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Where's Whitewater? The OIC's allegations reportedly include no
suggestion of wrongdoing by the President in any of the areas which Mr.
Starr spend four years investigating: Whitewater, the FBI files and
the White House travel office. What began as an inquiry into a 24 year
old land deal in Arkansas has ended as an inquest into brief, improper
personal encounters between the President and Monica Lewinsky. Despite
the exhaustive nature of the OIC's investigation into the Whitewater,
FBI files and travel office matters, and a constant stream of
suggestions of misconduct in the media over a period of years, to this
day the OIC has never exonerated the President or the First Lady of
wrongdoing.
Click to related section of the Starr Report
PRELIMINARY MEMORANDUM CONCERNING
REFERRAL OF OFFICE OF INDEPENDENT COUNSEL
This document is intended to be a preliminary response to the Referral
submitted by the Office of Independent Counsel to The Congress. Because
we were denied the opportunity to review the content, nature or
specifics of the allegations made against the President by the Office
of Independent Counsel (OIC), we do not pretend to offer a
point-by-point refutation of those allegations, or a comprehensive
defense of the President.
We commend the House of Representatives for the extraordinary steps it
has taken to safeguard the secrecy of the OIC's allegations.
Unfortunately, its efforts were thwarted by unnamed sources familiar
with the details of the OIC's allegations -- sources that could only
come from the OIC itself -- who saw fit to leak elements of the
allegations to the news media.
Based on these illegal leaks, as well as our knowledge of the
President's testimony, we offer this document as a summary outline of
his side of the case. We will provide you with a specific rebuttal as
soon as we have had a chance to review the materials that the OIC has
already transmitted to you.
The simple reality of this situation is that the House is being
confronted with evidence of a man's efforts to keep an inappropriate
relationship private. A personal failure that the President has
acknowledged was wrong, for which he apologized, and for which he
accepts complete responsibility. A personal failure for which the
President has sought forgiveness from members of his family, members of
the Cabinet, Members of Congress, and the American people. Such a
personal failing does not, however, constitute "treason, bribery and
high crimes and misdemeanors" that would justify the impeachment of the
President of the United States.
The President himself has described his conduct as wrong. But no
amount of gratuitous details about the President's relationship with
Ms. Lewinsky, no matter how salacious, can alter the fact that:
1) The President did not commit perjury:
2) The President did not obstruct justice;
3) The President did not tamper with witnesses; and
4) The President did not abuse the power of his office.
Impeachment is a matter of incomparable gravity. Even to discuss it is
to discuss overturning the electoral will of the people. For this
reason, the Framers made clear, and scholars have long agreed, that the
power should be exercised only in the event of such grave harms to the
state as "serious assaults on the integrity of the processes of
government," or "such crimes as would so stain a president as to make
his continuance in office dangerous to public order." Charles L.
Black, Impeachment: A Handbook 38-39 (1974). We do not believe the OIC
can identify any conduct remotely approaching this standard. Instead,
from press reports, if true, it appears that the OIC has dangerously
overreached to describe in the most dramatic of terms conduct that not
only is not criminal but is actually proper and lawful.
The President has confessed to indiscretions with Ms. Lewinsky and
accepted responsibility and blame. The allegations concerning
obstruction, intimidation, perjury and subornation of perjury that we
anticipate from the OIC are extravagant attempts to transform a case
involving inappropriate personal behavior into one of public misconduct
justifying reversal of the judgment of the electorate of this country.
I. STANDARDS FOR IMPEACHMENT
The Constitution provides that the President shall be removed from
office only upon "Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery,
or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors." U.S. Const. Art. II, ' 4. Of
course, there is no suggestion of treason or bribery present here.
Therefore, the question confronting the House of Representatives is
whether the President has committed a "high Crime[] or Misdemeanor."
The House has an obligation to consider the evidence in view of that
very high Constitutional threshold. It should pursue the impeachment
process only if there is evidence implicating that high standard.
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