This Is Not America
101
A. THE BIRTH OF A COMMITTEE Every woman expects her second child to be delivered in an easier way than her first. The second governmental investigation of the assassination of President Kennedy, however, like so many things about this assassination, didn’t fit into preconceived ideas about anything. Whereas the Warren Commission was quickly established, within days of the assassination, the only real problem lay in finally getting started. Everybody was ready, but it somehow didn’t start. The House Select Committee on Assassinations encountered the same problem: it couldn’t start an actual investigation. But the reason for this was that, at times, there wasn’t even a Committee to investigate. On April 15, 1975, Robert Groden, a private assassination researcher who had centered all his interests on the photographic evidence, was asked to show the Zapruder-film to the Virginia Congressional Delegation. At that time, not too many had seen that historic piece of footage; it was no small wonder that politicians were interested to see how one of their colleagues had so brutally and famously been murdered. Interested by what he had seen. Representative Thomas Downing introduced resolution 432 on April 30, requesting a Congressional investigation of the assassination of President Kennedy. Fellow Congressman Henry B. Gonzalez had already introduced a more or less similar resolution. Resolution 204, requesting an investigation of the murders of John and Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr., plus the attempted murder of Governor Wallace, while running for the Presidency against Nixon in 1972. Wallace had to pull out of the race because of his injuries. These resolutions were, as was the normal procedure around Washington, being upheld by some Committees for over a year. To speed up matters, these two resolutions were molded into one, Resolution 1540, supported by Gonzalez, Downing and Walter Fauntroy. Thomas ‘Tip’ O’Neill tried everything to stop this resolution. He ordered Richard Boiling, a Representative from Missouri who also opposed the resolution, to let that resolution pass the Rules Committee. As some other persons felt it to be their duty, he vouched for the Warren Commission and its conclusions. But it was to no avail: the resolution was introduced on September 14, 1976 and passed on a 280-65 vote in the House. A twelve member committee was established, investigating the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. Thomas ‘Tip’ O’Neill put Representative Thomas Downing in the seat of the Chairman of this Committee, knowing that Downing’s tenure would automatically end in December 1976, when his career as a Congressman would end. At that time, everyone believed Congress would reconstitute the Committee, presided by Representative Henry Gonzalez of Texas.
Chairman Downing The first problem the Committee had to solve was finding a Chief Counsel and Staff Director. The first man to be asked was Mark Lane, who had been Marguerite Oswald’s attorney and had recently started the Citizen’s Commission of Inquiry. Downing then felt Bernard Fensterwald, Jr., might be the man to lead the inquiry. Fensterwald had been interested in the assassination for quite some time, had founded the Committee To Investigate Assassinations and knew, like Lane, what areas needed to be probed. He, however, had been an attorney for James Earl Ray, the man