Word: mardian
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Fishing. Most prosecutors are understandably eager to make use of the grand jury's investigative powers. Robert Mardian, chief of the Justice Department's Internal Security Division, has said that grand juries in pursuit of wrongdoers "can run their tail off." Which is precisely what bothers many critics. Particularly in cases with political implications-like the Pentagon papers investigation-the Government, say some legal experts, does indeed use the grand jury to run the tail off assorted dissenters, either for pure harassment or as part of "a fishing expedition" to see what unexpected information the questioning may turn...
When the Times refused to comply. Assistant Attorney General Robert Mardian began the Government's legal attack by seeking a temporary restraining order?the prelude to a permanent injunction?in Manhattan's federal court. By chance, the case went before a recent Nixon appointee, U.S. District Judge Murray I. Gurfein, who was serving his first day on the bench. Last Tuesday the new judge issued the restraining order and set a Friday hearing to consider the injunction. Meanwhile, the Government showed concern about its key legal problem: how to prove the alleged injury. It asked Judge Gurfein to order...
Payoff Strategy. At HEW, Mardian earned a reputation as the conservative heavy in a cast of liberal attorneys intent on enforcing the spirit as well as the letter of federal civil rights laws. One former HEW lawyer says that Mardian "consistently tried to scuttle school desegregation guidelines." Defending his go-slow position, Mardian candidly explained, "Look, you might as well recognize that you're in politics." He told his colleagues: "There are two kinds of people in the world-winners and losers. I knew a loser once and he was a queer." ("That's a joke," he added...
...Mardian helped draft the Nixon Administration's famous 1969 memo that effectively relaxed desegregation dead lines in Southern states. He is convinced that his Southern strategy avoided violence and white flight to the suburbs. The payoff, he argues, is that 92% of the region's black pupils are in desegregated school systems, compared with 6% two years before...
...Mardian's political views place him a few paces to the right of John Mitchell, but the boss joins others in regarding Mardian as a first-rate lawyer and tireless prosecutor. Because Mitchell has shifted dozens of key cases to the revived Internal Security Division, Mardian is already considered the Justice Department's No. 3 man behind Mitchell and Kleindienst. One former colleague sums up: "He's remarkable for the clarity with which he thinks, but he's an absolutely cold-blooded political operator...