UPDATE 1-US Congress asks ex-BofA counsel to testify-source

* Two BofA directors also asked to testify at hearing

(Adds detail on hearing, Moynihan)

CHARLOTTE, N.C./NEW YORK, Nov 5 (Reuters) - The U.S. Congress has asked Bank of America Corp's (BAC.N) former general counsel Brian Moynihan to testify on the bank's acquisition of Merrill Lynch, a source familiar with the matter said on Thursday.

The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee is asking the bank to make Moynihan, who was the bank's general counsel at the time the Merrill deal closed, available to testify Nov. 17, the source said.

Moynihan now runs the bank's mammoth consumer banking division, the largest in the U.S. with 6,000 branches and 18,000 ATMs.

Moynihan has been tapped as a leading internal candidate to replace retiring Chief Executive Ken Lewis, who is stepping down by year's end.

One of the issues the committee will probe is Moynihan's reactivation of his status with the Massachusetts Board of Bar Overseers.

On Nov. 4, the New York Post reported Moynihan was appointed general counsel of the bank on Dec. 10, 2008, but changed his status with the state bar from inactive to active until a week later.

Hiring an inactive attorney as corporate counsel is not customary, the paper noted.

Democratic committee chairman Edolphus Towns described the move to the Post as indicating something was "rotten in the cotton."

The committee had previously scheduled a hearing in October to examine the Merrill deal and had asked two of the bank's directors, Charles Gifford and Thomas May, to testify, among others. The directors have been asked to testify at the November hearing.

The panel has been probing the bank's acquisition of Merrill for months. Among concerns is the government's involvement in the merger and whether the bank failed to adequately disclose to shareholders Merrill's fourth-quarter losses, which topped $15 billion.

Calls to Bank of America were not immediately returned. (Reporting by Joe Rauch in Charlotte, N.C., and Rachelle Younglai in New York; Editing by Derek Caney and Gerald E. McCormick)