Impeachable Offenses

WASHINGTON -- The report to Congress from the independent counsel -- whose inquiry began four years ago with an examination of a complicated land deal called Whitewater -- finds no offense by President Clinton in that area that would merit impeachment, lawyers with knowledge of the report's content said yesterday.Investigations involving the White House travel office and the administration's use of FBI files also found no impeachable offenses, the lawyers said.Parallels in conductBut the report draws parallels between the president's conduct in the investigation of his relationship with Monica Lewinsky and the Arkansas aspects of the inquiry.

WASHINGTON -- Rep. Henry J. Hyde, chief House prosecutor in the impeachment trial of President Clinton, solemnly told the Senate yesterday that its duty is to "sit in judgment." Another prosecutor, Rep. Ed Bryant of Tennessee, reminded senators of the obligation to "search for the truth." What, exactly, is the Senate's duty in this trial? Lyle Denniston of The Sun's national staff provides these answers:Do the Constitution or the Senate's rules make the senators' duty clear?In one sense, yes: They give the Senate an ultimate, stark duty -- choosing to acquit or convict.

WASHINGTON -- The vote of the Republican-controlled House of Representatives launching an open-ended inquiry into possible impeachment of President Clinton was no surprise.The Republicans held a solid front for it, and 31 Democrats joined in, either in a pragmatic effort to protect their chances of re-election on Nov. 3 or because they thought there was no sense lying down in front of a steamroller.Mr. Clinton's pre-vote advice to fellow Democrats to vote "on principle and conscience" was yet another bit of transparent dissembling.

On Clinton, impeachment and emperor's new clothes.Has not the Democratic Party just purchased the "emperor's new clothes"?Richard S. Dutton, AnnapolisThe constant one-sided reporting against the impeachment of President Clinton by the news media, including The Sun, is missing an important point: Our government is a representative one. We who take the time to vote for our representatives in Congress do so with the expectation that they will vote on issues...

Street racing column hit home for brotherI feel I have to reply to the comments of Mike Burns on June 14 concerning street racing ("Street racing is not drag racing; it's a crime").I feel his article is both passionate and genuine.The loss of life through this action is criminal and senseless and all involved must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Everyone must be held accountable for his or her actions.Geri Wu did pay the price for this aggressiveness, but her daughter will never get over looking at her mother and saying, "Mom, are you OK?"

WASHINGTON -- The testimony in the Clinton impeachment inquiry of constitutional scholars, historians, federal prosecutors and Nixon impeachment committee members has served to elevate the deliberations with their authoritative legal points on key issues involved.At the same time, that testimony has lent an air of unreality for the simple reason that the impeachment process, which goes forward in Congress and not in the courts, is a political exercise whose outcome will be determined by politicians, not scholars and historians.

WASHINGTON -- The Starr report on President Clinton will likely move Congress toward impeachment, it now appears, if lawmakers understand the accusations to mean that the president committed acts that would do "great injury to the community."Borrowed from an 18th-century statesman, that phrase -- or something like it -- is the difficult standard that legal and constitutional analysts said yesterday must be met if independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr's findings are to push the impeachment process forward.

WASHINGTON -- Rep. Henry J. Hyde, chief House prosecutor in the impeachment trial of President Clinton, solemnly told the Senate yesterday that its duty is to "sit in judgment." Another prosecutor, Rep. Ed Bryant of Tennessee, reminded senators of the obligation to "search for the truth." What, exactly, is the Senate's duty in this trial? Lyle Denniston of The Sun's national staff provides these answers:Do the Constitution or the Senate's rules make the senators' duty clear?In one sense, yes: They give the Senate an ultimate, stark duty -- choosing to acquit or convict.

WASHINGTON -- Independent counsel Lawrence E. Wals charged yesterday that "a pattern of deception and obstruction" at the top of the Bush and Reagan administrations concealed the nature of potential crimes committed by two presidents and a Cabinet secretary.On what evidence does Mr. Walsh base this extraordinary charge? How strong is the case he could bring against President Bush, former President Reagan and former Secretary of Defense Caspar W. Weinberger?In June, the independent prosecutor said he had discovered new documents -- including the personal notes of top officials, CIA cables, tapes and other records -- that led him to believe Mr. Reagan, former Secretary of State George P. Shultz and Mr. Bush had participated in a key White House meeting during which a cover-up of the arms-for-hostages scheme was begun.

WITH reality in such short supply these days in Washington and on television, here are a few observations to help keep "Impeachment Week" in perspective.Contrary to what the White House would have us believe, this is not a "crisis" situation for the nation. Even if President Clinton is impeached, convicted and removed from office -- the worst and most unlikely scenario -- remember that the nation has lost better presidents at far more crucial times and survived nicely, thank you.And despite what the Republicans would have you believe, worse presidents have done far more terrible things than Mr. Clinton and gotten off scot-free, without destroying the presidency or corrupting the morals of America's children.

WITH reality in such short supply these days in Washington and on television, here are a few observations to help keep "Impeachment Week" in perspective.Contrary to what the White House would have us believe, this is not a "crisis" situation for the nation. Even if President Clinton is impeached, convicted and removed from office -- the worst and most unlikely scenario -- remember that the nation has lost better presidents at far more crucial times and survived nicely, thank you.And despite what the Republicans would have you believe, worse presidents have done far more terrible things than Mr. Clinton and gotten off scot-free, without destroying the presidency or corrupting the morals of America's children.

WASHINGTON -- The testimony in the Clinton impeachment inquiry of constitutional scholars, historians, federal prosecutors and Nixon impeachment committee members has served to elevate the deliberations with their authoritative legal points on key issues involved.At the same time, that testimony has lent an air of unreality for the simple reason that the impeachment process, which goes forward in Congress and not in the courts, is a political exercise whose outcome will be determined by politicians, not scholars and historians.

WASHINGTON -- The vote of the Republican-controlled House of Representatives launching an open-ended inquiry into possible impeachment of President Clinton was no surprise.The Republicans held a solid front for it, and 31 Democrats joined in, either in a pragmatic effort to protect their chances of re-election on Nov. 3 or because they thought there was no sense lying down in front of a steamroller.Mr. Clinton's pre-vote advice to fellow Democrats to vote "on principle and conscience" was yet another bit of transparent dissembling.

THE House of Representatives undermined constitutional government by radically enlarging its definition of an impeachable offense.In accepting the independent counsel's report as the basis for its own unlimited inquiry, the House implicitly diluted "high crimes and misdemeanors" from its historic meaning of crimes against the government and its Constitution.By accepting President Clinton's reckless and scandalous personal behavior as worthy of this inquiry, the House opened future political struggle to prurience, violations of privacy and perjury traps.

WASHINGTON -- The House Judiciary Committee voted yesterday to release an edited version of the taped conversations between Linda R. Tripp and Monica Lewinsky that triggered Kenneth W. Starr's investigation into the Lewinsky matter.With Republicans joining the committee's Democrats, the panel voted to remove from the Tripp tapes material it said touched on "inappropriate sexual and otherwise irrelevant matters."Additionally, the committee voted to delete such passages from thousands of pages of documents that are also scheduled for public release.

WASHINGTON -- With Congress moving toward an impeachment inquiry of William Jefferson Clinton, the threshold question for lawmakers today is the same one House members faced nearly a quarter-century ago in considering the fate of President Richard M. Nixon: What should Congress deem an impeachable offense?Already, there is sharp disagreement about whether President Clinton's behavior in the Monica Lewinsky scandal rises to the level loosely defined by the framers of the Constitution as "Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors."

WASHINGTON -- While a tearful President Clinton vowed to fight to keep his job, the House laid independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr's voluminous case for Clinton's removal from office before the American people yesterday.Starr's report contains no major revelations that had not become public through leaks to the news media in recent weeks. But the wealth of detail in its 445 pages, filled with raw, sexually explicit language, spread shock waves across the country as millions of ordinary citizens scanned its contents over the Internet on their personal computers.

WASHINGTON -- The "grounds for an impeachment" section of independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr's massive report to Congress reads much like a criminal prosecutor's opening trial statement: the argument to jurors about what the evidence will show.He builds a suggested case for impeachment out of a pile of sometimes very specific testimony, a host of inferences about what opaque statements really meant, a few damaging pieces of physical evidence, and a wide array of debatable conclusions.That section only sporadically uses the language of impeachment.

WASHINGTON -- The Starr report on President Clinton will likely move Congress toward impeachment, it now appears, if lawmakers understand the accusations to mean that the president committed acts that would do "great injury to the community."Borrowed from an 18th-century statesman, that phrase -- or something like it -- is the difficult standard that legal and constitutional analysts said yesterday must be met if independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr's findings are to push the impeachment process forward.