called for new and corrective legislation. Kilgore, more than the other Senators, would get bills drafted to incorporate Committee recommendations. After many of the bills were filed in the Senate legislative hopper, they were referred to the Sedate Military Affairs Committee. The three Democratic leaders would push the proposed changes in law. Success, by congressional enactment, was almost assured from the start. Out of this reservoir of power and prestige came such laws as "Renegotiation of War Contracts,(65 Stat. 7 (This citation is from the Korean war version. The original war contract renegotiation law was enacted as part of the National Defense Appropriation Act of 1942. Here, again, one can see the importance of standing committee assignments of Truman Committee members. Truman, Mead and Burton were on the Senate Appropriations Committee.) “Contract Settlement Act of 1944" (Termination of Contracts); (55 Stat. 649.) and the "War Mobilization Act of 1944."(78th Congress, 2nd Session, Public Law 458, Oct. 3, 1944.)

Senator Kilgore was hard-working and always seemed to find the time to travel and attend hearings with the

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Committee. He had chronic sinusitis and flying always seemed to stir up the inflammation. On two or three trips I had to stop everything and get him to a naval dispensary for treatment and nose drops. On one trip, Lt. Commander Abbott was blamed for losing Senator Kilgore's luggage. There is hardly anything more distressing than a Senator arriving at a hotel without clean shirts, probably about to address a public gathering. Captain Kennedy was quite unforgiving about such a liaison mishap. It was a good thing that Senator Kilgore was an understanding and tolerant gentleman at all times.(In 1946, Senator Kilgore succeeded Senator Mead as Chairman of the Committee.)

Senator Ferguson was the most active Republican on the Committee. You have been told about his acting as a one-man Grand Jury investigating corruption in Detroit.(Oral History Interview with John W. Abbott, Harry S. Truman Library, March, 1970, p. 140.) Again, when Committee reports suggested follow-up changes in law, it was important to have bipartisan advocacy in the standing committees of the Senate.

In addition to his Truman Committee membership, Senator Ferguson was on six other committees, the most

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important being the committees on the Judiciary and Immigration. As far as the war effort was concerned, he was very useful testifying for passage of bills in such committees as Naval Affairs, Military Affairs, and Appropriations.

In marked contrast to Chairman Truman, who was very much to the point, and sometimes astonished witnesses by his ability to ask a simple question to clear up complex testimony, Senator Ferguson was a good man to delve deeply into incomplete testimony. Often this cross-examination was conducted in a very tough manner as he explored motives of witnesses, confusion of authority, or when he was making an effort to uncover corruption or stupidity.

The Republican membership of the Truman Committee, Senators Ferguson, Brewster, Burton and Ball gave the reports and recommendations bipartisan credibility. Ferguson was the hardest working member of this Republican group. Perhaps it was because he carried a lighter Senate work load, but I feel it was because of his intense interest and his personal admiration of Senator Truman.

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Senator Ferguson had an insatiable thirst for detail, not only when questioning witnesses, but for studying surroundings during inspections of war plants or during travel. He would crowd extra tours into an already jam-packed Committee schedule. He always included me into these forays, grinning archly when I seemed not ready to join him.

We had a slack morning in Marrakech, French Morocco in June 1945. He got me out of bed at 4:30 a.m. to make a side trip to the tiny village of Ourika in the Atlas Mountains. He had rounded up an Army car, and a Red Cross guide. It turned out to be an unforgettable experience. We saw an entire village existing on crusts of bread. We went into their houses. They didn't have a wall peg upon which to hang clothes because all the clothes they had were on their backs. No beds, no mats, earth floors, no doors or windows in the various openings. There was only one earth oven for the village with only enough fuel to bake twice a week. We had enjoyed a 14-course dinner the night before in the palace of the Pasha of Marrekech, El Glaoui.

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FUCHS: Senators Mead, Kilgore, and Ferguson were the greatest contributors to Senator Truman's work, in your opinion?

TOLAN: I think so. Perhaps they were the ones handling most of the matters that affected the Navy. Later, after Senator Mon Wallgren was elected Governor of the State of Washington, a lot of work was shouldered by his successor in the Senate and on the Committee, Senator Hugh B. Mitchell. He had been a member of the House of Representatives, thus, I knew him before he came on the Committee. He was a studious, capable and effective member. It became a distinct pleasure to work with him.

Of course, regardless of anything else, Senator Truman was the key to all Committee activity. He set the program. He established the priorities. He directed the staff -- the place where almost everything started.

FUCHS: How well did you get to know Committee Counsel Hugh Fulton?

TOLAN: I got to know him a lot better, personally, after

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he left the Committee than I did when he was still on the job.

FUCHS: How did that happen?

TOLAN: Well, we got off to a rather awkward start when I went to his office in August, 1943. I had been advised by people who were in a position to know that I should be wary of Fulton. I wasn't wary enough. Right off we got into an argument over Henry J. Kaiser's Permanente Magnesium plant at Cupertino, California. Actually, I didn't and couldn't dispute Fulton's knowledge about magnesium. He had just finished a series of hearings on the subject.(Hearings, Special Committee to Investigate the National Defense program, Part 20, August 1943.) But I was dubious about Mr. Kaiser being an unchallenged leader in shipyard production. I knew more about the Kaiser Yards at Richmond, California, and Portland, Oregon, than Mr. Fulton. He kept talking about magnesium miracles and I kept talking about shipbuilding non-miracles. After a few minutes we broke off the discussion and I headed back to the Navy Department quite upset with myself.

The reason I didn't get to know him better at

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that time was due, in part, to the remote location of his office. He had a large northeast corner room in the Senate Office Building shared by Rudolph Halley and a couple of secretaries. The bulk of the Committee staff was spread all over the same building. Some were in the basement -- others with a large pool of typists, in a large inside room in the same building. Hearings were held in the Senate Caucus Room. If I had to deliver Navy replies to a Committee inquiry I could discover who wrote the letter by telephone and would carry the response direct to the staff investigator involved. So, there wasn't much need to see Hugh Fulton on a day-to-day basis. When we received a printer's galley proof of a pending Committee report for check by the Navy as to accuracy of facts, then I might take our comments direct to Fulton's office. If there were problems with the Committee findings, the basic recommendations, or with security, there might be discussion. It was never an occasion for chit-chat.

FUCHS: With whom did you have most of your dealings?

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TOLAN: For the full two years of Committee liaison, probably Rudolph Halley and George Meader.

FUCHS: Where did you begin? What staff helped you the most?

TOLAN: Matthew J. Connelly, the Chief Investigator. Matt was a friend from the House side of the Capitol. He had worked as a field investigator for the House Appropriations Committee during their examination of the $4,880,000,000 New Deal work relief program. I believe he was also involved in the Indiana 2% Club inquiry. Matt had come to Washington from Massachusetts in mid-depression. He told me he expected to get employment through the office of Senator David I. Walsh. Somehow he got the cold shoulder from Senator Walsh. He always resented that slight, so he worked on the House side. When Senator Truman received Senate authorization for his new Committee, Matt was delighted to get the job.

It was in the House Committee work that Matt became acquainted with the means to get staff payroll

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subsidized by Government departments. .You found the personnel you wanted. Then you called on Executive agencies where there was an interest in your Investigation and checked as to whether or not they had unfilled positions in their budget. If they had such a position, you asked them to hire your applicant. The moment that person was employed the agency or department would "misassign" or "detail" the person to your congressional committee.

Using this method my father's committee hired about $60,000 in payroll in 1940 to stretch a skimpy House appropriation of only $23,000 for the first year.

When Matt Connelly was first employed by Senator Truman there was only $15,000 in the Committee fund for operations.

Hugh Fulton's salary alone was going to take half of that amount. What about the cost of travel, reporters for hearings, supplies, and a hundred other expenses? Matt solved the problem by borrowing payroll.( Margaret Truman, Harry S. Truman. New York, William Morrow Company, Inc., 1973, p.139.)

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The Committee, after the first few months, had no trouble getting all the Senate operating money needed. The practice of getting employees "on loan" was later stopped, it seems to me.

FUCHS: Harold Robinson took over as Chief Investigator, didn't he?

TOLAN: The first year OP50F was in business, Robinson became prominent. John Abbott had more contact with Robinson than either Kennedy or myself. Matt Connelly had the close personal ties with Chairman Truman. While we never asked Matt to use his personal influence that I can remember, Matt was always our potential backstop. Of course, I knew Robinson, knew his background as an ex-F.B.I. accountant. I admired his work, enjoyed his company, but never happened to travel with him or work closely with him as an investigator of the Navy Department.

Both Connelly and Robinson contributed, in their own way, to Senator Truman becoming a national figure. Matt handled some of Senator Truman's political career which arose out of Committee achievements. Robinson,

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with Fulton, Halley, Meader and Flanagan, by their force and detailed fact gathering, wrote incontrovertibly valid reports. Supporting Senators, and a chairman confident of their work, took those reports to the Congress, the press, and the Nation. The results appalled everyone, including Senator Truman. After all was said and done, the Committee staff provided Robert Hannegan with the powder charge with which he loaded the Truman catapult.

FUCHS: What were your experiences with Rudolph Halley?

TOLAN: I could talk for a considerable length of time about Mr. Halley. Until Hugh Fulton left the Committee on September 15, 1944, he and Halley were a somewhat frightening team. When I come to recounting some of the specific Navy investigations it will be explained why I say "frightening." Both men were enormously informed about American industry before they headed the Committee staff. They were quick learners about Government, and frequently astonished OF50F.

Halley, once again like Fulton, found no one or no situation awesome. He showed this in his Truman

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Committee work, and later, with the Kefauver Committee.

We were sufficiently wary of Rudolph Halley so that when he would telephone Jack Abbott or myself to come up to the Capitol to see him, we would go together. It turned out to be a very prudent course of action.

FUCHS: You mentioned George Meader, what about his work?

TOLAN: I traveled a great deal with George. In a way, he was a loner. He liked field work. He stayed close to his desk and did almost all his own drafting of preliminary committee reports. When he turned over investigative results to Fulton and Halley they could go right into executive or public hearings.

George Meader had a sort of persistent, bulldog way of working. He was more thorough than others. He was appointed Assistant Counsel July 1, 1943, a month before Captain Kennedy set up OP50F.

George Meader was a linguist. When we went through Europe after V-E Day, I kept close to George. In the Azores, he could speak Portuguese; in Paris, French; in Cologne, German; in Florence and Rome, Italian. Besides, he was fluent in Spanish.

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I asked him, "How did you accomplish this language facility?" He told me, "In Michigan University and Law School, I would never date a girl that couldn't speak a foreign language. Right now, in my apartment, is a Spanish-speaking cousin of Senator Chavez of New Mexico, I won't allow him to speak English when we are at home."

When George Meader investigated the accumulation of excess Navy stocks, due to wasteful, inadequate inventory controls, he found us extremely vulnerable. We traveled to every Navy supply base in the country. We were not accompanied by any Senators, but, when George got back to Washington and wrote his report, the Navy was in deep trouble with the Truman Committee.

George Meader was appointed executive assistant to then Chief Counsel Rudolph Halley on August 1, 1944, and Chief Counsel, August 1, 1945. In 1948 he was elected to the House of Representatives as a member of the Republican Party. He served with distinction. I still hear from him when he comes to San Francisco.

FUCHS: Did you have any such experiences with Francis

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Flanagan who eventually became Chief Investigator succeeding Connelly and Robinson?

TOLAN: Yes, I traveled extensively with "Frip" Flanagan. That was his nickname. He was a Committee staff man on the trip to France, England, Germany, Italy and North Africa in June 1945. I delivered Navy answers to Mr. Flanagan's desk in the Senate Office Building. The Committee asked for regular reports on Hull fractures involving Liberty ships. These reports were assembled by Vice Admiral R. R. Waesche, Commandant of the U. S. Coast Guard. Inasmuch as the Coast Guard was a part of the Navy during the war, the reports were delivered to OP50F for transmittal to the Committee. My recollection is that I delivered these reports to Francis Flanagan. By the time I left the Navy, detail of hull fractures of over 600 Liberty ships were in the Committee's hands. Some of the vessels split in half. I recall one at a Portland dock and the other one at sea near the Aleutians.

Francis Flanagan was an ex-FBI agent as was

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Robinson. But Flanagan was a lawyer rather than an accountant. He was vigorous, competent, and a good man at writing reports. Flanagan became Assistant Chief Counsel, December 1, 1945.

FUCHS: Were there any women on the staff?

TOLAN: Two were notable as far as I was concerned. One was an investigator of manpower utilization and war labor problems. That was Agnes Straus. She was married while on the Truman Committee staff to Lt. Commander Alfred C. Wolfe, U.S.N.R. who was the OP50F liaison in the Navy Shore Establishments Division. Agnes Straus had called on OP50F for the answer to a large bundle of questions on Navy manpower policy as well as a complex statistical report. It was an almost overwhelming task for Lt. Commander Abbott and myself. We asked Rear Admiral Charles W. Fisher and a Captain Crisp for permission to take Lt. Commander Wolfe directly to Miss Straus on Capitol Hill. They agreed. I took Wolfe up to the Committee denizens. Miss Straus and Lt. Commander Wolfe, from the very first, seemed to enjoy working together over

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a period of several weeks. In fact, they married, had three fine children. They continued to live in Washington, D.C. after the wax. Wolfe had a succession of important jobs in the Truman administration -- Interior Department and the Inter-American Development Bank. When I left the Office of War Mobilization and Reconversion in 1946, Wolfe took over my position as special assistant to Director John W. Snyder.

Agnes Straus Wolfe was a vigorous investigator and pulled her weight in a field usually crowded with men. The Committee's highly critical and effective manpower reports were substantially based on her work.

The second important woman to OP50P was Margaret "Peggy" Bucholtz, the hard working and alert committee secretary. She ran the hearing schedules, and was responsible for recording assignments of the various investigators. Almost daily Abbott or I would have to call Mrs. Bucholtz to ascertain who was doing what, when they were going to do it, and sometimes, how they were going to do it. If we had a valid reason for obtaining information, without violating confidential material, Peggy could supply the answers to our questions without delay. She was a great time-saver for OP50F.

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As the Committee grew in fame, the tip-offs of corruption and war production bottleneck complaints became overwhelming in number. Peggy controlled files and prevented utter chaos.

FUCHS: What about Walter Hehmeyer?

TOLAN: Walter handled Committee press relations very effectively. But the only reason OP50F had to deal with Mr. Hehmeyer was to pick up copies of Senator Truman's statements, press releases and advances of Committee reports.

Lt. Commander Abbott, due to experience with United Press and Associated Press had the most contact with Walter Hehmeyer. In late 1945, with a veteran Capitol Hill reporter, Frank McNaughton, Walter Hehmeyer wrote This Man Truman. It was published by Whittlesey House [McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc.).

Well, that's about all the staff that I can recall who were involved with Navy matters. If there were others that worked on the tank landing craft hearings or the faked steel plate inspections, it

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was before the organization of OP50F.

When Captain Kennedy and I started our work in August 1943, we found that the Truman Committee's and its staffs' reputation for fearlessness had run into a lot of fearless Navy Department civilian and uniformed heads of the various divisions. For instance, Rear Admiral Edward L. Cochrane, Chief, and Rear Admiral Earl W. Mills, Assistant Chief, were the hard-driving heads of the Bureau of Ships. Earlier Truman Committee hearings and reports had already compelled a reorganization of the Bureau. They were both competent men but they regarded Committee inquiries about possible corruption, procurement and ship production log-jams, etc., as intrusive, based upon dubious sources of information, and largely a waste of time. With their strong backing, their Counsel and our liaison, Lt. Commander Frank C. Nash, was particularly obdurate. OP50F would type up transmittal letters to Lt. Commander Nash. I would carry them to Nash's office. With an obvious show of distance, Nash would open the right-hand bottom drawer of his desk and throw the Committee request into it, slam the

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drawer closed and glance up at me with a guileless smirk. Nash had been a professor at the Georgetown Law School when I had attended classes there. So I knew him, but that acquaintanceship didn't seem to help. I kept telling him, "When I bring you one of Senator Truman's requests for information, you have our clearance to pick up the telephone, call up Hugh Fulton or Rudolph Halley, and at least acknowledge receipt. Tell them the answer will take some time, but that the Bureau will get out an early reply. That will give you a month, easily." I had used this, "we will get right on it" method quite successfully.

Nash kept stacking up the Truman Committee inquiries, without answering most of them. On the day I was discharged from the Navy in 1945, I called on Frank Nash. He said good-bye in his jovial manner. As I headed out the door, he said, "Wait a minute." I turned around. He reached into that bottom drawer. He wrapped both hands around a big stack of papers, picked them up, and unceremoniously dumped them in the wastebasket. He said, "And good-bye, Truman Committee."

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Well, I guess the Truman-Mead mail, so filled with hundreds of complaints had swamped their follow-up systems. Nash's assistant, Lt. William Able, has been quoted as saying Lt. Commander Nash often skipped OP50F and dealt directly with the Truman Committee. It's my story that Nash skipped everyone. After the war, Nash became General Counsel of Todd Shipyards Corporation in New York.

In January, 1945, events finally caught up with the Bureau of Ships (and Nash). The Committee, by hearing and debate on the U.S. Senate floor, chewed up Norfolk Navy Yard in a dreadful manner. As we go along, I'll show you an exhibit concerning this fiasco. Shattering as this experience was for OP50F, when the dust finally settled, I was promoted from Lieutenant to Lieutenant Commander. In large part, I could thank the Bureau of Ships.

FUCHS: In your opinion, what usually put the Truman Committee on the Navy's trail?

TOLAN: Captain Kennedy, Lieutenant Abbott and I were assigned to get answers to the Committee questions.

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Most of the time we had little information as to whom, or what, was behind the inquiries.

Walter Hehmeyer wrote that the Committee received "as many as two hundred tips a week in the mails, but has discarded nothing that appeared to bear possibilities of turning up faulty production, laziness or malicious mismanagement."(Frank McNaughton and Walter Hehmeyer, This Man Truman. New York, McGraw-Hill Book Co., 1945. p. 99, 100.)

Now and then we would get a hint. Complaints from Navy yards and other shore establishments could be traced to the military or the civilians working there. Some complaints came from disgruntled war contractors. The press would frequently feed the Committee, and hope for a scoop if something was turned up that was provable and printable. We had second-guessing and carping officers in the Navy Department who leaked information to reporters like Drew Pearson and the Committee. In my belief, hundreds of enlisted men kept up a staccato of tips by "letters to the editor" or by letters to Congress. Members of the Senate would forward such mail to the Truman Committee and stand by, waiting for action by that powerful body. (That's why Lt. Commander Nash's attitude was so

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risky. The chances of follow-up were very great if the Committee was giving service to some foot-stamping colleague of Senator Truman.)

We didn't concern ourselves about the sources of hundreds of Committee complaints. We had the simple assignment of assisting the Committee, and, to the best of our ability to defend the Navy when the Navy was right. Above and beyond that, we were able to help keep Secretary Frank Knox.. and later, Secretary James V. Forrestal, off Capitol Hill and out of the glaring publicity which was always the inevitable result. It was like trying to fight slander or libel. If you publicize the charge you raise questions about the adequacy of your answer to the charges.

If you were summoned before the Truman Committee, you had to be very lucky to come out ahead of the game. There were few winners. No wonder the Navy agreed to give "complete cooperation"

FUCHS: What was the first investigation in which you saw the Truman Committee function?

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TOLAN: The first, where I had the opportunity to watch Chairman Truman, Hugh Fulton, Committee members and staff, from almost on the inside, was the Canol Project inquiry.

As my travel orders show, (See Exhibit "E” Orders dated June 28, 1943 for travel to begin August 3', 1943.) from August 3, to September 15, 1943, I took an extended trip to Chicago and the West Coast. I was gathering witnesses for a hearing on Navy subcontracting for small business. This hearing was held by the Senate Small Business Committee (Senator James E. Murray, Chairman) on October 25, 1943.

Captain Kennedy had received a telephone call from the Committee to provide copies of correspondence, or any other information, as to whether or not the Navy had ever approved Canol.

Captain Kennedy dug up the Navy letter supporting Standard Oil of California's opinion that the Canol Project was unnecessary.

Captain Kennedy called both Lieutenant Abbott and me into conference. He said, "The Army is in real trouble on this. They may try to shift some of the blame on the Navy as being unable to supply the

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Alaska Defense Command with petroleum products. Get up on the Hill and follow this investigation as close as possible. Keep the Navy out of it, but if the Committee or the Army tries to pull us in, then pass the word and I'll inform Vice Admiral Horne and Secretary Knox."

That order provided Abbott and me with a ringside seat. We attended all the off-the-record Executive Committee hearings, the public hearings, and had a chance to read the Committee's report to the Senate in draft form. The report on Canol was filed in December 21, 1943.

Later on the Navy got in almost as bad a jam or two as the Army in Canol. The Army made a quick pass at the Navy's inability to ship oil to Alaska. But our response was, "We were never even asked about the problem -- if there was a problem of getting petroleum up the Inland Passage."

There has been so much written about the Canol investigation that there is no need for me to burden this record with repeating much of what is already in print.

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OP50F was observing the Truman Committee playing "hard ball" for the first time. They pulled out all stops. What caused this, of course, was Lt. General Brehon B. Somervell's uncompromising position that he had the right to find a strategic need to pump oil from the Arctic Circle. He felt there was no need fox the War Production Board or the Petroleum Administration for War to review his decision.

Lt. General Somervell, as head of the War Department Services of Supply was in enough trouble -- basic policy trouble. Vice Admiral Samuel M. Robinson Chief of the Navy Office of Procurement and Material had a similar job. Despite the Truman Committee demand that War Production Board Chairman Donald M. Nelson, take full control over military procurement, Nelson left actual procurement remain in the hands of these two officers in the military. (Herman Miles Somers, Presdential Agency -- OWMR. Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1950. p. 47 et. seq.)

Lt. General Somervell had much to lose, and eventually did lose procurement policy to the Office of War Mobilization.

Vice Admiral Robinson was very cooperative with OP50F. We were on hand for his weekly meeting where

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the most pressing production bottlenecks were revealed. Sometimes there were serious questions about relations with the War Production Board and the various czars such as Secretary Harold L. Ickes (Petroleum Administration for War), War Manpower Commissioner Paul B. McNutt; and Office of Rubber Director William M. Jeffers, etc., etc., etc.

It was at one of Vice Admiral Robinson’s staff meetings that I first heard of the "Manhattan Project." No one knew it was creating atom bombs. Everyone was mystified that this Army project had a higher priority rating for obtaining lead -- overriding the Navy's critical need for lead batteries in our submarine fleet.

Vice Admiral Robinson felt that the Congress had a right to question procurement policy and the impact of contract placement. Even if he didn't have that position, Secretaries Knox and Forrestal would not have given him support. On the other hand, Lt. General Somervell, convinced of his right to independent judgment in contract placement, had the full and complete support of Under Secretary of War Robert B. Patterson.

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The Truman Committee public hearing, during which Under Secretary Patterson testified, was supposed to vindicate Lt. General Somervell. It didn't. As I sat listening to the testimony, I could hardly believe what was being said. Patterson was not prepared for the cross-examination. If he had been in the executive committee hearing, as I had been, or if what was already on the record had been reported to him, he would have known that Lt. General Somervell's case was hopeless.

At one point he broke into a Senator's questioning, asking "What are you laughing at, Mr. Fulton?" He got an answer from Fulton he didn't really want. It is almost the first rule of congressional hearings that, no matter how hard-pressed you become, you never pick on the Committee staff. (Canol Committee Hearings, Part 22, p. 9696 et. seq.)

Under Secretary Patterson opened the hearing with a prepared statement. When he read, "The War Department is proud of Canol...Canol was a bold undertaking," I could hardly wait to return to the Navy and report that quote to Captain Kennedy. I rushed into Captain Kennedy's private office. I said, "You

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won’t believe how Patterson started off his defense of General Somervell. He came out with the flat-footed statement that the Army is proud of Canol." Kennedy looked up with interest and replied, " That's the doctrine of apparent frankness."

I stepped back to our outer office and told Lieutenant Abbott the story, and Captain Kennedy's reaction. We were enormously amused. Abbott said, "That's really great. After you have been in a few hundred hearings in the Congress, you realize there are lots of doctrines. Only I've never thought about calling a witnesses' defense ploys 'doctrines.'" I replied, "Let's think of some more ‘doctrines.’”

We did. After a short time we had about fifteen doctrines. When Matt Connelly heard about the doctrines, he joined us inventing new ones.

When Senator Homer Ferguson heard about our little game, he was not only amused, but said, "That would make a good magazine article.” I responded, "That's okay with us. We can't patent the idea, but we'll write up a draft and you can submit it under your name."

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So, we didn't get the Navy into any trouble in the Canol investigation. With somewhat scrambled editing, however, Senator Ferguson got an article on the "doctrines" in Liberty Magazine. (Exhibit "F", Liberty Magazine article, entitled "You Can't Fool Us Senators" by Homer Ferguson, (U.S. Senator from Michigan). Date of article is uncertain, probably December 14,)

Senator Ferguson added a few doctrines of his own, such as "the Cook's Tour." "Paul Revere-ing," however, was only used by Lieutenant Abbott and myself as a description of advance visits to military establishments to get ready for a committee visit.

On January 22, 1945, in a speech on the Senate floor about Norfolk Navy Yard, Senator Mead used the phrase "Paul Revere" while giving a description of Committee investigations being treated to a cover-up of conditions in the Yard. Lieutenant Abbott and I hardly could have imagined that our descriptive term, created in jocularity, would wind up in such formal precincts. (Congressional Record -- Senate -- January 22, 1945, p. 384.)

FUCHS: Were you on the Committee trip to the Canol Project in Alaska and the Yukon Territory?

TOLAN: No, Jim. The Navy was not in the picture at all until the Committee got back to Washington. In off-

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the-record executive hearings, they began to look at the options or alternatives General Somervell might have had available to supply Alaska with petroleum products. One answer was Navy protection of commercial tankers. The Army never consulted the Navy.

General Somervell had clear authority to make what turned out to be a monumental mistake. It seems to me, that after Pearl Harbor there might have been some justification in the General's mind for not counting on the Navy.

He could have imagined, quite easily, that the troops being mobilized in Alaska could have become stranded. Heating oil was very important in that vicious climate, not to mention motor fuel. and aviation gas.

Here was a plan to open up at Norman Wells a new oil field in late 1941. As I recall the testimony, the estimated cost to refine and deliver that oil over a new 625 mile pipeline was $25,000,000. The final costs were $146,000,000 to $160,000,000, roughly estimated. The total bill did not include a great

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deal of money spent on military manpower and supply. I also recall that 22 lives were lost. The diversion of critical manpower, of scarce materials, and skilled management talent was a shocking loss to the total war effort.

The first crude oil reached Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, April 16, 1944 -- at least two years behind the original schedule. Not until October 31, 1944 was the first 100 octane gasoline produced.

The refinery at Whitehorse was closed April 5, 1945. One tanker playing the Inland Passage to Skagway, Alaska, over a three-month time, could have delivered the total war output of Canol. (Report No. 10, Part 14, The Canol Project, December 21, 1943. Senate Committee to Investigate the National Defense Program.)

After 2 ½ years of effort occupying 4,000 troops and 12,000 civilian workers, the refinery was sold for junk. ( Donald H. Riddle, The Truman Committee. New Brunswick , N.J. , Rutgers University Press, 1964. pp. 117 et. seq.)

On February 7, 1982, I had a talk with the man who ran the Canol Project for Standard Oil of California. His name is William B. Bramstedt. Since we became friends during the last few years we have talked often about Canol.

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Bill was the president and general manager of Standard of Alaska -- a subsidiary of Standard of California. (WILLIAM B. BRMSTEDT, 1201 California Street, San Francisco, California 94109.) Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson appointed this firm to design and oversee operations of the refinery and pipelines.

The refinery at Whitehorse and the various petroleum product lines were all built at the same time Bill told me. One line ran East to Watson Lake; one line Northwest to Fairbanks; and a line to the Coast running to Skagway. The Skagway line carried bunker fuel for ships and motor gasoline.

One of the persistent stories about Canol was that it was underdesigned -- that the line to the refinery at Whitehorse was only four inches in diameter. Mr. Bramstedt says that the line was six inches about two-thirds of its length, and four inches the last one-third of the route.

Later on a line was extended to Haynes, Alaska, which carried aviation gas. Russian pilots ferried fighter planes from Alaska to Siberia and thence to the Russian front. Mr. Bramstedt says the Russians were aloof to the point of discourtesy. It was impossible

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to get to know them. However, the Cano1 Project fueled the American Lend-Lease P-51 planes for their ferry trip to battle Germany. The Russians brought along their own maids and cooks to their headquarters at Fairbanks. None of them would speak to the Americans.

Mr. Bramstedt said that the Northeast Service Command under General Worsham "did nothing for us." They did guard the line and the refinery, however.

He also said that General Somervell felt under intense pressure after the Truman Committee hearings. At one time, two of Standard of Alaska employees borrowed an Army automobile to take a recreational trip up the Alaskan Highway. They had permission from the Army to do so. The two men were caught in an avalanche and lost the car. In a routine report General Somervell heard of the accident. He telephoned from Washington, D.C. and demanded of Mr. Bramstedt that Standard of Alaska immediately reimburse the Army for the value of the automobile. Mr. Bramstedt says, "I never expected a personal call from General Somervell. He was very concerned and very abrupt. We gave General Wozaham the check. I didn't understand why he

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was so overwrought about the cost of this accident, but he certainly was."

Mr. Bramstedt's conclusions about Canol were: "It was a wild-hair scheme -- an unnecessary boondoggle and Standard of California had told them so from the beginning. But at that time we were accused of protecting our West Coast markets from Standard of New Jersey (Imperial Oil Company of Canada) and the Army wouldn't listen to us. Canol turned out to be a disastrous diversion of critical skilled and unskilled labor and strategically important materials. Obviously we were not worried about a small oil field on the Arctic Circle at Norman Wells, Yukon Territory. Before the war, this tiny refinery only operated part of the year to produce kerosene for the natives along the MacKenzie River. It never was an important field and despite what you tell me of Under Secretary of War Patterson's prediction of finding reserves of 50 to 100 million barrels, we never pumped over 7,500 barrels a day."

Mr. Bramstedt is now retired as a vice-president of Standard Oil of California. After he returned from

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Alaska he went to the Middle East and became chairman of the Board of Directors of the Cal-Texas Oil, Company.

FUCHS: That was an interesting sidelight, running into the actual designer and operator of the Canol project. Everyone who has written about the Truman Committee has given some attention to Canol. Why did you find it so important?

TOLAN: It was the first experience OP50F had with the Truman Committee where Senator Truman, the other Senators and Hugh Fulton went all out -- travel, executive hearings, public hearings and a hard-hitting report to the United States Senate. In a sense we cut our eyeteeth on an investigation where the Navy was not on the defensive.

However, Canol was a turning point for the Committee because it furnished, once and for all, incontestable proof that the Committee had been right all along about War Production Board Chairman Donald L. Nelson. Nelson, over Committee protests, had delegated procurement control to the Armed Services. He refused to withdraw that delegation. Canol was proof positive that the

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authority, in General Somervell's hands, had resulted in rampant waste that was seriously detrimental to the war effort.

The Truman Committee had been fact gathering about the procurement controversy since it had started work in 1941. In January, 1943, Chairman Tolan of the House Committee on National Defense Migration had again urged the House to pass his bill, H.R. 7742 to create the Office of War Mobilization and Reconversion. This legislation had been introduced by Chairman Tolan in October 1942. Senator Kilgore introduced companion bills S. 2092 and S. 2871. Senator Claude Pepper of Florida was a cosponsor of S. 2871. After five Chairmen of Special Senate and House groups came out in support of the Kilgore-Pepper-Tolan bills, (Senator Truman, Senator Kilgore (Subcommittee on Military Affairs); Senator Murray (Special Committee on Small Business); Senator Pepper (Subcommittee on Manpower of Committee on Education and Labor); and Representative Tolan (Select Committee on National Defense Migration).) President Roosevelt pre-empted everyone by establishing the Office of War Mobilization by Executive Order 9347, on May 27, 1943.

Thus, War Production Board Chairman Donald Nelson was made subordinate to James P. Byrnes, former Senator, Supreme Court Justice and then head of the Office of Economic Stabilization. Byrnes was called "Assistant President" as the new Director of War Mobilization.

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In retrospect, Nelson had an almost impossible assignment when he tried to move in on the military procurement territory, procurement needs were established by the strategy formulated by the Joint Chiefs of Staff. They outranked Donald Nelson with President Roosevelt.

O.W.M. Director Byrnes had a sustained struggle over the procurement issue all through the balance of 1943. The Canol project investigation was part of the continuing reminder to get procurement under his control or suffer the same fate as Donald Nelson. ( See Herman Miles Somers, Presidentia1 Agency -- OWMR. Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1950. p. 73 )

Finally, regardless of the O.W.M. Executive Order, Congress acted. The President was compelled to approve a new act creating the Office of War Mobilization and Reconversion on October 3, 1944. (78th Congress, 2nd Session, Public Law 458.)

In Canol the Truman Committee came up with incontrovertible arguments against letting military procurement run wild. Captain Kennedy, Lieutenant Abbott and I were very impressed by the Committee's power to explore ineptness.

The press had a field day. Vice Admiral S.M. Robinson, the Chief of Navy Procurement and Material was

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interested in our reports to him. Vice Admiral Frederick Horne, Vice Chief of Naval Operations followed closely Captain Kennedy's description of the Army's embarrassment from Secretary Stimson on down. OP50F began to get better cooperation from everyone in the Navy when we asked for prompt replies to Truman Committee inquiries.

General Somervell prevailed in one aspect of the Cano1 Project. The Committee with all its hearings and reports was not able to stop the project. General Somervell had obtained a decision from the Joint Chiefs of Staff that Canol was "strategic." Chairman Truman had promised that his Committee would not interfere with the conduct of the war. Somervell suffered little more than a loss of confidence in his judgment. Who knows, Under Secretary Patterson, but for Canol, might have been chosen the first Secretary of Defense when President Truman and the Congress consolidated the Armed Forces. As we all know, President Truman selected former Secretary of the Navy James V. Forrestal for that position.

FUCHS: What were your principal concerns with Truman

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Committee inquiries during the fall of 1943?

TOLAN: They asked us, repeatedly, to explain why certain production schedules in war plants were not being met. The Maritime Commission had jurisdiction over the building of merchant ships. The Navy was rushing the production of landing craft, auxiliary vessels, destroyer escorts, destroyers, cruisers, aircraft carriers and battleships like the New Jersey, Iowa and Missouri. The Army was struggling with transports, shell plants, tank production and training facilities.

It wasn't a very good answer to the Committee that our lagging production was due to shortages in materials, manpower, and lack of facilities to produce. Senator Truman and the staff members wanted specifics. It was very tempting to blame the War Production Board, the War Manpower Commission, the Office of Price Administration's rationing, or the many other civilian agencies.

However, if the Navy took the blame, we had to tell the Committee how the problem was being corrected.

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One had to keep assuring the Committee, and the public, that the Navy was doing its part to win the war. OP50F found that a Truman Committee inquiry could initiate a great deal of reorganization, instill a new sense of emergency, and, not infrequently, arouse some tempers.

FUCHS: Do you recall what raised some of the tempers?

TOLAN: Yes. When the Chief of Procurement and Material, Vice Admiral Robinson, at the instance of the Truman Committee and several others investigating committees, issued orders that top priority must be given to the use of small plants, there was, as Captain Kennedy put it, "a great deal of fussing."

Sub-paragraph (3) of the original Truman Senate Resolution, authorized the Committee to investigate 'the utilization of the facilities of small business concerns, through subcontracts or otherwise.” ( Senate Resolution 71, 77th Congress, 1st Session, March 1, 1947.)

The aircraft and the automobile industries that operated great assembly plants were accustomed to subcontracting, although "small business concerns" were not generally included. Navy shore establishments

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liked to do all their own work. Some of the manufacturing was secret and all the production plans were stamped "secret." This became an excuse more than a reason for not redistributing the war work to small plants. Another explanation was that an adequate supply of trained supervisors and inspectors was not available to control geographically scattered war contracts.

FUCHS: How could these objections be overcome?

TOLAN: For smaller plants, with under 500 employees for instance, it was burdensome to put in security procedures and arrange for clearance. Fences, gates, and guard had to be added to the plant. Employees had to be "cleared." Pressure from procurement officers, backed up by the Secretaries of the Army and Navy and the several congressional investigating committees soon broke through that objection.

The shortage of competent inspectors was solved by more recruitment, more training, and eventually, more pay. Even the largest war plants struggled with this problem. The Truman Committee found shoddy

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inspection and corruption. (Committee Report No. 10, Part 10, July 10, 1943. )

FUCHS: I believe there were many objections to the use of smaller plants, weren't there?

TOLAN: Yes, at a very early date, the Truman Committee began to study the problem of military procurement officials complete neglect of existing small plant capacity. (Hearings, Part 6, August 1941.)

The Committee discovered that small plants were prevented from participating in the war effort by: a) Too short notice to give them enough time to compile competitive bids on unfamiliar work; b) lack of equity capital, short and long term credit; c) access to, and unfamiliarity with, military plans, specifications, and contract procedures; d) refusal of the military procurement officers to execute negotiated contracts with small firms; e) inadequate accounting and cost estimating skills; f) in plants with less than 100 employees the machine tools or other facilities were not balanced to deliver a complete product; and, g) lack of the ability to furnish a performance bond.

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FUCHS: How was this sort of obstacle course challenged successfully?

TOLAN: It had to be challenged, and overcome. In attendance at that first Committee hearing in August 1941, was a great personal friend of Senator Truman, Mr. Lou E. Holland of Kansas City. He familiarized the Senator with the conditions of hopelessness and low morale among small plants in the Midwest. He then approached Congressman Tolan.

By November 26, 1941, Mr. Holland apparently with Senator Truman's help, was able to testify before the Tolan Committee, that his pool of smaller plants had received a $268,000 Navy contract for bore sights. (Hearings, Select Committee Investigating National Defense Migration (Tolan Committee) Part 23, p. 8930 et. seq.) As president, Mid-Central Associated Defense Industries, Inc., Kansas City, Missouri, Mr. Holland gave a lengthy recital of his troubles trying to find work for competent but idle, small manufacturers.

At that same hearing, Chairman Tolan supported Mr. Holland's view that too few contractors were getting all the defense work. He said, "Mr. Chairman. Before I left Washington on Monday, I received the following

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information from different offices in Washington: In August of this year (1941) 48.4 percent of the Army orders went to 10 states. In September the percentage rose to 70.8. In October it rose to 85.4 percent. With the Navy 56 companies in the United States held 45 percent of the contracts. Now, Mr. Odlum (Floyd B. Odlum, Chief, Division of Contract Distribution of the Office of Production Management) is in favor of taking care of the small plants for at least a period of six months to give them a chance to adjust themselves. Mr. Nelson of S.P.A.B. doesn't agree with him, but you will agree with me when I say this. We, in Washington, have got to get into our heads that after all is said and done, civilian morale is just as important as Army and Navy morale. You can't separate them."

He was bringing out an interesting point: even in the mobilization era of 1941, the only advocates for a fair share of goods and services for the civilian economy were in the Congress. After Pearl Harbor, the Truman, Tolan, and other investigating committees had to fight constantly to keep civilian needs equitably met.

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I read the reports of Mr. Holland's troubles. When I started to work for the War Production Board in January 1942, the idea he first propounded -- incorporating the pool of plants into a single business organization -- seemed feasible and basic.

By 1942 Congress had taken this problem of small contract distribution in hand. They passed a law creating the Smaller War Plants Corporation. (Public Law 603, 77th Congress.) As I have said earlier, Lou B. Holland became the first president of S.W.P.C. In time he was replaced by General Robert Johnson. Senator Truman was personally upset by this shift, as Holland was his good friend.

FUCHS: Did you have anything to do with the Smaller War Plants Corporation?

TOLAN: Yes. Before I went into the Navy, I was District Manager, Production, W.P.B. Concurrently with that position I was appointed District Manager of S.W.P.C. Oscar L. Starr (formerly with Caterpillar Tractor Company) Deputy Regional Director, was in charge of S.W.P.C. for California.

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Mr. Holland telegraphed Mr. Starr for information which might be included in his testimony before the Senate Small Business Committee on December 15, 1942. Mr. Starr asked me to prepare the reply for Mr. Holland. (See Exhibit "G”)

Mr. Holland had asked us to pass along to him a description of any problems. I wrote of the need for a uniform contract procedure for small business. I recommended the Mare Island Navy Yard's "Type C" contract which I had helped develop. We hoped Mr. Holland, with Senate help, would prevail upon the U.S. Maritime Commission to authorize the use of the Mare Island type contract, particularly in the massive Kaiser West Cost shipyards. "Type C" was a form of negotiated contract. We were getting millions of dollars of shipbuilding and repair work out of Mare Island in a steady flow. The work from Kaiser was interrupted frequently due to the Maritime Commission's insistence on fixed price contracts.

Not until September 18, 1943, did Donald M. Nelson, Chairman of the War Production Board direct "Placing War Contracts by Negotiation':" This order

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authorized preference for small plants. Further, it approved payment of higher prices if that became necessary to get the work to small business. (See Exhibit “H".)

Three days later, on September 21, 1943, Senator Ferguson introduced S.J. Res. 80, "A Joint Resolution to prohibit the use of cost-plus-a-fixed-fee system of contracting in connection with war contracts."

FUCHS: Was the Ferguson Resolution ever considered by Congress?

TOLAN: Not to my knowledge. Senator Ferguson realized that there were procurement situations where, if you wanted the work done at all, you had to use cost-plus-a-fixed-fee. One of the most frequent occasions was when you wanted to direct that the work be done by small plants, or by a pool of small plants. His resolution provided a general exception to the outlawed form of contract where "The head of such Department personally certified that, because of lack of precedents or experience upon which to base fixed prices, it is necessary to use the cost-plus-a-fixed-fee system of contracting." ( See Exhibit "I".)

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Senator Truman blamed many of the scandals he uncovered on the cost-plus form of contract. My conviction was that the waste of money discovered by Senator Truman was not always correctly attributed to the cost-plus contract.

FUCHS: Can you explain that?

TOLAN: Yes, first, the worst abuse was the open letter contract. This was a simple directive to proceed with the work. Then, it was anticipated, after the production was underway, the parties to the contract would "negotiate" a fixed price, or unit price, contract. That was really cost-plus. Of course, Congress tried to fix this runaway situation by a law providing for the renegotiation of war contracts, and., also excess profits taxation.

One of the largest profit contracts I heard about in World War II was for a fixed price per unit of 5,000 houses to be built in six months near Norfolk (Virginia) Navy Yard. The contractor, with whom I was later associated after the war, was the Barrett Construction Company of San Francisco.

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FUCHS: Was this an open letter contract?

TOLAN: No, it was a fixed price per house. The contractor produced 50 to 75 finished houses per day for shipyard workers. The heating system failed. The job was so profitable that the contractor put in all new furnaces, at no charge to the Navy. Then, later, he had to give about one-half of his earnings back in excess profits tax.

FUCHS: Would cost-plus-a-fixed fee have been more in the public interest?

TOLAN: Not necessarily. But it certainly would not have been more profitable, in my opinion.

My concern was with very small plants -- normally under 100 employees. They were established small firms, normally in rural cities where their employees were already housed, and their skills available without having to provide training programs at Government expense.

Senator Truman was a nationally recognized Champion of the small manufacturer. In 1942 and 1943 they were

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going bankrupt by the hundreds of thousands. They could not get materials for civilian production. They had to lay off their skilled workers. It seemed unpatriotic for them to stand by with idle machinery when the nation was in an all-out war for survival.

These plants were scattered in large and small cities. They were supposed to survive on "trickle down" subcontracts from the various industrial giants. The work was there, but almost entirely out of reach.

During all of 1942 the Navy and the Army built up a staff of advisors on procurement in every O.P.M. and star production Board field office. These uniformed liaison officers aided both small businesses and the actual military procurement officials. I'll enclose a description of their operation, (Exhibit 'J" "Some Additional Reasons why the Naval Advisor program should be Continued.")

The Naval Advisor -- W.P.B. liaison was not always effective. I am attaching a typical refusal. This rejection was by the Navy Bureau of Ships. The memorandum shows that the Bureau did not want to direct the large prime contractor (Dravo) to subcontract to a smaller plant. Refusing a direct Navy purchase, Captain Wyncoop told me, "Let them go back to Dravo." ( Exhibit "K" Memos to Captain Kennedy, April 14 and April 16, 1943.)

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As a result of this sort of refusal to take care of competent smaller plants, Commander Kennedy appealed to Assistant Secretary Ralph A. Bard. Bard had jurisdiction over the manpower shortage problems. Captain Kennedy said, "At least we can compel our own Navy Yards to farm out more work." Bard took his advice. On June 16, 1943, the Bureau of Ships issued a general order. (Exhibit “L” Bureau of Ships Order, dated ,June 16, 1943.)

Assistant Secretary Bard's affirmative subcontracting policy was applauded by the hundreds of naval advisors in the various War Production Board field offices. The Bureau of Ships effectively pushed forward the negotiated ''Type C" contract (estimated cost-plus-a-fixed-fee). Once this form of contract was in place, one simple work order after another could be issued by the Navy Yard Production Officer or the Supervisor of Ship Building in each of the 14 Naval Districts. Instead of an interrupted flow of work, there was a steady demand for the qualified small plant facilities.

FUCHS: Was the Truman Committee following the Navy efforts

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to do more subcontracting?

TOLAN: Absolutely. The Truman Committee and staff were concentrating on overseeing all war procurement, especially the share directed to small business. However, they were not conducting hearings on this topic. If the other House and Senate investigating groups decided to take up a topic, and they were underway with their inquiry before the Truman Committee, Senator Truman would obviously let them proceed. His Committee would simply stand by.

Subcontracting was the subject of a number of hearings, at that time, by the Senate Small Business Committee (Murray) and the House Small Business Committee (Congressman Wright Patman of Texas, Chairman).

In addition, we had a constant demand for help by individual Senators and Congressmen. A typical response to such an inquiry is attached. (Exhibit "M" Copy of letter dated December 17, 1943 to House Majority Leader John W. McCormack.)

In this case the pressure was put on the Navy by Regional Director Richard C. Cooke of the War Production Board, Boston. Regional Director Cook,

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in turn, had the weight of the Majority Leader of the House of Representatives (later Speaker), Congressman John W. McCormack, backing him up. You may rest assured that Lt. Commander McGregor and I rushed to Boston to tend to that problem. As you can see from the contents of this letter, we had some difficulties.

For nearly a year I traveled and surveyed small plants. For instance, on July 24, 1943, I was on an extended trip in West Virginia trying to locate facilities for Brooklyn Navy Yard, N.Y. The Yard sent Lieutenant (j.g.) E. D. Jones of the Farming-Out Board with us. We reviewed the facilities of 27 plants along the Ohio and Kanawha Rivers in West Virginia, Kentucky and Ohio. (Exhibit ''N" Copy of letter dated July 24, 1943 reporting on survey of potential small plant facilities.)

We continued to review the Farming-Out Boards at various Navy Yards -- Bremerton, Washington, Mare Island, California; Portsmouth, New Hampshire; Boston, Massachusetts; Norfolk, Virginia; Charleston, South Carolina; and various other Navy establishments such as the Advance Base Depots of the Bureau of Yards and Docks. These depots supplied the Navy Seabees, the civilian construction battalions. A copy of our

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review of Norfolk Navy Yard (Virginia), dated November 26, 1943 is attached. (Exhibit "O" Report on Norfolk Navy Yard.)

Between trips we were busy with many other requests for data on the various Navy activities, The Truman Committee was requiring about 70 percent of OP50F's time and attention. Attached is a copy of a typical request for information from the House Naval Affairs investigating subcommittee. (Exhibit "'P" Bureau of Aeronautics Plane Crash Statistics.) They wanted flight statistics, "causes of crashes in student training and aircraft operation." The date of this inquiry is February 7, 1944.

We were frequently drawn into issues involving proposed legislation -- some of which were the result of Truman Committee studies. Attached is a copy of a letter I wrote to Captain Lewis L. Strauss of the Industrial Readjustment Section, Bureau of Ordnance, dated January 1, 1944. The Truman Committee, and the other committees, were concentrating already on postwar surplus property disposition policy. (Exhibit "Q" Letter regarding Senate Bill 1609 addressed to Captain Lewis L. Strauss, Bureau of Ordnance.)

This letter illustrates what I have described earlier as the useful connection between Senators

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uncovering corruption or abuse of power; as members of investigating bodies, and also being in powerful positions on the right standing committees, That's where corrective legislation can be reported for passage to the entire Senate. In this case Senator James E. Murray, Chairman, had control of competent staff on his Small Business Investigating Committee. He had them draft a proposed law on surplus machine tool disposition. He introduced a bill. He knew in advance that it would be referred to the Senate Military Affairs Committee, of which he was also a member. Hearings were assured. In this case he started with machine tools, but the ultimate laws on properties included everything in the Surplus Property Act. (78th Congress, 2nd Session, P.L. 457, October 3, 1944.)

FUCHS: Was Senator Murray friendly toward the Navy?

TOLAN: Yes, he was. We did very comprehensive studies which showed clearly that we were giving small plants as much work as could be expected. It should be remembered that scandals and maladministration of the war were Truman Committee territory. Murray

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headed the Small Business Investigating Committee. He fought for small plants quite effectively. Once the Smaller War Plants Corporation was created, Senator Murray kept up a very active surveillance of S.W.P.C’s nationwide pattern of field offices. There was, of course, continuing work to be done on a number of other small business problems such as rationing, price controls, obtaining draft deferments for key workers, and, of course, war materials priorities and allocations.

As you have observed, no doubt, I had strong convictions that small plants could shorten the time it would take the Allies to become victorious.

While working for the War Production Board T made a study of small plants with serious troubles due to interrupted schedules. The war work they were capable of performing was ship subassembly fabrication, mainly for U. S. Maritime Commission shipyards such as Kaiser, Bechtel and Bethlehem.

As you can see from this spread sheet they were small operators, with under 100 employees. (Exhibit "R"
a) C. L. Stancliff letter dated Dec. 11, 1942.
b) Summary of Efforts to Find Subcontracts in Maritime Commission Shipyards.)

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They could not obtain a negotiated "Type C” contract as the Maritime Commission refused to use this procurement procedure.

The Maritime Commission's merchant shipbuilding program had a great deal of work that small plants could perform -- if they had a fair chance to obtain it. The Commission was not opposed to getting some of the work out of the shipyards for public opinion and the Congress would not permit such a policy. On the one hand, the Commission gave its large shipbuilders cost-plus-a-fixed-fee prime contracts. On the other hand, it insisted on fixed-price bidding from all subcontractors. This blocked, generally, the, placing of profitable work with the smaller plants.

All the ships had some need for furniture, bunk beds, storage lockers, etc., which was of great interest to small cabinet shops or those who normally made store fixtures. However, the large shipyards had carpenter shops. They didn't want to farm out the work, but when the critical shortage in skilled manpower developed, they wanted the War Manpower

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Commission to issue high labor recruitment priorities so they could pirate the labor from small producers. This would put the small plants out of business, regardless of their competence. They were also reluctant to contract with pools of small plants.

FUCHS: This became a political issue?

TOLAN: A running political furor with the Truman Committee as well as most of the Senators and Congressmen.

FUCHS: How did OP50F handle this for the Navy?

TOLAN: We had every Navy Yard and Shore Establishment organize "farm-out" Boards. We negotiated "Type C" contracts with pools, so that simple work orders were issued for each job under the blanket master contract. Then, we set up a reporting system on our effective placement of war work with small businesses. Finally, we went to Congress with a complete "Jack Horner" report.

FUCHS: What kind of a report is that?

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TOLAN: It's an old descriptive term in the Navy. The first time I heard it was when I was telling Vice Admiral Frederick Horne about bringing several officers from Navy Yard Farm-out Boards to testify before the Senate Small Business Committee. He said, "Oh, a Jack Horner report." I returned to our office and asked Captain Kennedy the same question you asked. He said, "You know the nursery rhyme, don't you? Little Jack Horner sat in the corner, eating a Christmas pie. He stuck in his thumb and pulled out a plum and said, "Oh, what a good boy am I'" I felt nonplussed, to say the least.

FUCHS: Did the Truman Committee, which always opposed the cost-plus-fixed-fee contract, raise any objection to the Navy "Type C" contract?

TOLAN: No, they never did. They could excuse any procedure if it was an effective means to get the small manufacturer into the war effort, to help him survive, to retain manpower at home and away from the over-crowded war production centers. Above all, waste should be under control.

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During my earlier experience with pooling of plants at the War Production Board, San Francisco, I had written an article for California Magazine. The idea needed pushing in every possible way. (Exhibit 'S" "'Successful Small Plant Pooling," by John H. Tolan, Jr, W.P.B. Pooling Specialist, California -- Magazine of the Pacific, September, 1942.)

Just before I left the War Production Board to start Navy duty, Reader's Digest gave our pools some wonderful national publicity. The author, Frank J. Taylor, was a thorough investigator in his own right. Reader's Digest had him travel with me to various California cities for two days. The article appeared in Forbes' Magazine under the title, "What Can Lodi Do." Reader's Digest then digested its own article, back to itself. (Exhibit "T", "Bringing Small Shops Into War Production," by Frank J. Taylor, Reader's Digest, January, 1943.)

I was given more credit than I deserved. There were about ten or twelve engineers in W.P.B., several procurement officers, bankers, naval advisors, and others who were most helpful in making the pools successful. Oddly enough, these men were not mentioned in the article.

FUCHS: Did the article arouse much interest?

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TOLAN: Indeed it did. There was a great deal of mail both to me, personally, and to the San Francisco War Production Board office. I'll attach a few of these letters. (Exhibit "U" a) Letter dated Feb. 4, 1943, from W.A. Martin, Sweetwater, Texas; b) Letter dated Feb. 1, 1943, from Atty. Jacob I. Horowitz on wooden hull barges, Machias, Maine; d) Letter dated Jan. 6, 1943, from "Don Juan of California", Los Angeles, Calif.; d) Letter dated Jan. 12, 1943, from Alfred Williams, Pittsfield, Mass.; e) Letter dated Jan. 14, 1943, from Elmer E. Shreven, Muncie, Indiana; f) Letter dated Jan. 13, 1943, from J. W. Malmquist, War Production Board, Minneapolis, Minn.; g) Letter date Jan. 28, 1943 from U.S. Representative Joseph O'Hara, M.C., Minn.) They show the intensity of feeling that ran very high about the neglect of small business. There was no way to follow-up on these inquiries. I was off to Navy duty. But once in the Navy, I was determined not to forget about the pools. My assignment was to the Contract Distribution Branch. Once there ample opportunity was provided for me to carry on.

FUCHS: Did any of the pools get into difficulty?

TOLAN: Not to my knowledge. If they were set up right they avoided contingent liability for non-performance of individual members. Also, each pool corporation, along with a list of its officers and directors, had to be cleared by the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice. This made it possible for businesses,

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which were normally competitive, to price their products by a joint effort.

All the plant facilities were inventoried. All the skilled manpower cataloged. The Navy provided inspectors and cost accountants to verify the quality of the work done and to certify that the costs were really incurred. The fee, or profit, was fixed at the outset by estimating the cost. If the work cost more than expected, the profit was not increased. If the estimated cost was too high, any windfall could be recaptured by the law on renegotiation of war contracts.

FUCHS: So then you gave the Congress your "Jack Horner" report?

TOLAN: Yes, to the Senate Murray Committee investigating the problems of small business. When the Committee hearing was printed we had it available to answer public inquiries, other 5enate and House committees, and to circulate it in the Navy to stimulate more interest in farming out work. Enclosed is a copy of the cover sheet of these hearings, a list of the

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Committee members as well as a list of the witnesses. (Exhibit "'Y". Facsimile of title page, Committee membership, list of witnesses and exhibits, and a portion of Captain Kennedy's testimony. Senate Committee to Investigate the Problems of Small Business, Hearings, Part 30, Oct. 25, 1943.)

Although I also testified briefly at this hearing, my main job had been the selection of the witnesses and preparing all the exhibits.

FUCHS: By this method of anticipating a Committee investigation, OP50F kept the Navy out of trouble

TOLAN: Yes, and Secretaries Frank Knox and Under Secretary James Forrestal off Capitol Hill.

However, right after that, we got into trouble with the Truman Committee with subpoenas, and both executive and public hearings.

FUCHS: How did that come about?

TOLAN: Because of a "tip" to the Committee by Mr. James H. Rand of the Remington-Rand Company.

Assistant Chief Counsel Rudolph Halley called me one day to come up to his office in the Senate Office Building. When I arrived he said, "I have need for some real cooperation from the Navy. You have a Commander John D. Corrigan in the Bureau of Ordnance. He is an engineer in charge of the inspection

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and compilation of production reports on Navy Ordnance contractors. Remington-Rand, the typewriter company, was awarded a very large contract for manufacturing the Norden bombsight. The Navy was authorized and constructed a new Government plant at Elmira, New York. They turned it over to Remington-Rand to produce the bombsight. Remington-Rand has not been meeting production schedules. There has also been some criticism as to the quality of the workmanship.

"Now, for some time, Commander Corrigan and his inspection team has been very critical of the Remington-Rand operation. They recommended that the Navy cancel the Remington-Rand contract, repossess the plant and turn the contract and the plant operation over to Carl Norden, the investor of the bombsight. Commander Corrigan, according to our information, originated the recommendation that the plant be turned over to the Norden firm and that the Remington-Rand Corporation have its contract cancelled. His recommendation was approved by the Assistant Production Director of the Bureau of Ordnance, Commander H.M. Briggs. Further

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approvals of these recommendations followed by Admiral W.H.P. Blandy, Chief of Bureau; Admiral S.M. Robinson, Chief of the Office of Procurement and Material; Under Secretary James V. Forrestal; Secretary Frank Knox; and finally, the president of the United States: Remington-Rand lost the plant and its contract.

"Now, Lieutenant, Mr. James H. Rand, one of the toughest industrial tycoons in the country, blames Commander Corrigan for all his troubles. You see, Commander Corrigan has a 50 percent interest in the industrial engineering firm of Corrigan, Osburne and Wells. Mr. Rand believes it can be proven that if Remington-Rand had hired the firm of Corrigan, Osburne & Wells as an outside consultant, the Navy would have accepted Rand's plans to correct his production problems.

"For some time Mr. Rand has employed private detectives to obtain evidence that Commander Corrigan is passing confidential information to his partner, Wells. This has happened with various Navy contractors who have production trouble. Mr. Wells calls on the

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firms in question. If they hire Corrigan, Osburne & Wells, they are certain to. get more favorable reports from the Navy. Naturally, this is the section headed by Commander Corrigan.

"I can tell you that the Committee has some voluminous reports -- the product of more than 20 private agents. We want the contents of Commander Corrigan's locked desk in the Bureau of Ordnance. We want all his personal correspondence. We want it now."

I said, "How do you expect me to get his files?"

Rudolph Halley said, "Move immediately. We know the evidence is in his desk. If you don't make a real effort to clean this up right now, the Committee will send investigators, with Senate subpoenas. We'll get the information anyway. However, we are giving the Navy an opportunity to cooperate with the Committee."

Halley concluded his request in a very serious and intense manner, "Under Secretary Forrestal has promised Senator Truman complete cooperation. This means that we want a commitment that anything you find in Commander Corrigan's desk that is related

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to the firm of Corrigan, Osburne and Wells, or to the Remington-Rand operation, will be turned over to the Committee."

I returned to the Navy Department and reported Halley's request to Captain Kennedy. He couldn't see anything wrong with Halley's demands. In turn, he reported to Admiral Horne. He came back to the office and contacted the office of the Chief of Naval Intelligence. He asked them to detail an officer to open Commander Corrigan's desk.

In the late afternoon O.N.I. sent over a Lieutenant, Edward P. Boland, Jr. (son of Congressman Boland of Pennsylvania). Lieutenant Boland and Captain Kennedy checked with Admiral Blandy, Chief of the Bureau of Ordnance, and received permission to check Commander Corrigan's desk.

That evening, in my presence, Lieutenant Boland open