Part IV: Using the ACHRE Collection as a Place to Start

Footnotes

2 . The scientific records of an experiment contain various medical facts about an individual subject, but generally only information pertinent to the conduct of the experiment and not the subject's medical history. The complete records of an experiment may include the medical records, but they will be handled separately from the scientific records. This may or may not mean that the medical records and the scientific records are the responsibility of different individuals and are stored in different places; it will certainly mean that they are created, controlled, and preserved under different guidelines.

3 . For example, Sources and Documentation describes the contents and classifications of the record groups and entries examined at the various National Archives facilities, the record groups and accessions reviewed at the various federal records centers, and the record collections examined at various agency record storage facilities, history offices, and other locations.

4 . Department of Energy, Office of Human Radiation Experiments, Human Radiation Experiments: The Department of Energy Roadmap to the Story and the Records (Washington, D.C.: Department of Energy, February 1995). For ordering information, write: U.S. Department of Commerce, Technology Administration, National Technical Information Service, Springfield, Virginia 22161; or telephone: 703-487-4650.

5 . Although the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) system includes records of the judicial and legislative branches of the federal government, most citizen researchers are looking for records created by agencies of the executive branch, and so the following information is generally limited to those records. A brief discussion of judicial and legislative records is included in Sources and Documentation.

6 . Because the National Archives was not established until 1934 and the records centers only came into existence in 1950, there are some instances where the records of federal officials and agencies are outside the "physical control" of the government. Also, unfortunately, no general rule can be applied to contractor records. The handling of the records of contract work is controlled by the terms of the contract, which may require anything from deposit of complete records with the contracting agency to complete retention of all records by the contractor. The citizen will need to research such situations on a case-by-case basis. Agency records should include copies of the contract or grant instruments, however, and research should begin with those.

7 . Provenance refers to the origin, creation, and ownership (or chain of custody) of records or other items.

8 . A folder listing is a list of the titles of the file folders (that is, what is on their labels) that are contained in the shipment. Because it reproduces the file labels more or less exactly, such a listing, while invaluable, is only as informative as the labels. SF-135s are unlikely to contain information on individual documents.

9 . The most practical resource is A Citizen's Guide on Using the Freedom of Information Act and the Privacy Act of 1974 to Request Government Records, House Report 104-156 (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1995), prepared by the Committee on Government Management, Information, and Technology of the House of Representatives. Another important resource (for those interested in the administrative and legal details) is the annual Department of Justice publication Freedom of Information Act Guide & Privacy Act Overview. Both volumes are available from the U.S. Government Printing Office, Superintendent of Documents, Mail Stop: SSOP, Washington, D.C. 20401-9328. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) also publishes an annual guide to FOIA and the Privacy Act; for information call (202) 544-1681.

10 . These sorts of records are subject to Privacy Act controls whether they are in the keeping of the originating agency or the National Archives.

11 . This is an area in which there is not agreement among the agencies. For example, the Advisory Committee was assured by one agency that records retrievable by the names of principal investigators were not subject to the Privacy Act--after all, officials said, these individuals were government contractors and grantees who had a practical relationship with the federal government that had to be substantiated by reports under the law. Under similar circumstances, however, another agency provided the Advisory Committee with information that it said could not be made public because it

12 . The act uses the phrase "any person," so that inquiry is not restricted to U.S. citizens.

13 . "There are three basic elements to a FOIA request letter. First, the letter should state that the request is being made under the Freedom of Information Act. Second, the request should identify the records that are being sought as specifically as possible. Third, the name and address of the requester must be included." A Citizen's Guide on Using the Freedom of Information Act, 8.

14 . The Department of Justice's Overview, 32 fn. 103, cites a Federal District Court decision: "FOIA creates only a right of access to records, not a right to personal services." Hudgins v. IRS, 620 F.Supp. 19, 21 (D.D.C. 1985), aff'd, 808 F.2d 137 (D.C. Cir.), cert. denied, 484 U.S. 803 (1987).

15 . The agencies concerned with human radiation experiments have provided information on their procedures for filing FOIA requests, and these are included in part II of this appendix.

16 . A Citizen's Guide on Using the Freedom of Information Act, 10, should be consulted on how fees may be waived.

17 . The effect of this provision is potentially highly elastic because, under the act, the agency may lengthen the time it takes to provide records in order to look for the records, search through the records, or consult with another agency or office.

18 . The requirements for MDRs under Executive Order 12958 are very similar to those of the FOIA described in the previous section, and accordingly, there is no separate discussion of this alternative procedure. Among the few differences are that only U.S. citizens may file MDRs, and that if there is a denial of an MDR in whole or in part there is a right to an administrative appeal, but no right of judicial redress.

19 . The U.S. Government Manual, published annually as a special edition of the Federal Register, is available by writing: Superintendent of Public Documents, P.O. Box 317954, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15250-7954; telephone (202) 783-3238.

20 . A FOIA reading room is a publicly accessible facility that houses information that has been released to the public by the agency, either voluntarily or as a result of a citizen's FOIA request. Almost without exception, however, these repositories contain only a small fraction of the records that have been released over the years. FOIA reading rooms are generally managed and staffed by the agency library. But access to agency libraries varies, and many agencies do not have FOIA reading rooms. Most agencies, however, have an office of public affairs that may be contacted for general information about the agency and its programs. An agency's FOIA office handles all FOIA requests and is the primary source of information about the agency's FOIA procedures.

21 . CIC is a records center operated by the Reynolds Electrical & Engineering Co., under contract with DOE. Reynolds's address is P.O. Box 98521, Las Vegas, Nevada 89193-8521. The CIC is the major source of the documents made available by DOE through the Internet and provides reference services and copies of documents to help the public.

22 . Some records transferred to the St. Louis facility were destroyed in a fire in 1973.

23 . The World Wide Web is a network of Internet sites using graphical and hypertext formats permitting access to images and linking distant and diverse

24 . Department of Energy, Assistant Secretary for Environment, Safety and Health, Human Radiation Experiments Associated with the U.S. Department of Energy and Its Predecessors (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Energy, July 1995).

25 . Some records transferred to the St. Louis facility were destroyed in a fire in 1973.

26 . The operations of the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) are diverse and decentralized and include several large components, such as the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Public Health Service (PHS), and the National Institutes of Health (NIH), which are so well known that they sometimes may appear to be independent. PHS is one of the major subdivisions of the department; FDA and NIH are components of PHS.

27 . The "institutes" that make up the National Institutes of Health are organized around medical specialties such as cancer and mental health, and physiological topics such as the heart and the kidneys. They are based in Bethesda, Maryland.

28 . The Common Rule governing human experimentation in most federal government agencies uses this phrase. See 56 Fed. Reg. 28,012 (1991) ([[section]] 101[a]).

29 . Some reference books that might be useful: (1) Directory of Physicians in the United States, issued by the American Medical Association; (2) Official ABCS Directory of Board Certified Medical Specialists, issued by the American Board of Medical Specialties; (3) The World of Learning, which contains entries for major universities that include medical center faculty lists and addresses; and (4) Directory of U.S. Hospitals, published by Health Care Investment Analysts, Inc.

30 . These records will be available at the National Archives in late 1995.

31 . The National Security Archive, Gelman Library, Suite 701, 2130 H Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20037; telephone, 202-994-7000; fax, 202-994-7005; e-mail, archive@cap.gwu.edu.

32 . A gopher is a software application that provides menu-driven access to electronic files, frequently over the Internet. The Advisory Committee maintained both a gopher and a World Wide Web home page.

33 . For additional information on provenance, see the section on the National Archives in part I.

34 . CIC numbers are assigned by the Coordination and Information Center. The CIC document number identifies the records series in which a document is indexed. The records of concern to the Advisory Committee are primarily from the human radiation series, which uses numbers 700,000-799,999. Other series cover such related topics as Enewetak Atoll, fallout, and Glenn T. Seaborg.

35 . Hard copy format is available in the transmittal documents (see next section).