<<That's not an acceptable reading. Misdemeanor is not modified by "high" as you imply.>>
Well, ordinarily you could argue that either way. I think usually the word High would be assumed to apply to both following words. But actually the whole phrase, "High Crimes and Misdemeanors" had a meaning, as a phrase, under English law that had developed to that time. And that meaning was as I described it, serious crimes or serious misuses of offices.
Anyway, the issue in this case is on the crime side, and the Constitution allows impeachment for only a High, or serious, Crime. Not just any crime.
You are right that there is nonetheless much discretion left to Congress to determine exactly how serious a crime must be to be a High Crime. But one really cannot argue that the mere loss of public confidence is impeachable, and remain true to the Constitution. And one really cannot argue that the mere fact that a crime has been committed by our "chief law enforcement office" makes the crime impeachable, and remain guided by the Constitution. To say so is to make the adjective High meaningless.
I do believe that very often perjury would be impeachable. But not THIS most minor of all possible perjuries. If any perjury whatsoever is not, this one under all the circumstances is not.
I would be interested in hearing from those who believe that this perjury is impeachable, which crimes they think are not impeachable, under the Constitution, if committed by the President? Not violations, but Crimes.
The circumstances of how Clinton came to be entrapped into this perjury are also a factor for me. Only some factor. He did nonetheless commit the underlying acts. And certainly no matter what the motivations of those out to get him, if they had discovered some clearly impeachable act, such as bribery or treason or covering up a conspiracy to illegally rig elections, how we got there would be of scant importance. But this is at worst a borderline case. And I think quite a bit under the borderline.
The fact here is that zealous ideological enemies of Clinton (including importantly Mellon-Scafe with his huge bankroll) had been routing around Arkansas from the times of Clinton's nomination race, and more concertedly thereafter. There were many rumors of Clinton's philandering (as there had been for some other Presidents). They wanted to get Clinton on something. Jennifer Flowers was floated, but had only a bit of traction. There was no mechanism to keep the story alive.
Whether Paula Jones' grievances against the President were discovered or created I do not know. I suspect they were at least greatly exaggerated (the nature of how he "came on to her", if he did at all -- he was not after all a sexually desperate man.) In any event she had much to gain compared to where she came from, and did gain much, through becoming supported for years and years in relatively high style, by right wing supporters of her lawsuit. Certainly without the millions behind that lawsuit her case would never have continued. It was far too weak, and could demonstrate far too small damages, if any at all, to attract any contingency fee lawyer. And of course the judge ultimately threw the case out, before fully investigating the issue of what conduct if any occurred, for her failure to show any damages whatsoever.
The motivation for the vast amounts of right wing support behind this lawsuit, and their motivations to control it, were clear. They hoped Clinton could be found liable for sexual harassment, even if that was a long shot. But even more they hoped to use the suit as a vehicle to examine in a court of law, through the power of subpoena and under threat of perjury, as much of Clinton's rumored philandering as possible. They knew that through leaks, if not in open court, any testimony of the President and any of his alleged sexual partners, would instantly become public. And because of its origin in a court proceeding, they knew the leaks would be deemed fair game by even the mainstream media, which would grab the story, run with it, and make it their own. For at least the duration of the entire trial.
So they knew Clinton would be faced with a horrible choice. Either admit extramarital affairs, or commit perjury. If he admitted the affairs, it would be as good as announcing them on TV. It would become undeniable, and definite, and not subject to wiggle room. Like no President before him, his personal sexual indiscretions would have been opened, and unambiguous, for all too see while he was still in office. With clearly bad and also unpredictable effects upon the respect and power which he and his agenda would enjoy among at least some large segments of the population. All of that would be certain if he did not comitt perjury. If on the other hand he did commit perjury concerning these most private matters, he took perhaps a small, but a very high stakes risk of being found out later. And if the Jones team could find contradictory evidence, they knew Starr would welcome it with open arms.
My sense of the unfairness of this is amplified by my sense that the questions about Lewinsky were not properly subject to the deposition in the Jones trial in the first place. The Jones complaint alleged that the President made crude and most unwanted and resisted advances upon Paula Jones. And yet they sought to ask questions about a fully consensual and long term affair that the President had had with Lewinsky. That affair was either completely irrelevant, or at the very least its prejudicial value vastly outweighed its probative (i.e. properly relevant) value. The judge initially allowed this line of questioning (leaving until trial she thought her decision as to whether it was material), but later ruled it immaterial, when it proved to be a lot of trouble to her proceedings. (Because of Starr's interest in the results, and conflicting claims on the evidence.) She tragically, and I think improperly, didn't rule initially because in civil trials usually the judge lets the litigants have very free reign without much judicial supervision, mostly to conserve judicial resources, until the parties are ready for trial. A tragic misapplication here.
So the perjury Clinton is alleged to have committed truly was with respect to questions that were not material. And for that reason, and because of their great prejudicial effects upon him, they should never have been asked of him.
Faced with all that, Clinton tried mightily to wiggle free. He sought to avoid as many Lewinsky questions as possible, and apply a highly technical reading of the definition of sexual conduct that the lawyers had sparred and agreed upon, to mislead the Jones lawyers. But not technically commit perjury. It was, at any rate, what he tried to do.
Doug
P.S. I also think that men generally, and not just the President, should have the same sort of protection from far ranging muckraking into their consensual sexual history with unrelated third persons in sex harassment cases, that women now generally have in rape or sexual abuse cases. There are rape shield laws to protect women, rightly. In harassment cases, its catch as catch can, depending upon the judge. |
