INVESTIGATIONS: HEAT ON HUNT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00149R000400130011-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 13, 2000
• Sequence Number: 11
• Publication Date: September 14, 1964
• Content Type: MAGAZINE

NEWSW011%,
SEP
Approved For Release
INVESTIGATIONS:
Heat on Hunt 'Propaganda Peddling': Glaring down
from his high mahogany bench at acting
Haroldson Lafayette 'Hunt lives in IRS commissioner Bertrand Harding, an
Dallas, has $700 million, and owns a Eisenhower appointee, Patman said: "It
home which is a replica of Mount Ver- has long been apparent to me that you
non, only much bigger. At 75, he is people, who are supposed to be protect-
bulky and slightly stooped, a shy home- ing the public interest, are engaged in
body of a farmer-turned-oilman-turned an unusual effort as apologists and ad=
financier, devoted to goat milk, clip-on vocates for the large foundations. For
bow ties, Deaf Smith County wheat some reason, a number of IRS and
bread, and some of the farthest right- Treasury officials feel compelled to cover
wing causes of his time. up the propaganda peddling of the elite
Propagandizing for these through his bureaucrats of the large foundations,
tax-exempt Life Line Foundation and their gravy trains; and their inefficiencies:".
its predecessor, Facts Forum, has been Harding's response was not lionlike.
the main interest of H.L. Hunt's life "Chairman, sir," he said, "'we are not
for the past fifteen years. Occasionally "Chaim n, proud of our record to the
he has stepped out bounds, as in his dexceedingly
ree with which we have made ex-
anti butin o of f 102,0 000 copies of an animations-,of-,, tax-exempt foundations. I
anti-Catholic sermon during the 1960 accept criticism for the past, but we
campaign. But most Americans, though have expanded our examination of these
.shying from his denunciations of Dwight
Eisenhower as "the worst of Presidents," organizations since 1960. IRS, however,
the "heathen nations" in the U.N., and cannot plead guilty of failure to support
the "socialistic tendencies" of Hoover's FTC, CAB, and SEC regulations. Our
role is not that of a general policeman."
Administration, might feel he was within 'Secret Conduit': Earlier in the week;
fact rights hts the sound government, for the the committee released a different kind
ha, b allowing of boomer. Another tax-exempt founda
thhie him that
to untadisclkoosed income-tax millions ions deductions he has s sunk on tion , the J.M. Kaplan Fund, had acted
into Life Line, is in effect footing part as a "secret conduit" for transmission of
of the bill. $395,000 of alleged CIA money to an.
This is certainly the opinion of sul- organization identified with anti-Con
phurous Wright Patman, 71, chairman mtmist activities in Europe and Latin'
of a House Small Business subcommit- America. Objections came on two
tee. Last week Patman challenged In counts: such. use of foundation grants
ternal Revenue Service officials for not would bring American scholars and sci-
revoking Life Line's tax-exempt status, entists in foreign countries under sus-
`and got IRS assurances that it had under picion; and CIA should not have used
"very active" investigation two dozen the Kaplan Fund because it is under
(unnamed) foundations that use mass investigation for free-wheeling business
news media to advance various causes. maneuvers. However, after a single ses-
The committee brought out the un- ' sion of testimony, . Patman met with
publicized fact that eighteen months representatives of the CIA and then an-
ago the Baltimore district , of the IRS% nounced: "The CIA does not belong in
recommended revocation of Life Line's this foundation investigation."
tax-exempt status, and that the recom-! . But Patman was sure Life Line still
mendation had been buried until now.: did. In Dallas, H.L. Hunt _ insisted
It also charged that $273,691 donated righteously it was an educational and
for subscriptions to Facts Forum News patriotic undertaking. "An attack is be-
between 1954 and 1956 had disap- ing made," he cried, "on the right of
peared, with the foundation unable to free speech and comment." But Patman
give the number of subscriptions pur- already had an answer on record: "If an
chased by each donor or the addresses old slouch like Hunt really waits to
to which they were sent. Among the educate the people, he's got lots of
contributors were Hunt himself, the money to do it, without putting
Hunt Oil Co.,. Sears, Roebuck and Co., $27.5 million which is tax-exempt -side
and'Standard Oil of Indiana. fgr the Life Line Foundation."
Approved-For R a-se OOI9 E-+AVRD -5 _VV