Sell Out: The Inside Story of President Clinton’s Impeachment by David P. Schippers Chief Investigative Counsel for the Clinton Impeachment with Alan P. Henry Click here to return to book details Chapter 1 If you ever plan to eat another sausage, you’d be well advised not to visit a sausage factory. It ain’t a pretty sight. If you ever plan to vote again, you might not want to know what went on behind the scenes in the Capitol Hill meat grinder leading up to and during the impeachment proceedings against President William Jefferson Clinton. What I saw, as Chief Counsel for the House Judiciary Committee and therefore the man in charge of compiling the case against the President, was not a pretty sight, either. Lies, cowardice, hypocrisy, cynicism, amorality, butt-covering-these were the squalid political body parts that, squeezed through the political processor, combined to make a mockery of the impeachment process. By comparison, sausage never looked so good. Plenty of “outsiders” have told the impeachment story. Almost by definition, their accounts are secondhand reports of public events that for the most part are already well documented. There haven’t been extensive “insider” accounts for obvious reasons. The Democratic Party players in the impeachment drama certainly aren’t going to thump their chests. After all, what would they say? “Yeah, we knew the President was a serial felon [OK to say?] who made Richard Nixon look like a Boy Scout, but we don’t care.” And the Republicans couldn’t do much better. “Yeah, we knew he was subverting the Constitution, too, but some of us were too scared to tie our own shoes.” When you get down to it, with the exception of the Republican Judiciary Committee members, nearly every insider politician would have something to lose by going public with the details of what really happened behind closed doors on Capitol Hill in the last half of 1998 and early 1999. I don’t suffer from the same qualms. Fortunately, I need not run for reelection. I am not hostile to the Democrats, nor do I feel beholden to the Republicans. From the first day in Washington, all my staff and I ever wanted was for the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth to be told. So far, that truth has been dominated by political spin, leaving much of the public purposely misinformed. Indeed, the scheme to rewrite history and to downplay the seriousness of President Clinton’s malfeasance in office is well under way. The President’s supporters attack the nebulous “vast right-wing conspiracy,” and blame its members for daring, in their words, to “undo the verdict of the electorate.” Further, in the wake of impeachment, the White House spin machine has attempted to convince Americans that the House Managers were enemies of due process and the Constitution, while President Clinton was a long-suffering victim-a role he is only too willing to assume. In April 2000, sixteen months after William Jefferson Clinton attained the dubious distinction of being only the second American president in more than two hundred years to be impeached, he had the unmitigated nerve to blame the House of Representatives for his adversity. He said: “On the impeachment, let me tell you, I am proud of what we did there because I think we saved the Constitution of the United States. I am not ashamed of the fact that they impeached me. That was their decision, not mine. And it was wrong. As a matter of law, the Constitution, and history, it was wrong. And I am glad I didn’t quit and I’m glad we fought it.” Well, as I hope you will realize after reading this book, it was not wrong. Impeachment was not only the proper remedy; it was the only constitutional remedy available to correct some of the most outrageous conduct ever engaged in by a President of the United States. Mr. Clinton was impeached for obstruction of justice and for perjury, both federal criminal offenses, yet he is not ashamed. To the contrary, he is proud of his actions. Nobody knows what the verdict of history will be, but if the truth is known, the reputation of the House and its Managers should soar, and that of Mr. Clinton and the United States Senate should suffer. Repeatedly, we hear that the whole case was about sex, and everybody lies about sex. If that were true, there might be some merit to the argument that the country was put through wholly unnecessary hell for such a venial fault. Once the truth is known, though, it becomes apparent that the President’s transgressions were neither defensible nor only about sex. There existed a far-reaching conspiracy to obstruct justice and to deprive Paula Jones of her constitutional right as an American citizen to have her day in court to redress wrongs committed against her by Mr. Clinton. Those wrongs, in themselves, are not impeachable offenses. Likewise, the President’s conduct toward Monica Lewinsky and other women is not an impeachable offense. No reasonable person ever suggested otherwise. If sexual misconduct were all that could be shown, there would have been no inquiry or impeachment. No, the impeachable offenses were committed much later: perjury, lies, intimidation of prospective witnesses, suborning perjury-all to achieve a personal and political result, whatever the cost. What’s more, my staff was preparing to document other potentially impeachable offenses completely unrelated to Paula Jones or Monica Lewinsky when the politicians lost their nerve and severely limited the scope of the inquiry. A great deal of evidentiary material remains under seal or in the executive protection of the House Judiciary Committee. While I cannot discuss that evidence, except in general terms, I am free to reveal other evidence and testimony that my staff developed independently, both during the oversight investigation of the Justice Department and while engaged in the impeachment inquiry. Some of that material is discussed in this book. In the telling, neither political party will be happy. But so be it. What I have tried to do is recount my firsthand knowledge of the impeachment process as viewed by an outsider-a lifelong Chicago Democrat, I might add-who became intimately involved. The account encompasses our investigation of the Department of Justice during the spring and summer of 1998, and prior to the receipt of Kenneth Starr’s referral. Also, events in the Judiciary Committee once the material was received will be discussed, as will the impeachment inquiry itself, the proceedings in the House of Representatives, and the “trial” in the Senate. The Founding Fathers of our nation established the impeachment process [“for the president”? Technically, impeachment can be for any elected official, no?] as a check upon the executive power in order to preserve the separation of powers that is so vital to the operation of the United States government. The constitutional system calls for impeachment by the House of Representatives charging the President with high crimes and misdemeanors. That charge must be proved by the House Managers with clear and convincing evidence in a trial that is exclusively to be held by the Senate. You will see that despite all roadblocks and obstacles, the system worked in the House, but utterly collapsed in the Senate. When the time came to name this book, one word came immediately to mind: “Sellout.” The Republican leadership in the Senate and House sold out the House Managers and our investigation. Democrats in both Houses sold out basic principles of law and decency for the sake of protecting one of their own. But most distressingly, the President of the United States of America and his White House water boys sold out the American people-not just in a one-time spasm of political expedience, but in a deliberate snarl of sophistry and cynical manipulation of public opinion, the singular aim of which was political self-preservation. In the process, he soiled not just himself, but the Constitution, the public trust, and the Presidency itself. Democracy in. Sausage out. Not a pretty sight at all. Price: $23.35 - Click here to order: Click here to return to book details