Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities, June 7, 1973
Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities, June 7, 1973
[00.17.22] Mr. SLOAN. The political committee essentially working with the, guidelines we gave them, for instance, if you are talking about a, $40 million campaign, each of the various differentials would begin the process by indicating the tasks they wanted to accomplish and how much their thought it would cost. The process within these meetings would be to review- these in total and totals might come in at $60 million and subsequent discussions would generally be along the line: where did you cut, where do we establish our priorities, how do we get all of the individual departments and divisions so they fall within the ceiling set by the finance committee in terms of total dollars expected to be raised. We subsequently were in the process which we had not completed at the time I left of setting up a monitoring function where we would report back to the various divisions on essentially a monthly basis as to how they were doing versus the funds they Were allowed within their budgets. Senator INOUYE. SO in your budget committee discussions you discussed the purposes for which these funds were to be used? Mr. SLOAN. In broad categories. There would be, for instance, in considering the advertising budget, the members of that department, would come in, essentially make a presentation and say our judgment is we should allocate 60 percent of this money for television, 10 percent for radio and so forth. But generally, to these kinds of dimensions there would often be discussion of whether that is the proper allocations in terms of percentages and so forth. Senator INOUYE. Would the disbursement of 81 million qualify for discussion in these meetings? Mr. SLOAN. I believe it should have, I never heard any of these funds listed here ever discussed in, any budget. Senator INOUYE, Did you ever discuss clandestine activities? Mr. SLOAN. No, sir, I never heard any such discussion. Senator INOUYE. Was it the practice of your budget committee to dispense $300,000 or a $1.7 million without your knowing what the purpose was to be? Mr. SLOAN. As I indicated, Senator these funds and the, authority that was set up to disburse them was never a subject of any budget committee meeting in which I sat. I did not sit in all of them'. Senator INOUYE. You just took it on face value That it was to be spent for legal purposes. Mr. SLOAN. Absolutely. Senator INOUYE. Never got suspicious? Mr. SLOAN. Not at the time I was doing it, Certainly, following June 17, yes, sir. Senator INOUYE Did your office, the White House and Internal Revenue Service ever get together to discuss how the laws of the United States, the tax laws of the United States would be skirted to raise funds such as, for example, avoiding payment of capital gains taxes? Mr. SLOAN. There were discussions, I am not sure quite the context you presented, Senator. Opinions on the subject of capital gains liability were sought from various legal sources independent as well as, I believe there were opinions probably from counsel in the White House at early stages since we did not have a full-time counsel ourselves. With regard to the other matters, for instance, the gift tax liability to donors, I believe both our Party as well as the Democratic Party were urging, I believe, cooperatively an attempt to reverse the decision to get some kind of a decision that would do away from the necessity of these multiple committees which are real headaches and nightmares for people involved in the mechanical end of fundraising. Senator INOUYE. I have here a draft letter prepared by Mr. Thomas Pike, cochairman of the California Committee To Re-Elect the President dent. It is a draft letter which is addressed to you, sir. It is a form letter that one would fill out when he wishes to contribute stocks and securities. Mr. SLOAN. Yes, sir. Senator INOUYE. Did you receive any stocks and securities? Mr. SLOAN. Yes, sir; we received a very large proportion, particularly, in the pre-April 7 period, of our receipts in the form of securities. Senator INOUYE. What was the scheme, sir? Mr. SLOAN, Excuse me, sir? Senator INOUYE. What was the scheme involved? Mr. SLOAN. The. scheme, sir? Senator INOUYE. Yes. Mr. SLOAN. I do not believe there was any scheme. I think in terms of fundraising, anything that is of value essentially can be accepted into a campaign. Securities, as far as I know, certainly not in the magnitude or quantity that existed normally in a Presidential campaign, have been handled by finance committees regularly. For instance, when I was with the Republican National Committee, there would be contributions in the form of securities. [00.22.47]