Word: clairs
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1970-1979
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Clair: The answer, sir, is that a criminal conspiracy is criminal only after it's proven to be criminal...
...President is the nation's chief law-enforcement official with final authority over whom to prosecute and with what evidence, St. Clair argued. Hence the Special Prosecutor is a subordinate member of the Executive Branch. The courts simply have no authority to intervene in such an "intra-branch" dispute between these two officials. Referring to Jaworski as "my brother"?a courtroom courtesy?St. Clair belittled the Special Prosecutor's claim that he had been granted independent authority having the force of law by both the President and the Attorney General in the prosecution of Watergate crimes. "A Special Prosecutor...
Then Stewart shrewdly drew St. Clair into comparing Jaworski with a U.S. Attorney who might seek confidential documents from the President for a criminal trial. Stewart wanted to know what would happen if the President disagreed and the U.S. Attorney persisted because he was "sworn to uphold justice." "Then you would have a new U.S. Attorney," St. Clair said, intentionally eliciting a laugh from the audience. But Stewart forced St. Clair to admit that Jaworski, unlike a U.S. Attorney, could not be fired by the President without the approval of leaders of Congress?a condition that had been specifically prescribed...
...Clair: That is correct. And he has not been dismissed. Nor is he likely...
...Clair contended that the Constitution grants the President, at least as an implied power, an unqualified right to maintain the confidentiality of his conversations with his advisers. Only he can decide which conversations he will make public, and the courts cannot challenge that decision. It is a political decision and, if abused, the only remedy is impeachment. Burger and White wondered if the subpoenaed conversations did not at least have to deal with official duties, and St. Clair agreed. Powell then elicited the catch-22 kind of circuitous reasoning that characterizes much of the St. Clair argument...