History 1967 to 1972CHAPTER VI
1967-1972: A PERIOD OF LONG RANGE PLANNING
Changes are slow and hard to come by, but, hopefully, continued persistence will effect some improvements.Logan Webster (1970)
The period between 1967 and 1972 can best be described, perhaps, as a time for long-range planning and the establishment of specific goals for the Probation System by the Federal Probation Officers' Association. The threat of consolidation of Probation within the Justice Department had all but passed, and the time consumed in that struggle could now be used for other important matters.[i]
Before discussing the first major long-range proposal of the Association that was developed in early 1967, several tasks were completed in 1966 which are important to mention. Within the first months of that year an index was completed for the "Looking At The Law" section of Federal Probation journal. This index, prepared under the supervision of Charles Hengstebeck (MI/E), greatly facilitated legal research on topics of interest to probation officers which were presented over the years in the magazine. Later in 1966 the public relations monograph, “Guide To Community Relations,” was also completed and would be published in 1967 with the cooperation of the Federal Judicial Center. For many years, this manual was the prime source for guidelines in working with radio, television, the press and the public, not only for federal probation officers but for their state and local counterparts as well.
In addition to its regular business activities during the year, the Association took a special time out to present the Honorable Luther Youngdahl, Chairman of the Judicial Conference Subcommittee On The Administration of Probation, with a plaque for his outstanding service to probation as chair of the subcommittee. The distinction was presented at a special ceremony following a Central States Training Institute in Wagoner, Oklahoma.
Before 1966 ended, the concept of a national training and research academy was again brought up for consideration. President Al Wahl and Secretary-Treasurer Charles Hosner held several conferences with Milton Rector, Director of the National Council on Crime and Delinquency. Unfortunately, the academy, as envisioned by the Association, would never materialize.
The Ten Point Program
Perhaps, in part, because of the recent experience with the Justice Department's attempt to consolidate probation within its structure, as well as because the Association may have seen a real need for such a document, the Executive Board developed a Ten Point Program for strengthening the Probation System. The program was discussed and assembled in late 1966, and it was formally presented to Chief Judge Walter Hoffman, as the new Chairman of the Judicial Conference Subcommittee On The Administration of Probation, in January 1967.
The Ten Point Program concerned itself with (1) manpower needs of the Probation Service, (2) the necessity to establish mandatory minimum qualifications of probation officers, (3) the assignment of uniform rules for the supervision of probationers in the various districts, (4) the continued and enhanced level of communication among the Probation Division, Board of Parole and Bureau of Prisons at the highest levels, (5) the creation by the Probation Division of a regional field supervision system to provide greater accessibility of Division representatives to the field, (6) an expansion of manpower within the Probation Division, (7) the enhancement of training, (8) an increase in funding for psychiatric and psychological services to clients of the various probation offices, (9) the expansion of research and experimentation, and finally, (10) a merger of probation and parole through a transfer of the Board of Parole from the Department of Justice to the Administrative Office of the U. S. Courts.
Chief Judge Hoffman received the Association's Ten Point Program and agreed that it should be evaluated in toto by the new Federal Judicial Center, an institution that was nearly assured of creation by the Congress in early 1968.[ii] However, he also informed the Association that his subcommittee would review certain points in the program at their own subcommittee meeting in July 1968 in San Francisco. Specifically, the committee wished to discuss the need for mandatory minimum qualifications, expansion of the Probation Division and the creation of field consultant positions within the Division. Although the time between submission of the document to the Conference and their consideration of it was somewhat more than a year, it is important to point out that the proposals were far-reaching and that the Conference subcommittee had numerous items with which to deal over this same period.
During 1967 and 1968 a number of studies commissioned by the Executive Board continued or were completed. The Economics Committee, for example, completed a new study on the cost of operating privately-owned vehicles by probation officers and recommended an increase in mileage reimbursement beyond twelve cents. The same committee also commenced research into a senior probation officer category within the Judiciary Salary Plan with the possibility of achieving this senior grade after fifteen years of service. Finally, the Economics Committee began to examine the Administrative Office guidelines on the classification of small, medium and large offices.
In the spring of 1968 an earlier survey of district presentence investigations was finally completed and published. The ultimate goal of the survey was to highlight areas of commonality and to foster uniformity throughout the country. Still in progress during this same period was an updating of a biographical directory of all probation officers, a new work on compiling felony registration statutes in the various states (in conjunction with Southern Illinois University at Carbondale) and a revision on the states' statutes relating to the loss of civil rights by convicted persons.
Also of note in 1968, President Al Wahl and Vice-President Ben Meeker met with Justice Tom Clark, first director of the newly-created Federal Judicial Center, and found him most receptive to the idea of increased attention to research and training. In mid-1968 President Wahl also met with the judges of the Judicial Conference subcommittee on probation as they considered the Association's Ten Point Proposal on Improving the Probation System. The concept of field consultants provided by the Division was discussed as were parking problems at official headquarters and the proposed Senior Probation Officer position. Judge Wollenberg, speaking later in the year for the Probation Committee, expressed the committee's appreciation of the Federal Probation Officers Association's support and the willingness of the organization to act as a sounding board for the Probation Committee over the years.
After the mid-year meeting with the Judicial Conference subcommittee, the Association met with Probation Division Chief Merrill Smith to pursue further the concept of field consultation services. Merrill Smith, long an advocate of probation officers and one who has believed in and fostered professionalism in the system, was receptive to the idea that the Division have greater involvement with the various Districts. He initially considered the assigning of his Assistant Chiefs to the several circuits but, in 1969, he decided to experiment with regional divisions, making use of his staff including Donald Chamlee, William Cohan, Victor Evjen and Wayne Jackson. The concept would be fully implemented in July 1970. After Merrill Smith's retirement in 1972, the newly-appointed Division Chief, Wayne Jackson, continued the idea of regional representatives to the field. Eventually, additional staff was added to the Probation Division to enable it to institutionalize the positions of Regional Administrators.
Revision Of The Judicial Salary Plan
Marshall McKinney had said many years earlier that "it is difficult to point to any one achievement …during (any) given term…" Usually it took several board terms to bring an objective to its conclusion. Revision of the Judiciary Salary Plan was one of these long-range efforts involving a number of individuals over several years.
Work on the revision of the Judiciary Salary Plan began in 1967 with Ken Beighle's Economics Committee and continued by the same committee headed by Logan Webster through 1972. The committee originally considered a single facet of the salary plan which would create a senior level for officers. It was envisioned that after fifteen years, officers would have the prospect of being promoted to this higher grade as a reward for exceptional service as well as to have an incentive to continue at a highly productive level. It was a concept already in place in a number of Executive Department law enforcement agencies.
In 1969 Logan Webster surveyed the field on a broader revision of the Judiciary Salary Plan and received responses from 92 offices. Later in the same year Chief Judge Walter E. Hoffman (US District Court, VA/E) of the Probation Committee met with the Board and urged them to submit their suggestions on revision to the Probation Division once they were completed. That study was completed in early 1970 and referred to the Administrative Office of the U. S. Courts. In August 1970, Association President Ben Meeker, accepted an invitation of the Judicial Conference to present the organization's information on the Judiciary Salary Plan. In the spring of the following year Merrill Smith met with the Executive Board and announced that the Administrative Office had completed the study of the Judiciary Salary Plan and submitted it to the Judicial Conference. During mid-1971 the Conference's Subcommittee on Probation agreed to two of the proposed changes. One would reclassify upward the position of clerk-in-charge and a second would reclassify upward the position of an officer-in-charge of a branch office where three or more officers were supervised.
As the fall of 1971 approached, Probation Division Chief Merrill Smith prepared a number of excellent documents for use by the House and Senate subcommittees on personnel with respect to their consideration of the Judiciary Salary Plan. Since the Plan was being actively considered, the Executive Board of the Association was asked to assemble additional supporting information. The Association contacted all Chief Probation Officers who, in turn, were asked to speak with their Chief Judges concerning their recommendations about the Judiciary Salary Plan. The information would, thereafter, be coordinated through Merrill Smith and the Judicial Conference Subcommittee Chairman, Chief Judge Francis L. Van Dusen.
The proposed reclassification plan of Logan Webster's Economics Committee covered the clerical grades from JSP-4 (Junior Probation Clerk) through JSP-11 (Chief Supervisory Clerk) in a major metropolitan office. It also covered the range of officer positions from JSP-7 (Trainee) to JSP-16-17 (Chief Probation Officer) in a major metropolitan office. There were further discussions about the Judiciary Salary Plan during the winter of 1971-1972, and in April 1972 the Executive Board submitted its final revisions.[iii]
Caseload Studies
At its fall Board meeting in October 1969, Merrill Smith asked the members to submit suggestions on a formula by which a proper distribution of officers could be made. This formula, to evaluate the workload of each District, would be used to approach the Congress for the authority to appoint the necessary number of officers to handle efficiently the work of the probation offices. The Chief of the Probation Division asked specifically (1) on what basis should a probation officer's workload be computed and (2) what should be the rationale for such a workload formula. Based upon the obvious impact of these questions to the field, the Executive Board established an Ad Hoc Committee to consider and reply to them. Lloyd Hubler (OH/S) was appointed Chairman and Walter Evans (OR) and Henry Long (VA/E) were delegated to assist.
In May 1971, Administrative Office Director Rowland Kirks met with the Executive Board in Washington and supported the concept of thirty-five supervision cases per officer. All Chief Judges were being asked to submit their personnel needs, and the Association had already alerted Chief Probation Officers to this circularized personnel request. In August 1971 Merrill Smith urged the Association to address the problem of understaffing. Several months later the Association again brought the matter to the attention of the field for comment as to the most effective means for computing a caseload formula. Almost simultaneously, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court issued a press release supporting increased manpower and specifying an ideal formula:
... the Judicial Conference took note of a very serious problem developing in the United States Probation Offices across the country. Because of the large increase in criminal cases filed in the district courts and a substantial increase in presentence investigations, the probation officers have far less time for the supervision and surveillance of persons on probation and parole. The problem is compounded by an increase of more than 4,000 probation and parole cases last year, from 38,000 in 1970 to 42,000 in the current year (1971). In 1967 the President's Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice recommended that the number of probation and parole cases should not exceed 35 per officer. The average in the Federal Probation System at the end of the fiscal year was 69, in addition to the investigative duties. The Conference endorsed a proposal that 348 officers be added to the probation service.
More discussions were held concerning the caseload formula in the spring of 1972. At that time, Congressman Robert W. Kastenmeier (D-WI), Chairman of House Committee Number Three of the Committee on the Judiciary, invited the entire Association Board to meet with his committee to discuss problems facing the Probation Service as well as to obtain the Association's comments on his committee's bills. One of the matters discussed by the Association was a statutory formula of thirty-five cases per officer, which formula would greatly aid the Administrative Office in determining annual requests of the Congress for personnel.
In May 1972, Merrill Smith, a strong advocate of probation, announced his intention to retire as Chief of the Probation Division. It was with great sadness that the Association heard the announcement since it was well known that the Division Chief was a strong supporter of the idea that much could be accomplished through a cooperative relationship between the Administrative Office and the Federal Probation Officers Association.
The Association, however, was fortunate in the appointment of Merrill Smith's successor, Wayne Jackson. In the fall of 1972, the new Division Chief met with the Board and asked the Association for all the assistance it could provide in justifying a caseload formula of between 35 and 50 cases per officer. Walter Evans of the Professional Standards Committee was asked to manage that assistance. As 1972 ended, the Association continued to work on a realistic caseload formula. (Wayne Jackson had also asked the Board to develop a formula for the optimum number of presentence reports that an officer could prepare annually if free of supervision responsibilities. This work, too, was in progress at the close of 1972). The results of the Association's work would be provided later.
The Establishment of Long Range Goals
When the Executive Board of the Association met for its fall meeting in Norfolk, Virginia in October 1969, Merrill Smith asked that they consider developing goals for the Probation Service over the long term. The assignment fell to Walter Evans and the Professional Standards Committee, especially Ted 0. Wisner. As this committee worked on the assigned project, the Board developed a number of initial proposals at its meeting in the fall of 1970 in New Orleans. These twelve proposals to the Administrative Office arose, essentially, out of an Economics Committee report at the time, to which the Board added several points. The twelve points included the following:
1. Modification of the Judiciary Salary Plan, broadening the categories and job specifications of the clerical staff, adding additional compensation to persons in charge of branch offices, reclassifying the sizes of offices and adding a senior officer category.
2. Increase in the mileage allowance for the use of privately owned vehicles.
3. Procurement of emergency welfare funds for short and long term client emergencies.
4. Addition of one day for training through the Federal Judicial Center.
5. Establishment of an advisory committee on training and education to the Federal Judicial Center consisting of field officers.
6. Establishment of a minimum number of officers in each region to attend major educational and training conferences annually such as the American Correctional Association (ACA) and National Institute on Crime and Delinquency (NICD) Conferences.
7. Development of a future course of action by the Administrative Office of the U. S. Courts, Bureau of Prisons and the Federal Offender Vocational Rehabilitation Project in relationship to the study findings of the latter group.
8. Evaluation of the Narcotic Addict Rehabilitation Program (NARA) by the Administrative Office and the Bureau of Prisons.
9. Development of guidelines for the disclosure of presentence reports.
10. Setting standards for the direct admissions to Federal Correctional Institutions to avoid local overcrowding.
11. Participation by the Association in national organizations such as the ACA.
12. Creation of incentive awards to recognize excellence.
The Federal Judicial Center was quick to respond to the propositions which concerned it. The Center staff extended the time for probation officer training at the Center and agreed to permit officer attendance at national institutes. Regrettably, no emergency funds for clients were available through the Judiciary - and none have ever been made available since. The Association, itself, through the Professional Standards Committee, also made a concerted effort to make state vocational rehabilitation services available to all Districts and asked Merrill Smith to meet with the National Social and Rehabilitation Service in Washington.
In the "Letter From the Chief" column of the August 1971 Newsletter, Division Chief Merrill Smith urged the Association to continue its long-range planning including the addressing of problems of understaffing, constraints on salary, the public image of probation and even consideration of the question of whether or not a different form of organization for probation would increase financial support. The response came in May 1972 with the submission by Walter Evans and the Professional Standards Committee of a document entitled “Goals Of The Federal Probation Service.” Published and distributed to the field five months later, the goals called for the following:
1. New alternatives to confinement and the development of necessary community resources.
2. Community treatment.
3. Training: especially in assistance to the Federal Judicial Center in achieving excellence in training in management for administrators and potential administrators, in caseload management, offender evaluations, and in a variety of specialized problems.
4. Research to increase the effectiveness of the Courts and the Probation Service particularly in the areas of management, behavior identification and validation of treatment techniques.
5. Office of Public Information.
6. Regional Consultants in the Probation Division for guidance to the field.
7. Joint Study on the implications of a centralized organizational structure, in cooperation with the Administrative Office and the Federal Judicial Center.
8. Sufficient funding to insure adequate manpower.
9. Service Purchase Funds for local diagnostic studies, temporary aid for indigents and special treatment assistance in unusual cases.
The Goals of the Federal Probation Service was an important document. In several ways it still continues to be, for some of the important goals have yet to be attained.
A Time For Planning - But For Other Considerations As Well
The six years between 1967 and 1972 reflected a great deal of work by the Association and was not limited to the tasks of goal setting and planning, as important as they are. Regrettably, space prohibits more than a cursory view of these other activities of the Association. It may also be noted that, although the reference may be brief, the work and outcome associated with the particular activity may have been substantial. One has only to consider, for example, the request by the Judicial Conference Subcommittee on Probation that the Association establish guidelines for the preparation of shortened presentence reports in selected cases. Paul Chandler was appointed Chairman of an ad hoc subcommittee of the Professional Standards Committee to deal with this task. In April 1972 he submitted his report to the Executive Board which was comprehensive and pertinent. Recommending against the use of such terms as "Limited PSI" and "Mini-PSI', Chandler detailed the classifications and established the bases for three styles of the presentence report. These were: (1) the standard presentence report; (2) the selective presentence report for use in the case of less serious offenses; and (3) the specified presentence report for use in those instances when the Court was interested in only certain areas of an individual's career.
In similar fashion do we refer to the work of Ted 0. Wisner (MI/W) on the revision of the booklet compiling the rights lost by defendants in the various states by reason of a criminal conviction. Another example of an important but little known work is that of Patrick Murphy (GA/N) as chairman of another ad hoc subcommittee who responded to Administrative Office Director Rowland Kirks' request to review the use and value of current Administrative Office statistical reports in 1972. Murphy's report was filed in the same year with the Chief of the Division of Information Systems and reflected a greater demand, especially in metropolitan offices, for information on offender typologies, success and failure indices and the like. He also recommended, after surveying the field, that the Division of Information Systems make use of the services of a professional criminologist in collating, evaluating and disseminating data.
Again in 1972 the Professional Standards Committee proposed to Division Chief Wayne Jackson that his office establish a Circuit or Regional Council of Chief Probation Officers, to meet with the Division from time to time on administrative matters. The current Chiefs’ Management Council can be traced to this proposal.
During the period 1967-1972, the Association continued to address before the Probation Division such concerns as protection under Title 18 U. S. Code §1114, parking, voluntary job transfers between districts[iv] and incentive awards. The Research Committee presented a report on the use of volunteers in probation and submitted it to the Judicial Conference at their request. In this same period, the Board of Parole asked for the opinions of the Association on the board's new classification of intensive supervision for parole and mandatory release cases. The Law Enforcement Assistance Administration requested that the Association act as advisors to local community correctional programs, to which the board agreed by resolution (May 1971).
Although incentive awards, one of the Association's main interests, were put off by the Administrative Office as not fundable, eventually the concept of Quality Step Increases came into existence.
In 1970 the Code of Ethics for Probation Officers, developed by the Association, was reprinted by demand from the field. The Code carried a new design by Evan Sanchez of Oakland, California which was used for many years thereafter. In the same year, the Association had a signal honor in accepting for membership retired Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, Tom C. Clark.
Portents of Future Debate: The Speedy Trial Bill of 1971
In October 1971 the Association's Board met in Executive Session to consider, among other issues, the recent introduction into the Senate of S.895, the "Speedy Trial Bill of 1971," by Senator Samuel Ervin, Jr. (D-NC). The bill would establish a special pretrial services staff in several districts in order to determine the need for such services throughout the country in evaluating the admission to bail by defendants. The Board saw this bill as an unnecessary duplication and communicated this position to Senator Ervin. In this same regard, a resolution of U. S. Probation Officers of the Western Region meeting in Palm Springs, California, was also sent to Senator Ervin and stated (in part):
We wish to state our agreement with the Federal Probation Officers Association, that the Federal Probation Service is the logical agency to assume the duties proposed in Title 11 (of the Speedy Trial Bill) - Pretrial Services Agencies.
Our Service currently performs duties similar to nearly all of the duties proposed for a new and separate pretrial agency as presently included in S.895. It is our position that our Service, properly staffed and funded, can most easily take on this new responsibility as we have taken on added responsibilities throughout our history as a career branch of the Federal Judiciary.
Senator Ervin would later reply that he had certain legal difficulties with probation officers performing a pretrial function. But the matter would not end there, as later events will show.
[i] In 1967 companion bills S916 and HR5038 were introduced in their respective Houses of Congress. These bills would have removed all responsibilities of probation officers toward supervision and left them with authority to conduct presentence investigations only. Both bills died without significant activity. A similar bill was introduced in the 90th Congress in 1969 and called for the creation of a 'U.S. Corrections Service', but it, too, met the same fate as earlier bills. However, the Association was concerned with this legislation at the time, enough to cause President Ben Meeker to meet with Congressman Abner Mikva (D-IL), its author. Eventually, the bill (HR14823) was revised by Rep. Mikva, retained Probation under the Courts and resubmitted to the House as HR15889. The last significant challenge occurred in August 1972 with the introduction of S3185, known as "The Federal Corrections Reorganization Act." The bill, too, would have splintered the Probation Service, combining some aspects with the Board of Parole and deferring supervision to another organization. It never gained serious acceptance [ii] HR6111, the bill that would establish the Federal Judicial Center, was strongly supported by Congressman Emanuel Celler of Brooklyn, NY. In his remarks about the bill, he informed his colleagues that it had the support, not only of the American and Federal Bar Associations, but of the Federal Probation Officers Association as well. [iii] See Appendix J for the detailed plan. [iv] Judge Walter Hoffman, in October 1969, invited all of the Executive Board members and their spouses to dinner at the Princess Anne Country Club in Norfolk, Virginia. The Chairman of the Judicial Conference Subcommittee on Probation announced at that time that the Conference endorsed and recognized the concept of lateral transfers.
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