Closing Statement
Of Sen. Patrick Leahy,
Chairman, Senate Judiciary Committee,
On S. 214, Preserving United States Attorney Independence Act Of
2007
March 20, 2007
In a few minutes the Senate will have
an opportunity to begin restoring accountability and checks and
balances to our Government. We should pass the Preserving United
States Attorney Independence Act, S.214. We need to close the
loophole exploited by the Department of Justice and the White House
that contributed to the mass firings of United States Attorneys.
When we roll back this excessive authority given the Attorney
General by the PATRIOT Act reauthorization, we will take a step
toward restoring the independence of federal law enforcement in this
country. We will be acting to reverse one more incident of
overstepping by an earlier rubberstamp Congress, which all too often
was all too willing to dance to the tune of a power-hungry White
House.
The Attorney General is right that
“mistakes were made.” It was a mistake to conduct this mass firing
to send the message to our United States Attorneys that they had
better act like “loyal Bushies” rather than objective law
enforcement officers. It was a mistake to malign the reputations of
these officials by contending that the firings were prompted by
their badly performing their law enforcement responsibilities. It
was a mistake to mislead the Senate Judiciary Committee in hearings
and Senators in phone calls and meetings about the firings. It was
a mistake to give the Attorney General the unlimited authority to
fill these critical posts with his selections and without the advice
and consent of the Senate. But most of all, it was a mistake to
inject crassly partisan objections into the selection, evaluation,
firing and replacement of the top federal law enforcement officers
around the country.
In the same way that any employer has
the power to hire, we understand that people cannot be fired because
they are Catholic or because of their race or because they are a
whistleblower. The power of employment is not without limit. It
can be abused. When it is abused in connection with political
influence over federal law enforcement the American people and their
representatives in Congress have a right to be concerned. We need to
get to the bottom of this situation. We need the facts, not more
spin, and not another concocted cover story.
The United States Department of
Justice must be above politics. The Attorney General of the United
States has to ensure the independence of federal law enforcement
from political influence. The Department of Justice should serve
the American people by making sure the law is enforced without fear
or favor. It should not be a political arm of the White House.
One of the finest Attorneys General of
the United States ever to serve was Robert H. Jackson. Of course,
he subsequently served as one of our most admired Justices on the
United States Supreme Court and as the principal prosecutor at the
International Military Tribunal for German war criminals in
Nuremberg after World War II. In April 1940, as a new Attorney
General, he spoke to the United States Attorneys from across the
country assembled in the Great Hall at the Department of Justice in
Washington about the responsibilities of being a federal
prosecutor. I think it appropriate to today to recall his
guidance. His words serve to show the Senate and the American
people how wrong this Administration’s practices are and how far off
the mark. Attorney General Jackson said:
The prosecutor has more control over life, liberty, and reputation
than any other person in America. His discretion is tremendous. . .
. While the prosecutor at his best is one of the most beneficent
forces in our society, when he acts from malice or other base
motives, he is one of the worst.
. . . .
Because of this immense power to strike at citizens, not with mere
individual strength, but with all the force of government itself,
the post of Federal District Attorney from the very beginning has
been safeguard by presidential appointment, requiring confirmation
of the Senate of the United States. You are thus required to win an
expression of confidence in your character by both the legislative
and the executive branches of the government before assuming the
responsibilities of a federal prosecutor.
Your responsibility in your several districts for law enforcement
and for its methods cannot be wholly surrendered to Washington, and
ought not to be assumed by a centralized Department of Justice. It
is an unusual and rare instance in which the local District Attorney
should be superseded in the handling of litigation, except where he
requests help of Washington.
. . . .
If the prosecutor is obliged to choose his cases, it follows that he
can choose his defendants. Therein is the most dangerous power of
the prosecutor: that he will pick people that he thinks he should
get, rather than pick cases that need to be prosecuted.
. . . It is in this realm—in which the prosecutor picks some person
whom he dislikes or desires to embarrass, or selects some group of
unpopular persons and then looks for an offense, that the greatest
danger of abuse of prosecuting power lies. It is here that law
enforcement becomes personal, and the real crime becomes that of
being unpopular with the predominant or governing group, being
attached to the wrong political views, or being personally obnoxious
to or in the way of the prosecutor himself.
In times of fear or hysteria political, racial, religious, social,
and economic groups, often from the best of motives, cry for the
scalps of individuals or groups because they do not like their
views. . . . Those who are in office are apt to regard as
“subversive” the activities of any of those who would bring about a
change of administration.
I ask that a copy of Attorney General Jackson’s full statement be
included in the Record following my remarks.
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