Page:CRS Report 98-611.djvu/8

CRS-8 date to appear in these compilations was sent jointly to the Speaker of the House and the President Pro Tempore of the Senate on January 4, 1979. Presidential letters and memoranda on matters other than tariffs and international trade are sometimes denominated as administrative orders and appear as such in CFR Title 3 compilations (see above).

Military Orders

CFR Title 3 compilations for the 1938-1943 and 1943-1948 periods contain the texts of 12 presidential directives denominated as military orders. The first of these was issued on July 5, 1939, and the last on October 18, 1948. Ten of them bear the signature of President Roosevelt; the other two were signed by President Truman. These directives appear to have been issued by the President in conjunction with the execution of his duties as Commander-in-Chief and pertain to matters concerning armed forces administration and personnel. Indeed, half of them bear the Commander-in-Chief title below the President’s signature. Moreover, while all of them make reference to “the authority vested in me as President of the United States and as Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States,” two also cite a specific Article of War and six also cite explicit statutory authority for their issuance. No directives of this designation were subsequently produced in the Federal Register or CFR Title compilations until November 2001, when President George W. Bush issued a controversial military order on the detention, treatment, and trial, by military tribunals, of noncitizens alleged to be terrorists.

National Security Instruments

Shortly after the creation of the National Security Council (NSC) in 1947, supporting staff began producing four types of policy papers: basic comprehensive policy statements on a broad variety of national security problems, together with pertinent political, economic, and military implementation strategies; situation profiles of large geographic areas or specific countries; assessments of mobilization, arms control, atomic energy, and other functional matters; and organizational statements on NSC, foreign intelligence, and internal security structure and activities. The initial products in the series reportedly were of the geographical type; the first comprehensive policy statement was completed and given NSC approval in November 1948.

The early NSC policy papers were initiated by the council's members, executive secretary, and supporting staff. Some ideas were also drawn from studies and reports prepared by the State-Army-Navy-Air Force Coordinating Committee, which was subsequently dissolved in 1949. The Department of State “was the most important single source of project requests, with the Defense Department a close second.” Moreover, the early council papers were drafted primarily by the policy planning staff