Tuesday 17 February 2009

Bush, Bartlet and last-minute pardons

Regular readers - and non West Wing fans - should feel free to yawn at this point. This blog has charted with dogged (some would say tedious) regularity the parallels between Aaron Sorkin's classic TV drama and the Obama campaign: start here and follow the links, if you're interested. But I never thought I'd come across any similarities between Presidents Bartlet and Bush....until today.

Those familiar with the final series of the programme will recall that Bartlet leaves it until the very last moments of his administration (just before he departs the Oval Office for the final time, to attend the inauguration of Matt Santos) to sign the pardon for his former communications director, Toby Ziegler, indicted for leaking government secrets (but for the best of reasons, naturally). Considerable tension is created during the episode by the efforts of other staff members, notably chief of staff C. J. Cregg, to persuade Bartlet to do the right thing.

Now it turns out that something very similar happened in the dying days of the Bush administration. Apparently Vice-President Dick Cheney repeatedly urged his boss to pardon his former chief of staff, Lewis 'Scooter' Libby, widely believed to have carried the can for others' misdeeds over the disgraceful outing of CIA agent Valerie Plame.  Bush had kept Libby out of jail by commuting his prison sentence, but Cheney wanted a full pardon. 'He tried to make it happen right up until the very end', an associate claims.

This being real life, rather than television, Bush didn't do 'the right thing' and resisted Cheney's overtures. Or rather, given that Libby, unlike the fictional Ziegler, was acting out of base motives, perhaps that should be 'the wrong thing'. Then again, if Libby was actually covering up for Rove, and possibly Cheney and Bush too, then it would have been 'the right thing' to let him off the hook. But then the truth about the whole affair might have come out....

Oh well. Just goes to show once again that truth is stranger than fiction, and real life is a lot messier than The West Wing...

5 comments:

Martin Meenagh said...

The President can pardon anyone for crimes committed or which may have been committed (pace Ford's pardon of Nixon). The pressure from Cheney was predictable. What would have been interesting is if Bush had contemplated issuing a blanket pardon to anyone involved in extraordinary rendition or interrogation at Guantanamo Bay or Abu Ghraib from any federal investigation.

He didn't, and once Obama gets into trouble with his own left he may well be forced into a presidential commission-style investigation that could bring his pardon power into play. Congress can offer limited immunity if testimony is proferred to illuminate issues--but this is such an electric issue, the effect of that may well be the same as that here when the alleged killers of Stephen Lawrence were allowed to give evidence before an inquiry that could not later be used against them, only much magnified. I don't think Obama would do it.

What do you think the most outrageous pardon in American history was? My money's on Andrew Johnson's pardons for confederates after the civil war, but you seem like a man who'd have his own ideas.

Martin said...

Thanks for the comment, Martin. My knowledge of US presidential history is pretty thin, so I can't really offer a view on the most outrageous pardon...But thinking about this further, it struck me how regal/monarchical the whole notion of a ruler pardoning offences is - as if s/he embodied the law...and behind that, it's almost theological - divine right of kings and all that - the idea that sins can be wiped out by a word...Odd to see all this baggage from the old world carried over into the new...

Martin Meenagh said...

It is an odd mix. The president is Three things; Chief Executive, Chief diplomat and Chief Magistrate, as well as being Commander-in-Chief. Most of these roles have evolved or been built on a very thin foundation in the constitution, but I'm always struck by the mixed motives when powers were constructed or claimed.

For instance, the pardon power is kind of monarchical, but also, I guess, recognises that law becomes political at some point, and that a representative of the people should have some say over it. I also think that it's compassionate too--hard cases make bad law, so if there was an exceptional circumstance a pardon could cater better than an anomalous exception in the case law.

But I wonder if you're not right--if the whole point of a pardon power was to advance some Hamiltonian scheme of a republican monarchy. I seem to remember French Presidents up to Chirac used to pardon all minor offences on the day they took office, but of course in the States they wouldn't be federal anyway.

All interesting. I really like your blog by the way. I suspect that you wouldn't agree with me about everything, but, what would the world be if we all did have the same opinion?

all the best, Martin

Martin said...

Thanks for the kind words about the blog, Martin. I discovered your blog via Bob from Brockley. Given my on-off fascination with Catholicism, I thought it would be good to link to some intelligent Catholic blogs - hence adding you, Dolphinarium and of course the estimable Andrew Sullivan to my blogroll, We probably agree on more than we disagree...

Martin Meenagh said...

Well, I'm flattered. I think Bob's blog is great, by the way. As for 'intelligent catholic'--well, you should hear my mother and girlfriend....