A L S O+T O D A Y Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Starr By Gary Kamiya When the real Kenneth Starr finally stood up before the House, he turned out to have a split personality Starr Wars By Joan Walsh The Democrats strike back Dear Ken The full text of ethics advisor Sam Dash's letter of resignation to Kenneth Starr Nothing has changed Compiled by Lori Leibovich and Fiona Morgan The consensus of political experts is that no minds were changed by Starr's day in court Starr speaks The full text of independent counsel Kenneth Starr's House Judiciary Committee testimony A dozen questions Congress should ask Kenneth Starr By David Talbot, Murray Waas and Joan Walsh (11/18/98)   T A B L E+T A L K Discuss Ken Starr and his testimony in the Politics area of Table Talk   R E C E N T L Y Same Old Party By Joshua Micah Marshall New leadership can't mend the rifts among Republicans in Congress (11/19/98) Reply to C.D. Ellison By David Horowitz It's time for blacks to have a two-party system, too (11/19/98) Toppling Saddam By Frank Smyth Clinton wants a new government in Baghdad, but he and the Iraqi opposition are unlikely to be up to the task (11/18/98) Brother on brother By Murray Waas Whitewater witness David Hale attempted to suborn perjury by his own brother by asking him to falsely corroborate illegal acts by President Clinton (11/17/98) The mark of Cain: a tale of two brothers By Murray Waas Though they traveled the same path from the family dirt farm through law school, the Hale brothers turned out different as night and day (11/17/98) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Browse the Newsreal Archives - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - S A L O N E M P O R I U M FREE! 12-ounce bag of Salon Blend with a purchase of $30 or more. While supplies last.
		STARR SPEAKS | PAGE 1, 2,3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12,13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20 , 21, 22 - - - - - - - - - - With that, Judge Starr, would you please rise so I may administer the oath? Mr. Starr, do you swear that the testimony you are about to give before this committee will be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God? STARR: I do. HYDE: Thank you. Let the record reflect the witness responded in the affirmative. And Mr. Starr, you may proceed. STARR: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I welcome this opportunity to be before the committee. This... HYDE: Is your mike on? (UNKNOWN): You need to pull it closer. STARR: I was just told to push it away. (UNKNOWN) Some Democrat told you that. (LAUGHTER) HYDE: I'm sure that may have been Mr. Delahunt. (LAUGHTER) STARR: The person did not identify his affiliation in saying that. But this is my first opportunity to publicly report on certain issues and aspects of our work, and I look forward to doing so and seeking to assist the committee. I appreciate both the seriousness of the committee's work and the gravity of its assignment. I have reviewed the statements made by the 37 members at the October 5 hearing. Any citizen who watched that hearing would have been impressed by the depth and the breadth of the discussion that day, and... (UNKNOWN): Mr. Chairman, I apologize for interrupting Judge Starr. But Judge, could you pull the mike a little closer? (UNKNOWN): Yes, I'll keep... RANGEL: Pull it. STARR: So I appear before you today in the wake of your own hearings, both on October 5 and in the hearings to which the chair just referred, with great respect and awareness of the difficulty of your task. As you know, in January of this year, and as the chairman indicated, the attorney general of the United States petitioned the Special Division of the United States Court of Appeals for this jurisdiction, the panel that oversees independent counsels. And at the attorney general's request, the special division granted authority to us to investigate whether Monica Lewinsky or others committed federal crimes relating to the sexual harassment lawsuit brought by Paula Jones against the president. Our office conducted a swift yet thorough investigation. We completed the primary factual investigation in under eight months, notwithstanding a number of obstacles in our path. The law requires, as the chairman indicated, an independent counsel to report to the House of Representatives substantial and credible information that an impeachable offense may have been committed. On September 9, pursuant to our statutory duty, we submitted a referral, and we submitted backup documentation to the House, as Mr. Conyers has noted. I am here today at your invitation in furtherance of our statutory obligation. Let me say at the outset that I recognize that it is the House of Representatives -- and not an independent counsel -- which enjoys the sole power to impeach. My role today is to discuss our referral and the underlying investigation. Let me then begin with an overview. As our referral explains, the evidence suggests that the president made false statements under oath and thwarted the search for truth in Jones versus Clinton. The evidence further suggests that the president made false statements under oath to the grand jury on August 17 of this year. That same night, the president publicly acknowledged an inappropriate relationship, but maintained that his testimony had been legally accurate. The president also declared that all inquiries into the matter should end, because, he said, it was private. But shortly after the president's August 17 speech, Senators Lieberman, Kerrey and Moynihan stated that the president's actions were not a private matter. In our view, they were correct. Indeed, the evidence suggests that the president repeatedly tried to thwart the legal process in the Jones matter and in the grand jury investigation. That is not a private matter. The evidence further suggests that the president in the course of those efforts misused his authority and his power as president and contravened his duty to faithfully execute the laws. That, too, is not a private matter. Closer still? OK. There's noise in the hall, so I will continue to try to speak up and into the mike. OK. The evidence suggests that the misuse of presidential authority occurred in the following 10 ways. First, the evidence suggests that the president made a series of premeditated false statements in his civil deposition on January 17, 1998. Those were statements under oath. The president had taken an oath to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. By making false statements under oath, the president, the chief executive of our nation, failed to adhere to that oath and to his presidential oath to faithfully execute the laws. Second, the evidence suggests that apart from making false statements under oath, the president engaged in a pattern -- a pattern of behavior du Jones' case was proceeding and Ms. Lewinsky's truthful testimony would have been harmful. He engaged in an apparent scheme to conceal gifts that had been subpoenaed from Ms. Lewinsky. He coached a potential witness, his own secretary, Mrs. Currie, with a false account of relevant events. Those acts constitute a pattern of obstruction that is fundamentally inconsistent with the president's duty to faithfully execute the law. Third, the evidence suggests that the president participated in a scheme at his civil deposition in which his attorney, in his presence, deceived a United States district judge in an effort to cut off questioning about Ms. Lewinsky. The president did not correct his attorney's statement. A false statement to a federal judge in order to shortcut and to prevent relevant questioning is an obstruction of the judicial process. Fourth. The evidence suggests that on January 23, 1998, after the criminal investigation had become public, the president made false statements to his Cabinet and used his Cabinet as unwitting surrogates to publicly support the president's false story. Fifth. The evidence suggests that the president, acting in a premeditated and calculated fashion, deceived the American people on January 26 and on other occasions when he denied a relationship with Ms. Lewinsky. Sixth. The evidence suggests that the president, after the criminal investigation became public, made false statements to his aides and concocted false alibis that these government employees repeated to the grand jury sitting at the United States courthouse. As a result, the grand jury here in Washington received inaccurate information. Seventh. Having promised the American people to cooperate with the investigation, the president refused six invitations to testify before the grand jury. Refusing to cooperate with a duly authorized federal criminal investigation is inconsistent with the general statutory duty of all executive branch employees to cooperate with criminal investigations. It also is inconsistent with the president's duty to faithfully execute the laws. Eighth. The president and his administration asserted three different governmental privileges to conceal relevant information from the grand jury. The privilege assertions were legally baseless in these circumstances. They were inconsistent with the actions of Presidents Carter and Reagan in similar circumstances, and they delayed and impeded the investigation. Ninth. The president made false statements under oath to the grand jury on August 17, 1998. The president again took an oath to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. The evidence demonstrates that the president failed to adhere to that oath and thus to his presidential oath to faithfully execute the laws. Tenth. The evidence suggests that the president deceived the American peopls foreseeable, even likely, that she would be a witness in the Jones case. And the president used a governmental attorney, Bruce Lindsey, to assist his personal legal defense during the Jones case. In short, the evidence suggests that the president repeatedly used the machinery of government and the powers of his high office to conceal his relationship -- to conceal the relationship from the American people; from the judicial process in the Jones case; and from the grand jury. Let me turn, then, to the legal context in which these issues first arose. At the outset, I want to emphasize that our referral never suggests that the relationship between the president and Ms. Lewinsky, in and of itself, could constitute a high crime or misdemeanor. Indeed, the referral never passes judgment on the president's relationship with Ms. Lewinsky. The propriety of a relationship is not the concern of our office. The referral is instead about obstruction of justice, lying under oath, tampering with witnesses and the misuse of power. The referral cannot be understood without appreciating this vital distinction. This case or matter thus raises the following initial question: Is a plaintiff in a sexual harassment lawsuit entitled to obtain truthful information from the defendant and from associates of the defendant in order to support her claim? That should be easy to answer. No citizen who finds himself accused in a sexual harassment case, or in any other kind of case, can lie under oath or otherwise obstruct justice and thereby prevent the plaintiff from discovering evidence and presenting her case. Paula Jones, a former Arkansas state employee, filed a federal sexual harassment suit against President Clinton in 1994. The president denied those allegations. We will never know whether a jury would have credited the allegations. We also will never know whether the ultimate decision-maker would have found that the alleged facts, if true, constitute sexual harassment. When the president and Ms. Jones settled the case last week, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals, in St. Louis, was still considering the preliminary legal question whether the facts as alleged could constitute sexual harassment. After the suit was first filed in 1994, the president attempted to delay the trial or more broadly the proceedings, until his presidency had concluded. The president claimed a temporary presidential immunity from civil suit. And the case proceeded to the Supreme Court of the United States. At oral argument, the president's attorney specifically warned our nation's highest court. But if Ms. Jones prevailed, her lawyers would be able to investigate the president's relationships with other women as is common in sexual harassment cases. The Supreme Court rejected the president's constitutional claim of immunity and did so by a nine to zero vote. The court concluded that the Constitution did not provide such a temporary immunity from suit. The idea was simple and powerful: No one is above the law. The Supreme Court sent the case back to trial with words that warrant emphasis. These are the words of our unanimous Supreme Court. "Like every other citizen who invokes" the District Court's jurisdiction, Ms. Jones -- the words of the court again "has a right to an orderly disposition of her claims." After the Supreme Court's decision, the parties started to gather the facts. The parties questioned relevant witnesses in depositions. They submitted written questions. They made requests for documents. Sexual harassment cases are often "he said-she said" kinds of disputes. Evidence reflecting the behavior of both parties can be critical, including the defendant's relationships with other employees in the workplace. Such questions can be uncomfortable, but they occur every day in courts and law offices across our country. Individuals in those cases take an oath to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. And no one is entitled to lie under oath simply because he or she does not like the questions or because he believes the case is frivolous or that it is financially motivated or politically motivated. The Supreme Court has emphatically and repeatedly rejected the notion that there is ever a privilege to lie. The court has stated that there are ways to object to questions. Lying under oath is not one of them. During this fact-gathering process, Judge Susan Webber Wright in Little Rock followed standard principles of sexual harassment cases. Over repeated objections from the president's attorneys, the judge permitted inquiries into the president's relationships with government employees. On January 8, 1998, for example, Judge Wright stated that questions as to the president's relationships with other government employees, in the words of the judge, are within the scope of issues in this case. In making these rulings, Judge Susan Webber Wright recognized that the questions might prove embarrassing. She stated, in her words, "I have never had a sexual harassment case where there was not some embarrassment." She also stated that she could not protect the parties from embarrassment. Let me summarize the five points that explain how the president's relationship with Ms. Lewinsky -- what was otherwise private conduct -- became a matter of concern to the courts. This is critical to fully understand the nature of the committee's inquiry. One, the president was sued for sexual harassment in federal court, and the Supreme Court of the United States ruled in that case that the case should go forward. STARR: Two. The law of sexual harassment and the law of evidence allow the plaintiff to inquire into the defendant's relationship with other women -- with women in the workplace, which, in this case, included the president's relationship with Ms. Lewinsky. Three. Applying those subtle legal principles, Judge Susan Webber Wright repeatedly rejected the president's objections to such inquiries. The judge instead ordered the president to answer the questions. Four. It is a federal crime to commit perjury and obstruct justice in civil cases, including sexually harassment cases. Violators are subject to a sentence of up to 10 years imprisonment for obstruction and five years for perjury. Five. The evidence suggest that the president and Ms. Lewinsky made false statements under oath and obstructed the judicial process in the Jones case by preventing the court from obtaining the truth about their relationship. At his grand jury appearance, the president invoked a Supreme Court justice's confirmation hearings as a comparison to his current situation. The president's use of the analogy did not fit the facts in the Monica Lewinsky case, however. But the president, having raised the analogy, let me make it more fitting to the case, here. Suppose that there is a nominee for a high government position. Assume that in the confirmation process, there is an allegation of sexual harassment. Suppose that several women other than the accuser who have worked with the nominee testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Suppose that the nominee then confers with one of tho Suppose that the lying under oath and obstruction of justice occurs in a sexual harassment suit brought against the nominee. Suppose further that the false statements and obstruction continue into a subsequent criminal investigation. What would this committee do with compelling evidence of perjury and obstruction of justice committed by, for example, a sitting justice of the Supreme Court in a sexual harassment case in which he was the defendant? Those hypotheticals -- which track the facts of this case -- put in sharp relief the issue that is before this committee. Let me again stress that it is this House, the House of Representatives, and not an independent counsel, that has the sole power to impeach. But I am suggesting that the consideration of our referral be focused on the issues that are actually presented by the referral. N E X T+P A G E+| "He could choose truth, or he could choose deception" - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Become a Salon member. Click here.