This is Fresh Air.

I'm Dave Davies in For Terry Rose.

We live in a world today where it's understood that the United States has a powerful array of

intelligence agencies, including the CIA, the FBI, the National Security Agency, and others.

And while much of what they do is classified, it's also understood that they're ultimately

accountable to Congress and the American people for what they spend and what they do.

But that wasn't always the case.

Our guest today, veteran journalist James Ryzen, tells the story of Frank Church, a senator

from Idaho who in the mid 1970s held hearings which exposed shocking crimes and cover-ups

by the intelligence agencies, including assassination attempts on foreign leaders, the surveillance

and harassment of Martin Luther King and other activists, and CIA mine-controlled experiments

with LSD.

Ryzen writes that more than anyone else in American history, Frank Church is responsible

for bringing the CIA, the FBI, and the rest of the government's intelligence apparatus

under the rule of law.

James Ryzen earned the Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting in 2006 for his stories at the

New York Times about the National Security Agency's domestic spying program.

He shared another Pulitzer in 2002 for the paper's coverage of the September 11th attacks

and terrorism.

He's the author of four previous books and is currently the senior national security correspondent

for the intercept.

His new book is The Last Honest Man, the CIA, the FBI, the Mafia, and the Kennedys and

...