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Gerald R. Ford Library1000 Beal Avenue,
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Gerald R. Ford Library1000 Beal Avenue,
www.fordlibrarymuseum.gov |
National Security Adviser
NSC Press and Congressional Liaison Staff:
Files, 1973-1976
SUMMARY DESCRIPTION
Materials concerning the
work of NSC staff members Leslie Janka and Margaret Vanderhye on NSC press and
congressional relations. Included is
foreign affairs press guidance provided to the White House Press Secretary,
outgoing letters and memoranda, a small subject file, and memoranda of conversations
and briefing papers for presidential meetings with members of Congress on
foreign affairs and defense matters.
QUANTITY
3.2 linear feet (ca. 6,400
pages)
DONOR
Gerald R. Ford (accession
number 77-118)
ACCESS
Open, but some materials continue to be national
security classified and restricted.
Access is governed by the donor’s deed of gift, a copy of which is
available on request, and National Archives and Records Administration
regulations (36 CFR 1256).
COPYRIGHT
Gerald Ford has donated to
the
Prepared by William McNitt, January 1997
Revised by Donna Lehman, June 2004
[s:\bin\findaid\nsc\nsc press and congressional liaison staff.doc]
BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION
Leslie Allan Janka
1962 B.A.
(economics),
1964 M.A.
(international affairs),
1964-67 Graduate courses
in public administration, management science, and statistics at
1964-68 Management specialist, U.S. Information Agency
1968-71 Assistant Dean,
School of Advanced International Studies,
1971-75 Staff Assistant, National Security Council
1975-76 Senior Staff Member for Legislative and Public Affairs, National Security Council
1976-78 Deputy Assistant Secretary for Near Eastern, African, and South African Affairs, Office of International Security Affairs, Department of Defense
1978-83 Consultant and
lecturer specializing in Middle Eastern defense and international economic
issues; associated with the government relations firm of Neill and Company,
Sept.-Oct. 1983 Special Assistant to the President and Deputy Press Secretary for Foreign Affairs, White House
BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION
Margaret (Margi) E.G. Vanderhye
1970 B.A.
(political science),
1971-72 Part-time research assistant to U.S. Senator Adlai E. Stevenson III
1972 M.A.
(international relations and economics),
1972-73 Legislative research assistant to U.S. Senator John V. Tunney
1973-75 Staff officer, Commission on the Organization of the Government for the Conduct of Foreign Policy (Murphy Commission)
1975-76 Staff assistant, National Security Council
After 1976 Chair, Citizens Advisory Committee to the Northern Virginia 2010 Transportation Plan; President, Virginia Association of Planning District Commissions; President, Virginia Planning District Commission; member, Chesapeake Bay Local Assistance Board; member, Virginia Commission on Population, Growth and Development
1995- 2001 Member, National Capital Planning Commission (appointed by President Clinton
NSC Press and Congressional Liaison Staff Files is one of many subcollections that comprise the National Security Adviser Files. The provenance and nature of the National Security Adviser Files as a whole are described in Appendix A.
Duties of Janka and Vanderhye
Leslie
Janka and Margaret Vanderhye handled National Security Council (NSC) press and
congressional liaison during the Ford administration. Janka served as staff assistant for press
liaison from 1971 until February 1975, working out of an office on the ground
floor of the White House West Wing.
Around September 1974, he also began working on NSC congressional
relations (apparently sharing these duties with Robert McFarlane for several
months). Janka was promoted to Senior
Staff Member for Legislative and Public Affairs in February 1975. Janka then moved from the West Wing of the
White House to room 376A in the nearby
After Janka’s promotion, Vanderhye took over both his press liaison duties and his old office in the basement of the White House. She served as staff assistant for press liaison until her departure in August 1976. Janka apparently resumed his press liaison role for August to October 1976 and then left the NSC to take a position in the Department of Defense. An NSC organization chart dating from late in the administration lists DeSibour as heading both press liaison and congressional liaison.
A key responsibility of the NSC press liaison
officer was to provide substantive guidance on foreign policy issues to the
President’s Press Secretary. This
guidance kept him abreast of developments and prepared him for his daily press
briefings. Another role was to
coordinate and prepare foreign affairs/national security briefing materials for
presidential press conferences and media interviews. Janka and Vanderhye also provided liaison
between the White House and public affairs officers in the Departments of State
and Defense,
As Senior Staff Member for Legislative and Public Affairs, Janka provided substantive foreign policy guidance to the White House Congressional Relations Office and legislative analysis to other NSC staff members. Janka took notes and produced memoranda of conversations for presidential meetings with congressional leaders and other members of Congress that concerned foreign affairs and defense matters.
Janka
also represented the NSC on the administration’s Legislative Interdepartmental
Group, which consisted of representatives of the various agencies involved in
foreign affairs and national security matters and focused on legislation and
the activities of Congress. In addition,
Janka monitored Executive Branch public affairs activities, domestic and
international, in support of
Scope and Content of the Materials
Three
series in this collection document the work of Janka and Vanderhye on NSC press
relations. The Press Guidance File
contains materials they prepared for White House Press Secretaries Ron Ziegler,
Jerald terHorst, and Ron Nessen to use during their press briefings, January
1973-August 1976. Included are questions
likely to be asked by the news media, guidance on suggested answers, background
information provided to give the Press Secretary a better understanding (with
the provision that it not be shared with the press), and announcements to be
made. Foreign policy issues that receive
significant attention include the Vietnamese War and the Paris Peace Accords,
The Chronological File contains some substantive items concerning foreign affairs and defense issues. Much of the series concerns interactions by Janka and Vanderhye with Henry Kissinger, Brent Scowcroft, and members of the NSC staff; preparation of briefing materials for press conferences; handling of media interview requests; contacts with agency public affairs officers; and answering questions for the White House Press Secretary’s office. Significant items in the file include a translation of a Le Duc Tho press conference (June 14, 1973), memoranda of conversations covering a Kissinger dinner meeting with members of the State Department press corps (September 14, 1973) and a Scowcroft interview by Ann Compton of ABC (December 13, 1975), notes from a Kissinger deep backgrounder with the press about Vietnam (April 10, 1975), and the ribbon copy of a Scowcroft memo to the President (marked “The President has seen”) concerning Ronald Reagan’s statements about grain sales to the Soviet Union (March 24, 1976).
Three
series contain materials on Janka’s congressional liaison work. The Congressional Meetings File contains
briefing papers and memoranda of conversations for presidential meetings with
congressional leaders and members of Congress.
The Chronological File includes materials concerning legislation and
congressional relations meetings between September 1974 and February 1975,
including significant materials on Legislative Interdepartmental Group meetings
of
This collection probably does not contain a complete set of all files maintained by Janka and Vanderhye during their NSC service, but these are the only files received by the Ford Library. The congressional relations material seems to be especially incomplete. The Ford Library staff has not discovered any explanation for these gaps.
Related
Materials (January 1997):
National Security Adviser collections having related materials include the Presidential Subject File which contains a large sequence of material under the heading “Congressional,” the Legislative Interdepartmental Group File containing information on the meetings of that body, and the Memoranda of Conversations File which provides records of meetings between President Ford and various congressional delegations. The Robert C. McFarlane Files include some documents on legislative liaison and the Legislative Interdepartmental Group from the fall of 1974, and materials on interactions with members of Congress appear in the Program Analysis Staff Files. Among non-NSA collections, the Robert K. Wolthuis Files include minutes of several presidential meetings with Congressional leaders.
The Ron Nessen Papers contain substantive materials on all aspects of press relations; the Ron Nessen Files include a complete set of transcripts of the Press Secretary's daily briefings. The Edward J. Savage Files include press releases, transcripts of interviews, briefing guidance, briefing books and presidential press guidance relating to various foreign policy issues.
Series Descriptions
Copies of memoranda, Q&A briefing papers, and background information submitted by Janka and Vanderhye to the White House Press Secretary. The series basically ends in August 1976, although material for one day in September appears. There are occasional unexplained gaps of several days duration for which the series contains no materials.
Janka prepared his briefing information in the form of virtually daily memoranda to the Press Secretary with the subject line “Morning Press Items.” Vanderhye continued the formal memoranda for a short time after assuming the position in February 1975, but eventually switched to a form cover memo with attached briefing sheets.
Arranged chronologically.
Boxes 6-7 Chronological File, 1973-76. (0.7 linear feet)
Memoranda, correspondence, Q&A briefing sheets, and occasional briefing papers and memoranda of conversations. The file primarily concerns NSC press relations, but Janka’s congressional relations work is well documented for the period September 1974 to February 1975. In addition to materials drafted for their own signature, Janka and Vanderhye often drafted items for Scowcroft or Kissinger to sign (including some items addressed to the President, but also many responding to letters from the media or the general public). Copies or originals of incoming items are often attached to the carbons of outgoing letters. Sometimes originals of outgoing items addressed to other NSC staff members were returned to Janka and Vanderhye with comments and are filed here.
Arranged chronologically.
Memoranda, briefing papers, and Q&A briefing sheets. Although some earlier materials appear in the file, the bulk of the material dates from 1976 and much of it is from the months of August to October.
Arranged alphabetically by subject and chronologically thereunder.
Case files containing memoranda of conversations (memcons) and briefing papers on presidential meetings with members of Congress, mostly on foreign affairs and defense issues.
Arranged chronologically by date of the meeting.
Container List
Jan.-Oct. 1973
Nov. 1973-Sept. 1974
Oct. 1974-July 1975
Aug. 1975-March 1976
April-Sept. 1976
Jan. 1973-Feb. 1975
March 1975-July 1976
Janka Subject File
Arab Boycott, Aug.-Sept. 1976
CIA Oversight, Jan. 1975
”Green Book Affair,” Sept. 1976
Box 8 Janka Subject File
National Security Council Sub-Groups, April 1976
Nuclear Proliferation, July 1976
Nuclear Weapons, Nov. 1975-Jan. 1976
SALT, July-Sept. 1976
Security Assistance Legislation, May 1976
Turkish Arms Embargo, Sept. 1975
United Nations Genocide Convention
United States Military Strength, March 1976
Uranium
Congressional Meetings File