Page "J. Edgar Hoover" Paragraph 30

Hoover amassed significant power by collecting files containing large amounts of compromising and potentially embarrassing information on many powerful people, especially politicians.

According to Laurence Silberman, appointed Deputy Attorney General in early 1974, FBI Director Clarence M. Kelley thought such files either did not exist or had been destroyed.

After The Washington Post broke a story in January 1975, Kelley searched and found them in his outer office.

The House Judiciary Committee then demanded that Silberman testify about them.