Pelosi's Subpoena Power = Nixon Return

Three Cheers for The Nation's William Greider, whose October 30, 2006 article Pelosi's Moment, ruminates cogently on some compelling and intriguing futures.  Herein one of my favorite Congressmembers, George Miller, D-CA 07, says of the House "This most democratic institution now looks more like a bad Third World country where if you win an election, you get to shoot your opponents."

But the one thought that snagged me like barbed wire was Nancy Pelosi's answer to the question "what is most important about regaining majority status."

"Subpoena power," Pelosi said.

Ah, yes, subpoena power.

Before we return to the Nixon era war between Congress and the President and the Constitutional crisis of that era, let's look at a little of Greider's really hopeful article, which I strongly urge you to read in whole.

"In the first 100 hours of a new Congress, if elected," minority leader Pelosi has declared, "Democrats will roll back the subsidies to Big Oil." She means to repeal the tax relief and royalty giveaways Republicans enacted while oil prices and profits soared. House Democrats promise there will be no pay raise for Congress until Congress enacts the long-blocked increase in the minimum wage. They would also have the votes to pass what would be the most significant labor-law reform in at least four decades--"card check" certification for organizing unions that can liberate workers from the brutal unionbusting tactics of business.

Democrats intend to correct Bush's malformed prescription drug program by allowing Medicare to use its vast bargaining power to lower drug prices. Other goodies for drug companies and HMOs will be removed.

Dems expect to cut the interest rate on tuition loans and expand Pell grants. They would push for exit from Iraq, while implementing numerous homeland-security measures that the 9/11 commission recommended and Bush has ignored. . .Representative George Miller, another California liberal and Pelosi's close policy adviser, would again become chair of the Committee on Education and the Workforce and is confident of winning on many matters.

"I have constructed the votes on a number of environmental issues or labor issues where I have a clear majority--230, 240 or 260 members who would vote for them," Miller explains.

So that's all hopeful.

Subpoena power.

Greider says "The power to investigate has the potential to create the biggest waves in public opinion. Representative John Conyers promises, if he becomes chair of the Judiciary Committee, to initiate a preliminary inquiry into George W. Bush's constitutional abuses."

1974.  U.S. v. Nixon.  

In November 1972, Richard Nixon defeated Democrat George McGovern and won a second term as president. However, on June 17, 1972, burglars broke into the Democratic Party campaign headquarters at the Watergate hotel. Carl Bernstein and Robert Woodward of the Washington Post and their courageous employers, WaPo owner Katherine Graham and editor in chief Ben Bradlee, followed the burglary into the White House, revealing the GOP slush funds, money laundering, the Pentagon Papers (first published by the New York Times), and  many as yet underexamined Nixonian assaults on the U.S. Constitution.

Nixon and his administration denied all wrongdoing.  In February 1973, the Senate appointed a Committee to Investigate the Watergate Scandal.  The Chairman was North Carolina Senator Sam "I'm just an old country lawyer" Ervin.

The Committee held public hearings that compelled the attention of the nation, and the world: John Dean, Nixon's former White House Counsel, rocked the White House boat with his evidence.  And the Committee found out about the secret White House tape recordings.  

What followed was the visible tumor of the Constitutional crisis that we had been living with.  The tumor showed as a political and legal battle between the Congress and the President.  But we are living in the same Constitutional crisis today, in my opinion.  Pelosi, heads up, please.  

Recall that Nixon appointed a special prosecutor. (Several to be accurate - recall the Saturday Night Massacre.  But you can look this up for yourself, I am putting the history elephant in the diary shoe box.)  The prosecutor subpoenaed the tapes which he believed were relevant to the criminal investigation. In March 1974, a federal grand jury indicted seven Nixon confreres for conspiracy to obstruct justice - and they named the President as an unindicted co-conspirator.

President Nixon released edited transcripts of some of the subpoenaed conversations, his counsel moved to quash the subpoena on the grounds of executive privilege. When the District Court denied the motion, the president appealed to the Supreme Court.

Here is the nut:

The Burger Court unanimously held that the Constitution grants the Judiciary final authority to decide Constitutional questions.  And as to President Nixon's claim that he could choose to withhold materials germane to a criminal investigation under executive privilege, Chief Justice Burger held that "no person, not even the president of the United States, is above the law."

Surprisingly, Nixon obeyed the ruling and on August 5, 1974, the White House released the transcripts of 64 tapes, including the damning one revealing the White House involvement in the Watergate cover-up. ("It is wrong, that's for sure. . ")  Three days later, his national and Congressional support nil, Nixon announced his resignation.

Now.  That was then.  This is:  February 2007.  

House Committee to Investigate the War in Iraq demands White House documents on Cheney energy meetings, or any other meetings you like.  

The President refuses, citing national security and executive privilege.

The special independent prosecutor goes to the District Court, which finds the President must give up the subpoenaed material; the President appeals to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Roberts U.S. Supreme Court.

We have a Constitutional crisis.  

And by the way:  Expect the televangelicals to pogo stick on this:  Former Massachusetts self-identifying gay Congressman Gerry Studds has died.