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Independent counsel law fades into history
June 29, 1999 WASHINGTON (AllPolitics, June 29) -- The independent counsel law, created as part of post-Watergate reforms but a target of increasing criticism over the years, will expire Wednesday. Before the act was signed into law in 1978 by President Jimmy Carter, the president alone appointed special prosecutors to investigate allegations of wrongdoing against high-ranking government officials. After the so-called Saturday Night Massacre during the Watergate scandal -- where two top government officials resigned rather than carry out President Richard Nixon's demand the special prosecutor Archibald Cox be fired -- Congress was convinced the executive branch could not be trusted to impartially investigate its own.
"After Watergate, we decided that we wanted to have someone independent, someone to come in on horseback and solve our problems for us, someone outside the system," Sen. Fred Thompson (R-Tennessee) explains. But support for the law waned after one counsel after another was named during the Carter, Reagan, Bush and Clinton administrations. Even current independent counsel Kenneth Starr, a target of a wave of recent criticism over the powers of the office, favors the law's demise. Former Independent Counsel Arthur Christy agrees. In testimony before Congress, Christy said, "I was a bit of a piker, I think, because I completed my investigation in six months and it only cost $180,000." Christy investigated Carter White House Chief of Staff Hamilton Jordan on allegations of drug use. Critics also argue that independent counsels cost too much for so little result. Donald Smaltz spent $15 million investigating $35,000 worth of gifts to Clinton Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy. Espy was acquitted, but not until well after he was forced to resign.
"If our investigations and prosecutions dissuade corporations from giving gifts to their regulators and the regulators from accepting gifts from those who are regulated, I believe that the costs we have incurred are worth the price," Smaltz said. In 1988, the law was tested in the federal court system but upheld by the Supreme Court. Justice Antonin Scalia, the only dissenter, criticized the law, saying it unconstitutionally gave too much power to the independent counsels who were politically unaccountable. After Republicans complained in 1988 that Independent Counsel Lawrence Walsh was abusing the law during his seven-year Iran-Contra investigation, Congress let the law lapse for 18 months in the early 1990s. With the law's expiration, the Justice Department stands poised to take over the job of appointing special prosecutors. Attorney General Janet Reno told reporters that the regulations will be ready by July 1. Of the 20 independent counsel investigations launched, Starr's is one of five that are still active. Seven resulted in indictments and five led to at least one criminal conviction, although some of those were overturned on appeal. CNN's Charles Bierbauer and the Associated Press contributed to this report. |
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MORE STORIES:Tuesday, June 29, 1999
• Transcript: Clinton announces Medicare rescue plan • Independent counsel law fades into history • Congress, White House agree on Y2K liability bill • Agency backing tough draft rules for special counsel removal • What Medicare reform means to you • Conservative group preparing to sue over Hillary Clinton travel • Pataki pays up in bet with Bush • Idaho congresswoman to marry opponent of federal land control • Kasich wants to debate Social Security - but only with Forbes • Analysis: Clinton, Congress have own agendas • 25 years later, Jerry Brown is much the same • Bush heads to California in quest for cash • First lady scopes New York real estate as president raises money | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
