Reading Room Document

Questions Concerning Lobbying by Federal Grantees

The document is a memorandum addressing questions concerning lobbying by federal grantees. It reviews an "anti-lobbying" rider that applies to current appropriations for specific departments and agencies. The document includes a collection of memoranda, letters, and other documents that pertain to activities of six federal grantees apparently calculated to influence legislation or appropriations pending before Congress. The memorandum concludes that the grantees' activities depicted are contrary to the terms of the rider, and it discusses the power to cut off funds and the most expeditious processes for doing so. The questions presented for review include whether violations of law have been committed by the grantees, whether the appropriations rider grants or denies power to funding agencies to cut off unexpended funds to grantee violators, and the processes by which the funding agencies may effect the most expeditious funds cutoffs.

July 1, 1981