Sam Ervin, a senator from North Carolina, could not be accused of sitting around idle during the late 1960s and early 1970s, even from his harshest critics. Ervin was a decorated World War I veteran who spoke his mind in Washington even when he was in enemy territory. While his politics screamed left, his concerns with security clearance and civilian government employee screening methods would have made any libertarian proud.
The Case of Carolyn Tatnall
In 1968, the 22-year-old civilian employee, Carolyn Tatnall, had her security clearance revoked for being “immoral”. According to a nationally syndicated UPI article from May 1968, Tatnall was asked the following questions by investigators: Are you a homosexual? Have you ever had an abortion? Do you take birth control pills?
Investigators, according to the article, also told her that they interviewed seven people that lived near her in the apartment complex about her behavior. Tatnall noted she didn’t even know seven people in her complex, but according to investigators they made statements alleging Tatnall hosted loud, ‘out of control parties” and another person was seen coming and going into her apartment on a regular basis. Tatnall told investigators she did not even know seven people who lived in the apartments and the only party she had was a birthday celebration. She did admit she gave her boyfriend a key, so he could feed her cat when she was out of town. She was quoted in the article as saying “I am not promiscuous”.
Someplace there may be a rest of the story, which I probably will never have access to, unless I track Ms. Tatnall down, but it is important to note she was offered her job and clearance back the next month by the Army, which she politely refused. Sometime before that happened (no coincidence), she contacted Senator Ervin, who was working on a bill that prohibited such intrusive questioning by government officials involving both security clearances and employment, known as a Federal Employees Bill of Rights. Emma Best gives a great historical analysis of the bill, that’s worth a read.
Ervin’s Crusade
During a hearing before the Senate, Ervin said “I have found nothing in the Constitution which permits federal officials to strap an individual to a lie detector machine and ask him: ‘When was the first time you had sexual relations with a woman? When was the first time you had intercourse with your wife? Before you were married?”
Ervin went on and gave several more examples, all of which by today’s standards, seem both outrageous and comical (ranging from “what is the meaning of life” and “playing the field” when asking dating type of questions). His bill passed the Senate but did not make it past the House, which argued that these questions were relevant especially in the midst of the popular Soviet tactic of sexpionage. Ervin did not give up however. He became a staunch opponent of the polygraph and advocated for computer data privacy way back in 1967 when the federal government was starting their data banks.
He prophetically said, “Too often, an organization may seize upon a device or technique with the best intentions in the world of achieving some laudable goal, but in the process may deny the dignity of the individual, the sense of fair play, or the right of the citizen in a free society to privacy of his thoughts and activities. The computer industry, the data processing experts, the programmers, the executives – all need to set their collective minds to work to deal with the impact of their electronic systems on the rights and dignity of individuals.”
Ervin eventually authored the Privacy Act of 1974 shortly before retiring from Congress. While not the Federal Employee Bill of Rights, it did put limitations on what an agency could do with sensitive information.
Sam Ervin, depending on the issue, could be hated and loved by the same person at the same time. While short lived, Carolyn Tatnall’s case shined a more public light on the battle Ervin was fighting, and even though her name is but a minuscule mark in American history, the subject of government scrutiny over employee’s lives should not be written without mentioning her and Ervin.
