Word: ervin
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...florid, folksy, courtly Southern gentleman-thought to be a vanishing breed-was suddenly resuscitated and became relevant. As one witness after another came before the committee to tell of his shabby doings, Ervin's devotion to law and liberty shone by contrast. His eyebrows dancing up and down like puppets on a string, he made his points sharply and supported them with apt quotations from Shakespeare and the Bible. He sympathized while he remonstrated with the errant public servants, and redemption was always possible. Ervin intended the investigation to educate the American people, and he succeeded. In turn...
...that Sam Ervin was tired, though he has been working harder than ever. Nor did he have any doubts of being able to whip the younger men who have an eye on the Senate seat that he has occupied for nearly 20 years. It was simply that at 77 he felt that he was too old to carry on. Last week he phrased his announcement that he will not stand for re-election next November in those by now familiar rolling cadences-a little of Virgil, a little of Shakespeare, a little of Sam. "Since time takes a constantly accelerating...
...Ervin had long promised his wife that he would quit, and his decision was a Christmas present for "Miss Margaret." As Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield once remarked: "Sam sticks pretty close to his wife and the Constitution. He's married to both." Ervin's love affair with the Constitution has been lifelong, ardent, unflagging-and finally requited. In an hour of constitutional peril, the Senate turned to Ervin to chair the Watergate investigating committee...
...Ervin's Senate career defies conventional analysis. He was a leader of the Southern bloc that tried to stop desegregation with everything possible-particularly filibusters. He argued vehemently against the expansion of rights for criminal suspects by the Warren Court. He was a moderate hawk who thought the generals should have their way in Viet Nam. Yet he also became the most formidable opponent of incursions on civil liberties by the Government. Says he: "The history of liberty is the history of limitations of Government power...
Fried Fish. Ervin was a forceful foe of Senator Joe McCarthy when he was indulging in his red-baiting excesses. Ervin was a principal backer of the Bail Reform Act of 1966 that allowed poor people to remain out of jail before their trials if they were reasonable risks. Over the years, he has held many little-publicized hearings looking into Government snooping and surveillance. Finally, as Watergate unfolded, it was as if his entire career were preparatory to this ultimate confrontation with a power-hungry Chief Executive. Fighting the White House on all fronts-from Executive privilege to freedom...