Word: ervine
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...ERVIN MEREY-KADAR
Half-forgotten in the struggle was the fact that Senator Sam Ervin, who hailed Sirica's decision as a "great victory for the search for truth," has also been demanding the presidential tapes. His committee has filed a separate complaint in Sirica's court, and last week the White House lawyers fought back with a barrage of arguments far more pugnacious than the ones they had filed in opposition...
Criminal Trial. In imperious language, the White House answer declared that the Ervin committee not only had no right to the tapes but that its whole investigation was unconstitutional in the first place. It said that the committee probe "has been, in fact, a criminal investigation and trial conducted for the purpose of determining whether or not criminal acts have been committed and the guilt or innocence of individuals." Such a proceeding, the lawyers argued, exceeds Congress's constitutional powers. The answer asked Sirica to dismiss the committee's subpoena on a number of other grounds. It said...
...Ervin committee lawyers immediately fired back a motion for summary judgment, asking Sirica to rule on their request with a minimum of further proceedings. They noted that the committee had received evidence, principally from former White House Counsel John Dean, that the President was involved in a crime-the Watergate cover-up-but that he refused to give up the tapes and memoranda that might exonerate him. The committee insisted that the subpoena was well within its "mandate and responsibility to ferret out all the facts regarding the Watergate affair, both to aid the Senate in its legislative function...
...setting the mighty linguistic engines of Shakespeare and the Bible against the bankrupt slang and pusillanimous euphemisms of the witnesses, Ervin is admittedly using cannons against sparrows. But he is also constantly reminding us that the gap between language and truth has not always existed-and need not continue to exist...