To Set the Record Straight by John Sirica

Author:John Sirica
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: mom 04/05/2014
ISBN: 9780393012347
Publisher: Signet
Published: 1979-01-02T06:00:00+00:00

From my point of view, the fact that the judicial process did not run its course has had additional unfortunate consequences. The initial evidence presented was compelling enough to cause the grand jury to name the president as an unindicted co-conspirator in March 1974. The prosecutors in the position to know best, because they worked with the grand jury nearly every day, have since reported that the jury was prepared then to return an indictment against Nixon. Only the arguments of Leon Jaworski persuaded them that the impeachment process provided the better forum for bringing the president to account. Once Nixon had left office, the grand jury was again ready to indict him, but was waiting for the jury to be selected in the cover-up case so that that trial would not be delayed by the publicity. Jaworski, as he has since told me, was prepared to approve an indictment.

I now feel that Nixon should have been indicted after he left office and after the cover-up jury was sequestered. And then, no matter how long it took, he should have stood trial. Of course, that was

made impossible by the pardon. I take this view not because I would wish any more suffering on Nixon or his family, but because I feel it would have been better for the country if the legal process had been allowed to run its course—either to acquit the former president or to find him guilty. As it was, only one committee of the House and a grand jury ever took any official action against the president. After a trial, after the best prosecution case possible had been presented, after the best defense had been offered, after testimony and cross-examination under oath had been completed, a final verdict would have put the president’s guilt or innocence beyond dispute. No one then could wonder whether or not he had done wrong. No one, not even Nixon himself, could any longer argue that his fate was the product of politics rather than the result of justice being served. This may not seem a problem now. After all, not many people take his explanations and evasions all that seriously. Yet the question may, some day, be a matter of historical debate. I would feel better knowing that the final processes of our system of justice had been permitted to function.

I still have the lingering feeling that no matter how great his personal loss, Nixon did manage to keep himself above the law. He was forced to give up his office, but he was not treated the same way as the other defendants. His associates served time in jail. He received a large government pension, and retired to his lovely home in San Clemente. I think people still wonder whether the concept of equal justice under law really applies if one climbs high enough in terms of wealth, power, or influence. All of my life as a lawyer and judge, I have tried to make the idea of equal justice mean something.

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