Mrs. Clinton’s Foresight

This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

The New York Sun

One way to sort who is presidential timber in the Democratic Party and who isn’t is to keep an eye on the reaction to the prospect – extremely remote that it may be – that President Bush is going to pardon Lewis Libby. This has thrown Senator Schumer and a number of his comrades in the Democratic party, such as Senator Reid, into a lather normally reserved for foreign invasions. Notably absent from those demanding that Mr. Bush rule out granting a pardon to Mr. Libby has been Senator Clinton. Her absence is notable because Mrs. Clinton is one of the few senators with any realistic presidential aspirations.


Cynics will no doubt suggest that it would look hypocritical for Mrs. Clinton to jump into the campaign against a possible presidential pardon of Mr. Libby. President Clinton, after all, ended his term by issuing one of the most controversial strings of pardons in the history of the Republic. But we’d like to think that Mrs. Clinton’s time as first lady and her eyeing the presidency has given her an appreciation for the importance of the presidential pardon power that is lacking on the part of Mr. Schumer & Company, whose vision appears to extend only as far as the next memo from angry-left groups.


The power to pardon is one of the most important checks and balances in the American constitutional system. It gives the president an opportunity to correct an injustice. It could be a politicized prosecution such as that against, say, Secretary of Defense Weinberger. Or a wrongly-based prosecution, such as that Mr. Clinton concluded was brought against Marc Rich. Or a pardon could be an exercise of discretion, as in the pardon of President Nixon, when President Ford simply said he preferred to avoid subjecting the nation to a time when “our people would again be polarized in their opinions” and “the credibility of our free institutions of government would again be challenged at home and abroad.”


In pardoning Caspar Weinberger and others involved in the Iran-Contra affair, the 41st president said that he worried about the “criminalization of policy differences,” which, he said, “should be addressed in the political arena, without the Damocles sword of criminality hanging over the heads of some of the combatants.” In the letter Senator Schumer and friends wrote to the president, they said that a “pardon in these circumstances would signal that this White House considers itself above the law.” Yet even a cursory reading of the Constitution would find that a pardon in all circumstances except impeachment is completely within the law.


The pardon power is one of the most absolute delegated in the Constitution. There is no requirement for the president to receive approval from, or even to consult, senators. There is no need to consult the Department of Justice or any other authority. The founders wrote plainly of their awareness of the possibility of controversy and abuse. Of the tens of thousands of times the presidential pardon has been exercised many more “controversial” pardons have been granted than the one Mr. Schumer & Co. fear in respect of Mr. Libby. President Carter pardoned those who dodged the Vietnam War draft. President Andrew Johnson pardoned Confederate soldiers. President Washington pardoned those involved in the Whiskey Rebellion.


Mr. Libby is a patriot whose only alleged crime is obstructing a grand jury investigation. We don’t belittle obstruction, but nothing alleged against Mr. Libby holds a candle to the abuses by the Central Intelligence Agency and others seeking to obstruct the elected leadership from carrying out legally authorized war aims.


If Mrs. Clinton is silent on Mr. Schumer’s latest crusade, we’d like to think that she is looking beyond the current fracas to the day when she might be the commander in chief facing attempts by subordinates to undermine her leadership in a time of war. She’s a long way from the White House yet, but if that is her instinct it’s a mark of a maturity that will help her in the coming campaign.


The New York Sun

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