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puella -> RE: Executive Priviledge? (3/22/2007 4:08:19 AM)
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Having utilized my favorite gadget (Tivo!!!!) I watched today's press briefing and was glad to see the rather lapdog white house press corps asking about this issue. Glenn Greenwald asked how Tony Snow could takes such a 180 on his position of Executive Priviledge...
Q So, Tony, back when President Clinton was citing executive privilege to keep internal deliberations in that White House from being talked about in Congress, you wrote -- But you wrote quite eloquently about this. You said, "Taken to its logical extreme, that position would make it impossible for citizens to hold the chief executive accountable. We would have a constitutional right to a cover up."
I will except that passage from the column written by Snow:
“Executive Privilege is a Dodge”:
Evidently, Mr. Clinton wants to shield virtually any communications that take place within the White House compound on the theory that all such talk contributes in some way, shape or form to the continuing success and harmony of an administration. Taken to its logical extreme, that position would make it impossible for citizens to hold a chief executive accountable for anything. He would have a constitutional right to cover up.
Chances are that the courts will hurl such a claim out, but it will take time.
One gets the impression that Team Clinton values its survival more than most people want justice and thus will delay without qualm. But as the clock ticks, the public’s faith in Mr. Clinton will ebb away for a simple reason: Most of us want no part of a president who is cynical enough to use the majesty of his office to evade the one thing he is sworn to uphold — the rule of law....) ironic.
Given that statement was regarding an investigation into Clinton lying about a personal sexual matter with no impact on our country or Constitution, the fact that he is unwilling to apply that same logic to an issue regarding the politicization of our system of justice seems (wait for it
As I believe fargle pointed out, the most notable case on Executive Privilege comes from the Supreme Court case regarding Nixon's abuses of that murky privilege (which ended up being the turning point of his Presidency's demise).
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=418&invol=683
However, neither the doctrine of separation of powers, nor the need for confidentiality of high-level communications, without more, can sustain an absolute, unqualified Presidential privilege of immunity from judicial process under all circumstances. The President's need for complete candor and objectivity from advisers calls for great deference from the courts. However, when the privilege depends solely on the broad, undifferentiated claim of public interest in the confidentiality of such conversations, a confrontation with other values arises. Absent a claim of need to protect military, diplomatic, or sensitive national security secrets, we find it difficult to accept the argument that even the very important interest in confidentiality of Presidential communications is significantly diminished by production of such material for in camera inspection with all the protection that a district court will be obliged to provide. [418 U.S. 683, 707]
The impediment that an absolute, unqualified privilege would place in the way of the primary constitutional duty of the Judicial Branch to do justice in criminal prosecutions would plainly conflict with the function of the courts under Art. III. In designing the structure of our Government and dividing and allocating the sovereign power among three co-equal branches, the Framers of the Constitution sought to provide a comprehensive system, but the separate powers were not intended to operate with absolute independence.
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