WASHINGTON — The British memo that reported President Bush was determined to go to war in Iraq months earlier than he publicly acknowledged will get its first official hearing today, sort of.

In the closest thing so far to a congressional hearing on the Downing Street Memo, Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., will head a forum examining it. That will be followed by a rally in front of the White House. Conyers plans to deliver the signatures of 105 congressional Democrats and more than 500,000 citizens on petitions demanding a detailed response to the memo.

The memo, minutes of a meeting that British Prime Minister Tony Blair had with aides on July 23, 2002, said it "seemed clear that Bush had made up his mind to take military action." Bush has said he didn't decide to go to war until shortly before bombing began in March 2003. The memo also says the White House "fixed" intelligence data to justify the war. The memo came to light May 1.

Conyers said he is holding the forum, being televised on C-SPAN 3, to uncover whether "there a secret decision well ahead of the authority Congress had given" on Oct. 11, 2002, to Bush to launch the war. Bush and Blair have denied such accusations but haven't challenged the memo's authenticity. Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Mich., chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, doesn't plan to investigate the memo.