THE Watergate drama shifts this week to the marble-pillared, chandelier-lit Senate Caucus Room, scene of the Teapot Dome investigation and the Army-McCarthy hearings. Such is the demand for seats that for the first time in Senate history tickets are being issued for the 200 public places.
With scores of witnesses due to testify, the hearings are expected to last until next fall—perhaps longer, depending on what the probe unearths. The committee comprises four Democrats and three Republicans chosen by the Senate leadership of both parties:
SAM J. ERVIN JR., 76, chairman, a Democrat from North Carolina, is perhaps more suited for the job than any other member of the Senate. His political ambitions behind him, he is respected for his fairness and for an understanding of constitutional issues that he gained from service on the North Carolina Supreme Court.
HOWARD H. BAKER JR., 47, ranking Republican member, is a moderate conservative from Tennessee who still has political ambitions (he has twice tried to gain the Senate G.O.P. leadership). Working closely with Ervin, he will try to get at the truth without alienating his fellow Republicans.
EDWARD J. GURNEY, 59, first Republican to be elected to the Senate from Florida since Reconstruction, is a loyal supporter of the Nixon Administration. If the Democratic members get too rough on the White House, he can be counted on to set them straight.
DANIEL K. INOUYE, 48, Democrat from Hawaii, is assistant majority whip. A combat veteran who lost his right arm in World War II, he is likely to be one of the most aggressive interrogators.
JOSEPH M. MONTOYA, 57, Democrat from New Mexico, served eight years in the House before he was elected to the Senate in 1964. Not a Senate power, he is likely to follow Ervin's lead.
HERMAN E. TALMADGE, 59, a Georgia Democrat, is a plainspoken, cigar-chomping Senate veteran who had to be prodded into serving on the committee. "I don't have the time nor the resources nor the inclination to be a private eye," he explains. Whatever Ervin does will be all right with Talmadge.
LOWELL P. WEICKER JR., 42, first-term Republican Senator from Connecticut, is the most controversial member of the committee. By conducting his own investigation of John Dean and others, he has run afoul of his fellow committee members, who have publicly reprimanded him. Primed for a vendetta against the White House guard, he may provide explosive moments before the cameras.
Most of the questioning will probably be done by the committee's chief counsel, Samuel Dash, 48, who heads a staff of 39. Dash's credentials are impeccable: he served as a district attorney in Philadelphia, teaches law at Georgetown, and wrote a book on electronic surveillance, The Eavesdroppers. Working alongside him is Chief Minority Counsel Fred D. Thompson, a scourge of moonshiners as a federal prosecutor in Tennessee.
So extensive is the Watergate scandal, so complex is it in detail that it has inspired several other investigations, all operating more or less simultaneously: