>>We'll be sure to set our alarms; wouldn't want to miss it.
Looks like your whole corrupt world is starting to crumble.
July 24, 1998
Bad Faith at Justice
Whether Republican or Democrat, the next Presidency's first
years are going to be spent repairing the damage this Presidency has done
to Washington's institutions. Next to the Oval Office, there is probably no
more respected institution than the Justice Department in whose service
generations of attorneys have served with earned honor and pride. Not
now. That respect is eroding.
Yesterday morning the New York Times reported that Justice's departing
campaign-finance prosecutor Charles La Bella had delivered a report to
Attorney General Janet Reno arguing that her refusal to appoint an
independent counsel for alleged Clinton fund-raising abuses was wrong.
This is the same conclusion reached earlier by Director of the FBI Louis J.
Freeh.
As reported by the Times, "Mr. La Bella concluded that the Attorney
General had misinterpreted the law, creating an artificially high standard to
avoid invoking the independent counsel statute."
Virtually all who have followed these matters are at a point of exasperation.
The most charitable have given Janet Reno the benefit and deference
traditionally accorded an occupant of her office. There is no more left to
give. In declining to make the independent counsel appointment she cites the
advice of "my people." What people? What are their names?
On a matter of the highest moment--allegations that an incumbent President
or his agents repeatedly violated federal laws --the American people have
legal opinions from the director of the FBI and the individual brought into
Justice to investigate those charges. What possible justification or
explanation can remain for Ms. Reno's repeated appeals to anonymous
opinions from some Oz inside Justice?
We will offer an explanation. This version of the Justice Department is not
acting in good faith. It isn't an honest broker. An honest prosecutor, Charles
La Bella, was brought in to serve as that broker, and he quit, leaving behind
a withering judgment of Ms. Reno's "legal analysis."
The air around Justice is quite noxious now, and it is in such an atmosphere
that a Senator such as Arlen Specter would talk of seeking a writ of
mandamus to force Ms. Reno to do her legal duty. And there is talk in
Washington, not unreasonably, of whether a Cabinet member can be
impeached. Perhaps, but not easily.
Madison, addressing this point in the First Congress, believed that burden
fell on the President: "I think it absolutely necessary that the President
should have the power of removing from office; it will make him, in a
peculiar manner, responsible for their conduct, and subject him to
impeachment himself, if he suffers them to perpetrate with impunity high
crimes or misdemeanors against the United States, or neglects to
superintend their conduct, so as to check their excesses."
Fat chance of that. Janet Reno, by all accounts, desperately wanted
reappointment, and she got it. Her behavior since toward this White House
has reflected gratitude. And once this reality is squarely faced--that Justice
is led by a grateful Attorney General whose reservoir of good faith is empty
on matters touching this White House--other realities must also be faced.
If the department's pose on an independent fund-raising counsel is
indefensible, one may reasonably wonder: What else?
To begin, it is hard to believe that this department could be trusted, in the
matter of investigating alleged leaks from Mr. Starr's office, with rummaging
through the independent counsel's most sensitive documents with no
possibility of that material finding its way to the White House.
Has the department's investigation of the Teamsters been tanked? Has Ms.
Reno impeded the work of Espy Independent Counsel Donald Smaltz, as
he charged two months ago? What explanation is there for the Department's
failure to comply with the Vacancies Act, drawing the wrath of even
Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd? Why have the Internal Revenue Service's
two requests for an investigation of Illinois Senator Carol Moseley Braun's
egregious fund-raising practices elicited no response at Justice?
For five years Washington has lived with constant charges--from critics,
Congress, the press and from the courts--that this Presidency has pressured
or abused the institutions of government. Whatever the eventual disposition
of Janet Reno's reputation, at issue now is the future credibility and
reputation of the institution, the Department of Justice, that she purports to
speak for.
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