The U.S. Information and Educational Exchange Act of 1948 (Public Law 80-402), popularly called the Smith–Mundt Act, was first introduced by Congressman
Karl E. Mundt (R-SD) in January 1945 in the
79th Congress. It was subsequently passed by the
80th Congress and signed into law by President
Harry S. Truman on January 27, 1948.
The Act was developed to regulate broadcasting of programs for foreign audiences produced under the guidance by the State Department, and it prohibited domestic dissemination of materials produced by such programs as one of its provisions.
The original version of the Act was amended by the
Smith–Mundt Modernization Act of 2012
The National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for Fiscal Year 2013 (short title) is a United States federal law which specifies the budget and expenditures of the United States Department of Defense for fiscal year 2013. The full title is An Act to ...
which allowed for materials produced by the State Department and the
Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) to be disseminated (widely spread) within the United States.
History
Origins of the bill
The original legislation authorizes the
U.S. State Department
The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs of other nati ...
to communicate to audiences outside of the borders of the United States through
broadcasting
Broadcasting is the distribution of audio or video content to a dispersed audience via any electronic mass communications medium, but typically one using the electromagnetic spectrum (radio waves), in a one-to-many model. Broadcasting began ...
, face-to-face contacts, exchanges (including educational, cultural, and technical), the publishing of books, magazines, and other media of communication and engagement. Funding for these activities comes from other legislation passed by the U.S. Congress called
appropriations.
The legislation was introduced in the
House Committee on Foreign Affairs
The United States House Committee on Foreign Affairs, also known as the House Foreign Affairs Committee, is a standing committee of the U.S. House of Representatives with jurisdiction over bills and investigations concerning the foreign affairs ...
in January 1945 by Rep. Mundt, a member of the committee. It was modified a few months later at the request of the State Department. At this time, it did not include broadcasting. The bill was reintroduced with the State Department's requests and renamed the Bloom Bill, after the committee's chairman, Rep.
Sol Bloom (D-NY). The purpose was to make permanent various exchange activities, and some information programs such as books and other printed material. President Truman's dissolution of the
Office of War Information
The United States Office of War Information (OWI) was a United States government agency created during World War II. The OWI operated from June 1942 until September 1945. Through radio broadcasts, newspapers, posters, photographs, films and other ...
(OWI) included moving substantial OWI programs over to the State Department, including a radio broadcast operation not-yet-commonly known as the
Voice of America
Voice of America (VOA or VoA) is the state-owned news network and international radio broadcaster of the United States of America. It is the largest and oldest U.S.-funded international broadcaster. VOA produces digital, TV, and radio content ...
. The Bloom Bill was altered and reintroduced in October 1945 to include the substantial information programs from OWI, notably the libraries, book publishing, movies and film strip production, and speakers tours. In December 1945, it was reintroduced again as H.R. 4982, but whereas the previous iterations amended pre-war legislation from 1939 authorizing exchanges in the American Republics, plus the Philippines, this time was a stand-alone and it also included the radio operation. The language "shall disseminate" abroad found in the early versions was a specific authority requested by the State Department to permit it to operate globally. Under previous authorities, the department was restricted to operating these programs within North, Central, and South America. It would provide legislative approval for a new peacetime instrument of
foreign policy
A state's foreign policy or external policy (as opposed to internal or domestic policy) is its objectives and activities in relation to its interactions with other states, unions, and other political entities, whether bilaterally or through ...
.
Congressional concerns
Congress harbored significant reservations about empowering the State Department to propagate informational and ideological materials to the American public. A key issue was oversight over State Department programs, including exchanges, which books were distributed abroad, art that was distributed as representing the United States, and the radio programming. When the Bloom Bill (H.R. 4982) went to the
House Rules Committee in February 1946, committee Chairman
Eugene Cox (D-GA) informed Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs
William B. Benton that ten of the twelve committee members were against anything the State Department favored because of its "Communist infiltration and pro-Russian policy". That the
House Foreign Affairs Committee
The United States House Committee on Foreign Affairs, also known as the House Foreign Affairs Committee, is a standing committee of the U.S. House of Representatives with jurisdiction over bills and investigations concerning the foreign affairs ...
unanimously reported the bill out was meaningless. Cox told Benton that the Foreign Affairs Committee was "a worthless committee consisting of worthless impotent Congressmen; it was a kind of ghetto of the House of Representatives".
Cox publicly characterized the State Department as "chock full of Reds" and "the lousiest outfit in town". The information component of the Bloom Bill was seen as a revitalization of the Office of War Information, for which many in Congress held contempt as a
New Deal
The New Deal was a series of programs, public work projects, financial reforms, and regulations enacted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the United States between 1933 and 1939. Major federal programs agencies included the Civilian Con ...
"transgression". The cultural component was held in greater disdain, which caused Benton to change the name of his office from the Office of Cultural and Public Affairs a year after it was created to the Office of Public Affairs.
Other comments were similarly tough. The ranking minority member of the House of Representatives Appropriations Committee, Rep.
John Taber (R-NY), called for a "house-cleaning" of "some folks" in the State Department to "keep only those people whose first loyalty is to the United States". The
Federal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic intelligence and security service of the United States and its principal federal law enforcement agency. Operating under the jurisdiction of the United States Department of Justice, ...
was also concerned over the ability of State to monitor and control participants in the exchange programs.
Debate and passage
In July 1946, the Bloom Bill passed the House, but due to a failure to steward the bill in the Senate, it was blocked from moving in the
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the House of Representatives being the lower chamber. Together they compose the national bicameral legislature of the United States.
The composition and ...
by Senator
Robert A. Taft. Taft's reasoning, which he gave in a speech later, was concern about a growing government bureaucracy. After the department, when Congress reconvened, Taft supported the legislation.
On March 21, 1947, pre–
Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor is an American lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. It was often visited by the Naval fleet of the United States, before it was acquired from the Hawaiian Kingdom by the U.S. with the signing of the ...
isolationist
Isolationism is a political philosophy advocating a national foreign policy that opposes involvement in the political affairs, and especially the wars, of other countries. Thus, isolationism fundamentally advocates neutrality and opposes entangle ...
and former teacher Representative
Karl E. Mundt (R-SD) introduced H.R. 3342, which was an evolution from the bill he had originally introduced in January 1945, which itself was a version of a bill he introduced in March 1943, at the request of the State Department. The State Department's information and exchange activities were still ongoing, although without authorization from the Congress. The authority was derived from Congressional appropriations legislation. In other words, the activities continued because they received money from Congress, which carried implicit authority but actual authority was still lacking. Co-sponsoring the Mundt bill in the Senate was Senator
H. Alexander Smith
Howard Alexander Smith (January 30, 1880October 27, 1966) was an American lawyer and politician. A member of the Republican Party, he served as a United States Senator from New Jersey from 1944 to 1959. He was the uncle of Peter H. Dominick, who ...
(R-NJ). The stated purpose of the reintroduced legislation was not to curtail the overall information activities of the United States, but to raise the quality and volume of the government's information programs. As the State Department admitted to lax oversight due to personnel and budget constraints, Congress voiced its frustration and slashed State's information budget. This time, Taber said if the "drones, the loafers, and the incompetents" were weeded out, he would allow a few million dollars for international broadcasting.
Several significant leaders went to the House to testify in support of the bill, including Secretary of State
George C. Marshall, Chief of Staff General
Dwight D. Eisenhower, Under Secretary of State
Dean Acheson
Dean Gooderham Acheson (pronounced ; April 11, 1893October 12, 1971) was an American statesman and lawyer. As the 51st U.S. Secretary of State, he set the foreign policy of the Harry S. Truman administration from 1949 to 1953. He was also Truma ...
, Secretary of Commerce
W. Averell Harriman
William Averell Harriman (November 15, 1891July 26, 1986), better known as Averell Harriman, was an American Democratic politician, businessman, and diplomat. The son of railroad baron E. H. Harriman, he served as Secretary of Commerce un ...
(formerly the Ambassador to the Soviet Union), and Ambassador to the Soviet Union
Walter Bedell Smith. They agreed that it was "folly" to spend millions for foreign aid and relief without explaining America's aims.
Congress, in recommending passage of the bill, declared that "truth can be a powerful weapon". Congress further declared six principles were required for the legislation to be successful in action: tell the truth; explain the motives of the United States; bolster morale and extend hope; give a true and convincing picture of American life, methods, and ideals; combat misrepresentation and distortion; and aggressively interpret and support
American foreign policy. As a
Cold War measure, it was intended to compete with
propaganda from the Soviet Union and
Communist
Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a ...
organizations primarily in Europe. The principal purpose of the legislation was to engage in a global struggle for minds and wills, a phrase used by Presidents Harry S. Truman and Dwight D. Eisenhower.
It established the programming mandate that still serves as the foundation for U.S. overseas information and cultural programs at the Department of State.
Cold War era
Since 1972, the act prohibits domestic access to information intended for foreign audiences. Prior to this, the
United States Department of State
The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an United States federal executive departments, executive department of the Federal government of the United States, U.S. federal government responsible for the country's fore ...
and then the
United States Information Agency
The United States Information Agency (USIA), which operated from 1953 to 1999, was a United States agency devoted to " public diplomacy". In 1999, prior to the reorganization of intelligence agencies by President George W. Bush, President Bil ...
(USIA) beginning in 1952, were prohibited from disseminating information intended for foreign audiences, with the express intent that
Congress
A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of ...
, the
American media, or academia would be the distributors of such information.
The exchanges in the act, known as the Mundt Exchanges through about the early 1960s, went beyond those of the complementary
Fulbright Program
The Fulbright Program, including the Fulbright–Hays Program, is one of several United States Cultural Exchange Programs with the goal of improving intercultural relations, cultural diplomacy, and intercultural competence between the people of ...
to include any country and any skill. Whereas the Fulbright Act, the name Benton gave the original 1946 amendment to the
Surplus Property Act The Surplus Property Act of 1944 (ch. 479, , ''et seq.'', enacted October 3, 1944) is an act of the United States Congress that was enacted to provide for the disposal of surplus government property to "a State, political subdivision of a State, or ...
of 1944, required a bilateral agreement signed by the Secretary of State following certification of the availability of local funds by the
U.S. Treasury, after the sale of U.S. surplus war equipment in the nation, and supported only the exchange of students and teachers, the Mundt Act used monies appropriated by the Congress for the program and did not require a signed bilateral agreement or other certification. Further, the Mundt exchanges supported educators and students, technicians (from industry experts to sewage treatment engineers), entertainers, and even bureaucrats to help nations develop local capacity and stability.
Amendments to the Act in 1972 and 1985 reflected the
Cold War's departure from the "struggle for minds and wills" (a phrase used by both President Truman and President Eisenhower) to a
balance of power based on "traditional diplomacy" and counting missiles, bombers, and tanks. As a result, Senator
J. William Fulbright argued America's international broadcasting should take its "rightful place in the graveyard of Cold War relics".
A decade later, Senator
Edward Zorinsky (D-NE) successfully blocked taxpayer access to USIA materials, even through
Freedom of Information Act requests, as he compared the USIA to an organ of Soviet propaganda.
Provisions
There are three key restrictions on the U.S. State Department in the Smith–Mundt Act.
The first and most well-known restriction was originally a prohibition on domestic dissemination of materials intended for foreign audiences by the State Department. The original intent was the Congress, the media and academia would be the filter to bring inside what the State Department said overseas. In 1967, the
Advisory Commission on Information (later renamed the Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy) recommended the de facto prohibition on domestic distribution be removed noting that there is "nothing in the statutes specifically forbidding making USIA materials available to American audiences. Rather, what began as caution has hardened into policy." This changed in 1972 when Senator J. William Fulbright (D-AR) argued that America's international broadcasting should take its "rightful place in the graveyard of Cold War relics" as he successfully amended the Act to read that any program material "shall not be disseminated" within the U.S. and that material shall be available "for examination only" to the media, academia, and Congress (P.L. 95-352 Sec. 204). In 1985, Senator Edward Zorinsky (D-NE) declared USIA would be no different than an organ of Soviet propaganda if its products were to be available domestically.
The Act was amended to read: "no program material prepared by the United States Information Agency shall be distributed within the United States" (P.L. 99-93). At least one court interpreted this language to mean USIA products were to be exempt from Freedom of Information Act requests. In response, the Act was amended again in 1990 to permit domestic distribution of program material "12 years after the initial dissemination" abroad (P.L. 101-246 Sec 202).
The second and third provisions were of greater interest to the Congress as they answered critical concerns about government engaging domestic audiences. Added to the Bloom Bill, the predecessor to the Smith–Mundt Act in June 1946 by Representative
John M. Vorys (R-OH) "to remove the stigma of propaganda" and address the principal objections to the information activities the Congress intended to authorize. These provisions remain unamended and were the real prophylactic to address concerns the U.S. government would create
Nazi-style propaganda or resurrect President
Woodrow Wilson
Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921. A member of the Democratic Party, Wilson served as the president of P ...
's
CPI-style activities. The amendment said the information activities should only be conducted if needed to supplement international information dissemination of private agencies; that the State Department was not to acquire a monopoly of broadcasting or any other information medium; and that private sector leaders should be invited to review and advise the State Department in this work.
Section 1437 of the Act requires the State Department to maximize its use of "private agencies". Section 1462 requires "reducing Government information activities whenever corresponding private information dissemination is found to be adequate" and prohibits the State Department from having monopoly in any "medium of information" (a prescient phrase). Combined, these provide not only protection against government's domination of domestic discourse, but a "sunset clause" for governmental activities that Rep. Karl Mundt (R-SD) and Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs William Benton stated clearly: as private media stood up, government media would stand down.
Excerpt
Section 501(a) of the Act (care of the
Voice of America
Voice of America (VOA or VoA) is the state-owned news network and international radio broadcaster of the United States of America. It is the largest and oldest U.S.-funded international broadcaster. VOA produces digital, TV, and radio content ...
website) provides that
information produced by VOA for audiences outside the United States shall not be disseminated within the United States … but, on request, shall be available in the English language at VOA, at all reasonable times following its release as information abroad, for examination only by representatives of United States press associations, newspapers, magazines, radio systems, and stations, and by research students and scholars, and, on request, shall be made available for examination only to Members of Congress.
"This means that VOA is forbidden to broadcast within the United States." However, any American with a shortwave receiver or an Internet connection can listen to VOA. This is incidental, however. VOA cannot direct or intend its programs to be "for" Americans.
George W. Bush-era State Department official
James K. Glassman has called for directing VOA at American audiences.
Entities covered by the act
The following are administered by the
Broadcasting Board of Governors, an agency of the United States government.
*
Voice of America
Voice of America (VOA or VoA) is the state-owned news network and international radio broadcaster of the United States of America. It is the largest and oldest U.S.-funded international broadcaster. VOA produces digital, TV, and radio content ...
, a radio, television and Internet network broadcasting worldwide, intended for reception outside of the United States
*
Alhurra
Alhurra ( ar, الحرة ' ,The pronunciation differs depending on the variety of Arabic, for example, . "the Free One") is a United States-based public Arabic-language satellite TV channel that broadcasts news and current affairs programming ...
, satellite television broadcasting to the Middle East
*
Radio Farda
Radio Farda ( fa, راديو فردا, lit=Radio Tomorrow, ''Radio Farda'') is the Iranian branch of the U.S. government-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) external broadcast service for providing "factual, objective and professiona ...
, a radio station targeted at Iran
*
Radio Free Asia
Radio Free Asia (RFA) is a United States government-funded private non-profit news service that broadcasts radio programs and publishes online news, information, and commentary for its audiences in Asia. The service, which provides editorial ...
, a radio network broadcasting in Asia
*
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) is a United States government funded organization that broadcasts and reports news, information, and analysis to countries in Eastern Europe, Central Asia, Caucasus, and the Middle East where it says tha ...
, a radio network based in Europe and the Middle East
*
Radio and Television Martí, a radio and television network broadcasting in Cuba
*
Radio Sawa, a radio station broadcasting in the Middle East
The Department of State is also covered by the Smith–Mundt Act. No other department or agency of the United States government is covered by the Smith–Mundt Act. The
United States Agency for International Development
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is an Independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, U.S. federal government that is primarily responsible f ...
and
Millennium Challenge Corporation
The Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) is a bilateral United States foreign aid agency established by the U.S. Congress in 2004. It is an independent agency separate from the State Department and USAID. It provides grants to countries that ...
have said they are not sure whether they are covered.
Recent interpretations
A 1998 U.S. Court of Appeals ruling indicated that this act exempts
Voice of America
Voice of America (VOA or VoA) is the state-owned news network and international radio broadcaster of the United States of America. It is the largest and oldest U.S.-funded international broadcaster. VOA produces digital, TV, and radio content ...
from releasing transcripts in response to a
Freedom of Information Act request.
The act does not prohibit the entirety of the Executive Branch from distributing information at home, just the State Department and Broadcasting Board of Governors. The result of the amendments to the Act means that most United States taxpayers do not know how the VOA (and its successor agencies) operate or what their programming content was, as was noted in 1967 by the Stanton Commission report noted above. The act insulates the American public from being targeted by the government-sponsored information and broadcasting which is directed at audiences beyond America's borders. Some experts claim that the United States is the only industrialized democracy to do this, and creates mistrust of the same activities in these audiences who increasingly question why Americans cannot read or hear the same material. However, anyone with an Internet connection can access VOA programs and articles for the Web, radio and television (VOA increasingly emphasizes television programming now) in English and other languages.
U.S. Congressional amendments to the act
Chronological
legislation
Legislation is the process or result of enrolling, enacting, or promulgating laws by a legislature, parliament, or analogous governing body. Before an item of legislation becomes law it may be known as a bill, and may be broadly referred to ...
relative to U.S. Congressional revisions as pertaining to the United States Information and Educational Exchange Act.
See also
*
Fulbright–Hays Act of 1961
The Fulbright–Hays Act of 1961 is officially known as the Mutual Educational and Cultural Exchange Act of 1961 (, ). It was marshalled by United States Senator J. William Fulbright (D-AR) and passed by the 87th United States Congress on Septe ...
References
Voice of AmericaNews's online press kit, retrieved March 22, 2005
on the Court of Appeals ruling, February 23, 1998
*
External links
Voice of America NewsFull text of the Smith–Mundt ActVoABroadcasting Board of Governors (BBG)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Smith-Mundt Act
1948 in American law
1948 in law
1948 in international relations
1948 in the United States
80th United States Congress
United States federal communications legislation
United States foreign relations legislation