The Fifth Amendment in Congressional Investigations, and More from CRS
How should a congressional committee respond when a witness before the Committee asserts his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination, and refuses to provide the testimony or documents sought by investigators?
The options available to the Committee were discussed by the Congressional Research Service in a new memorandum. See The Fifth Amendment in Congressional Investigations, CRS Legal Sidebar, September 11, 2015.
Other new and updated CRS publications include the following.
Election in Greece, CRS Insight, September 14, 2015
OSHA Proposed Rule Contradicts D.C. Circuit Decision, CRS Legal Sidebar, September 14, 2015
Confederate License Plates are Government Speech, Rules Supreme Court, CRS Legal Sidebar, September 14, 2015
“Just Mayo” Just Isn’t, Warns FDA, CRS Legal Sidebar, September 14, 2015
District Court Holds House has Standing to Pursue Portions of ACA Lawsuit, CRS Legal Sidebar, September 11, 2015
Jim Thorpe’s Tribe and Sons Continue Fight against the Borough of Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania, CRS Legal Sidebar, September 11, 2015
The FY2014 Government Shutdown: Economic Effects, updated September 11, 2015
The Debt Limit Since 2011, updated September 11, 2015
Surface Transportation Program Reauthorization Issues for Congress, updated September 11, 2015
Procedures for Congressional Action in Relation to a Nuclear Agreement with Iran: In Brief, updated September 11, 2015
Abortion: Judicial History and Legislative Response, updated September 11, 2015
The United Arab Emirates (UAE): Issues for U.S. Policy, updated September 14, 2015
Using the NIST as an example, the Radiation Physics Building (still without the funding to complete its renovation) is crucial to national security and the medical community. If it were to go down (or away), every medical device in the United States that uses radiation would be decertified within 6 months, creating a significant single point of failure that cannot be quickly mitigated.
The federal government can support more proactive, efficient, and cost-effective resiliency planning by certifying predictive models to validate and publicly indicate their quality.
We need a new agency that specializes in uncovering funding opportunities that were overlooked elsewhere. Judging from the history of scientific breakthroughs, the benefits could be quite substantial.
The cost of inaction is not merely economic; it is measured in preventable illness, deaths and diminished livelihoods.