(6 of 11)
Contempt Citation. The committee strategy is to continue to move warily, maneuvering to avoid any court battles. Not only are such battles time consuming, but the committee is convinced that no court has any jurisdiction over any part of the impeachment inquiry and process. Impeachment is sanctioned by the Constitution as solely a congressional activity. The committee leaders expect to give St. Clair perhaps two more weeks in which to respond conclusively to its request for evidence. If he fails to do so, the request will be renewed. If Nixon and St. Clair still refuse to comply, only then will the committee issue a subpoena for the material.
Meanwhile, the committee's investigation will continue. First, all of the evidence given to Jaworski by the White House will be examined. Then the committee intends to study the package of evidence from the Watergate grand jury. If St. Clair and Nixon decide to resist the subpoena, the committee will probably seek a contempt citation against the President. The citation would become one of several—or perhaps many—points in an impeachment charge. "I would make it the last article of impeachment, not the first," declares a Republican member of the Judiciary Committee.
Reports TIME'S veteran congressional correspondent, Neil MacNeil: "St. Clair's strategy is offending the House's sense of itself—an extremely dangerous business for Nixon. He is losing Southern Democrats and conservative Republicans by the dozens right now." And this is even before any of the potential impeachment evidence has been analyzed by the Rodino committee.
Always Smile. Despite St. Clair's problems, many legal scholars give him high marks so far for making the best of what they see as a very difficult case. Under St. Clair, observes Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz, "the quality of legal representation has gone way up." St. Clair is following a predictable pattern of impeachment defense, says Law Professor Arval Morris of the University of Washington. "The first thing is to narrow the concept of the impeachable offense—that rules out a whole lot of evidence." The University of Chicago's Philip Kurland views St. Clair's defense strategy as "to give only what he is forced to give and to delay as long as he can."
Richard Donahue, a leading trial lawyer in Massachusetts, offers a more invidious assessment. He considers St. Clair's tactics much the same kind of defense that one would put up for "a drunken driver. If you have a guilty client, you make 'em prove everything every inch of the way, attack everyone in the room—the judge, the court officers, the witnesses—but you always smile." Harvard's Dershowitz says that it is difficult to rate St. Clair's overall effectiveness without knowing the culpability of his client. "If Nixon is innocent, has nothing to hide, then St. Clair is doing a terrible job because he is making it appear as though Nixon has something to hide. If he is guilty, then St. Clair is doing a great job."
A strategy of delay, however, is a disservice to the nation, argues Law Professor John Flynn of