Foes turn up heat on Ashcroft
Jules Witcover
Baltimore Sun
Originally published Nov 26, 2001
WASHINGTON - Attorney General John Ashcroft found
himself in a somewhat ironic situation the other day when he
presided over the naming of the Justice Department building in
honor of one of his predecessors in the job with whom he has
little in common - the late Robert F. Kennedy.
Mr. Ashcroft likes to compare his approach toward the war on terrorism
with Kennedy's own war against Mafia kingpins and labor tough guys like
Jimmy Hoffa, saying he intends to get terrorist suspects off the streets the
way he says Kennedy dealt with the hoods: by catching them in any minor
violation of law.
But that's where the comparison ends. Mr. Ashcroft's record as a state
attorney general, Missouri governor and senator in the realm of civil rights,
where Robert Kennedy made a much more lasting contribution to
American life than as a crime-fighter, obliged him to stand on his head
disavowing his past during contentious Senate confirmation hearings last
winter.
The large Kennedy clan, pleased at the dedication of the building and
willing to swallow the temporary discomfort of Mr. Ashcroft trying to don
the mantle of their lost kin even temporarily, sat and politely applauded the
incumbent attorney general's remarks of praise. As one of them said later,
"The building will be there long after he will."
But Mr. Ashcroft played host to the event at a time he is under increasing
fire for his actions as the nation's chief law-enforcement officer.
His latest decision to eavesdrop on certain conversations between
suspected terrorists or associates detained and not charged with any
crime has many legal scholars declaring the order to be unconstitutionally
in violation of client-attorney privilege.
One of Kennedy's daughters, Kerry Kennedy Cuomo, seemed to allude
to the matter at another event on the same day as the building dedication,
saying to her own daughter, "Cara, if anyone tries to tell you this is the
type of justice your grandpa would embrace, don't you believe it."
Others recall, however, that Kennedy as attorney general did authorize
FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover to wiretap Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on
national security grounds when Hoover suspected the civil rights leader of
associations with Communists during the Red Scare days. But Kennedy
redeemed himself in the eyes of civil rights advocates with his record
against racial discrimination.
There are other raps against Mr. Ashcroft and his attitude toward civil
liberties.
His recent ruling against the so-called assisted suicide law in Oregon
inspired a large ad in the New York Times by the Hemlock Society,
self-described as "the nation's oldest and largest organization advocating
death with dignity."
The ad says: "Intolerance comes in many forms. Attorney General John
Ashcroft just arbitrarily decreed that terminally ill Americans cannot
choose physician aide [sic] in dying. If his action stands, no hopelessly ill
American in any state will be able to get physician help for a dignified
death. This is an unwarranted and cruel intrusion into the private lives and
personal choices of all Americans."
In another Oregon case, Portland's acting chief of police, Andrew
Kirkland, has decided to buck Mr. Ashcroft by announcing he will not
help the FBI question 200 Middle Eastern immigrants as part of the war
on terrorism. The acting chief has invoked a state law that he says
prohibits such interrogation of immigrants not suspected of having
committed a crime.
This same matter of ethnic or racial profiling is being opposed in legislation
co-sponsored by Democratic Sen. Russell Feingold of Wisconsin, a
liberal who nevertheless provided the deciding vote that moved Mr.
Ashcroft's nomination as attorney general to the Senate floor last winter.
President Bush himself has gone out of his way to urge Americans not to
engage in racial or ethnic profiling and has taken commendable action to
shield Muslims from harassment by hosting a large group of Islamic
leaders at the White House and visiting a major Islamic mosque. But civil
libertarians are plainly concerned that he has a loose cannon running the
Justice Department, which has such a critical role to play in the war on
terrorism, especially on the home front.
Jules Witcover writes from The Sun's Washington bureau.
Copyright © 2001, The Baltimore Sun
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