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Spousal conflict-of-interest charges are usually aimed against wives for a simple reason: few women hold high public office that could place their husbands in jeopardy. When Barbara Morris Lent, wife of New York Congressman Norman Lent, became a lobbyist for NYNEX, she sought assurance from the House ethics committee that her job would not interfere with his voting on communications legislation. When Debbie Dingell, a lobbyist for General Motors, married Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman John Dingell, she switched to an administrative position. "Fortunately," she says, "GM is large enough that I could change jobs."
Successful male spouses, on the other hand, often get the benefit of the doubt, though there are exceptions to the rule. James Schroeder, whose wife Pat, a Colorado Congresswoman, once ran for President, says his legal career has not suffered and he has never been accused of a conflict of interest. But investment banker Richard Blum, husband of former San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein, says his firm was hampered because he turned down some clients to avoid the appearance of impropriety. "Could I have done better if my wife was home baking cookies?" asks Blum. "I think so." Another Californian, secretary of state March Fong Eu, decided to abandon her race for the U.S. Senate rather than ask her husband to disclose his business holdings. It came down to a choice between her candidacy and her marriage, she said, and she chose her marriage.
Nonprofessional jobs pose as many potential conflicts but tend to attract ! less criticism. Marilyn Quayle forswore the practice of law because she is the Vice President's wife. But it is hard to believe that she would have been invited to appear on the Today show to promote her turgid novel, Embrace the Serpent, if Dan Quayle were just another golf-loving lawyer from Indiana. Could it be pure coincidence that Greek businessman Basil Tsakos was paying Mark Hatfield's wife $55,000 for choosing fabric and paint chips for his office at the same time the Oregon Senator was urging federal support for Tsakos' $12 billion oil pipeline? Former Washington Mayor Marion Barry's wife Effie hardly got those fur coats and low-interest loans as just another "publicist" in a town where nearly everyone fits that description.
Still, the political wife who scares people most is usually a super success like Hillary Clinton, who ranks among the nation's most powerful lawyers and got better law-school grades than her husband. Perhaps she would be better off just trailing beside her husband, holding the Nancy Reagan gaze. Instead, she is out speaking, spinning and strategizing with as much force as the candidate. When the networks broadcast the Super Tuesday victory celebration at the Chicago Hilton, Hillary Clinton introduced her husband at speech length. She knows the latest take on the GATT talks and Israeli loan guarantees. Her appearances are so devoid of the life-style fluff local papers thrive on that one reporter jokingly complained about "substance abuse."