National Sunshine Week

NATIONAL SUNSHINE WEEK

Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, this week our country is celebrating the second annual National Sunshine Week, established last year by an extraordinary coalition of print, radio, television, and online media associations and outlets. And yesterday was national Freedom of Information Day--celebrated every year at a national conference held at the Freedom Forum's World Center in Arlington, VA, on James Madison's birthday.

As we celebrate National Sunshine Week, it is an appropriate time to evaluate the significant progress of the past year toward reforming the Freedom of Information Act. But we must also recognize that we can--and should--certainly do more to preserve the open-government principles on which our great country was founded.

At a time when Americans reportedly know more about the television show ``The Simpsons'' than they do about the five provisions of the first amendment--freedom of press, speech, religion, assembly, and petition for redress of grievances--or can name the three ``American Idol'' judges more readily than three first amendment provisions, Congress must do its utmost to preserve these protections while also educating the public about reform efforts.

The Declaration of Independence makes clear that our inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness may be secured only where ``Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.'' And James Madison, the father of our Constitution, wrote that consent of the governed means informed consent--that ``a people who mean to be their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.''

As attorney general of Texas, I was responsible for enforcing Texas's open government laws. I have always been proud that Texas is known for having one of the strongest, most robust freedom of information laws in the country, and I have enjoyed working with my colleagues here in Washington to spread a little of that ``Texas Sunshine''.

I would specifically like to express my gratitude to Senator Leahy and to his staff for all their hard work on these issues of mutual interest and national interest. And I would like to thank and to commend Senator Leahy for his decades-long commitment to freedom of information. He has been a strong ally and valuable advocate in this process, and he and I have both noted that openness in government is not a Republican or a Democratic issue. Any party in power is always reluctant to share information, out of an understandable--albeit ultimately unpersuasive--fear of arming its enemies and critics. But regardless of our differences on various policy controversies of the day, we should all agree that those policy differences deserve a full debate before the American people.

While much of the FOIA reform efforts, to date, have focused on providing access generally, more can be done to improve the process specifically. Access to information is certainly essential, but so is accelerating the rate at which these requests are fulfilled. Access is of little value when requests for information are subjected to lengthy delay.

Open government is one of the most basic requirements of a healthy democracy. The default position of our Government must be one of openness. If records can be open, they should be open. If good reason exists to keep something closed, it is the Government that should bear the burden to prove that need--not the other way around.

Back in December, President Bush signed an Executive order that enhances current FOIA policies. That move was just one important step toward more sunshine in government.

But the President's directive moves the country forward toward strengthening open government laws and reinforcing a national commitment to freedom of information in several important ways that I will discuss here just briefly:

It affirms that FOIA has provided citizens with important information about the functioning of government;

It directs FOIA officials to reduce agency backlogs, create a process for everyday citizens to track the status of their request, and establishes a protocol for requestors to resolve FOIA disputes short of filing litigation;

It creates a FOIA service center where people seeking information can track the status of their requests;

And one very good step is that it creates a FOIA public liaison who acts as a supervisor of FOIA personnel. This person will be available to resolve any disagreements that might arise between people seeking information and the Government. It also requires each chief FOIA officer to review his or her agency's practices, including ways that technology is used, in order to set concrete milestones and timetables to reduce backlogs and carry out its FOIA responsibilities.

Other important progress was made throughout 2005. In June, the Senate passed the legislation Senator Pat Leahy and I authored, and hopefully the House of Representatives will quickly pass this important legislation. This particular reform creates additional legislative transparency by requiring that any future legislation containing exemptions to requirements be ``stated explicitly within the text of the bill.

In addition, we introduced the Openness Promotes Effectiveness in our National Government Act of 2005--OPEN Government Act, S. 394--in February and a separate bill in March to establish an advisory Commission on Freedom of Information Act Processing Delays. A hearing held in March examined the OPEN Government Act. And I urge Congress to pass this law as quickly as is possible.

But, as I said, more remains to be done to ensure that American citizens have access to the information they need. One way we could do that, and something I believe would be a positive and welcome step in this area, would be to provide additional, dedicated funding for FOIA resources, to address request backlogs. I believe this could be accomplished much in the same way Congress offered assistance to local law enforcement through providing additional funds so they could address their DNA backlogs or the assistance it provided to the FBI to address its backlog of untranslated intercepts of terrorists' telephone calls. Additional funding dedicated to this problem will speed the rate information is given to the requestors. Working toward these goals means that we continue to ensure the public's access to information.

Our Founders understood that a free society could not exist without informed citizens and open, accessible government. And as our country celebrates National Sunshine Week, Congress must continue its work to restore and strengthen its commitment to open government and freedom of information.

http://thomas.loc.gov/