[1] It was named for its chairman Loyd Wright, a former president of the American Bar Association, whom the Commission's 12 members elected to that position.
Those appointed by Vice President Richard Nixon on behalf of the Senate were Senators John C. Stennis and Norris Cotton, Loyd Wright, and Susan B. Riley, a Tennessee professor of education and the only woman.
The Speaker of the House named Representatives William M. McCulloch and Francis E. Walter, James L. Noel Jr., a Texas attorney, and Edwin L. Mechem, former Governor of New Mexico.
A man who talks too freely when in his cups, or a pervert who is vulnerable to blackmail, may both be security risks although both may be loyal Americans.
The Commission recommends that as far as possible such cases be considered on a basis of suitability to safeguard the individual from an unjust stigma of disloyalty.It noted:[1] ... the dangers to national security that arise out of overclassification of information which retards scientific and technological progress, and thus tend to deprive the country of the lead time that results from the free exchange of ideas and information.Senator Daniel Moynihan summarized the Commission's report in 1997:[1] This was not an angry or accusatory group; rather the opposite.