The Pardon: Questions Persist

The actors and props were assembled for an occasion of high drama. For the first time in the nation's history, a President was appearing on Capitol Hill to submit himself formally to the questions of a congressional committee.

What was more, President Ford was there to discuss an intensely controversial and emotional subject--his pardoning of Richard Nixon for any offenses he had committed while in the White House. But despite the setting and expectations, last week's event was something of a disappointment--nearly as inconclusive as the soap operas it displaced in two hours of network time.

The session left troubling questions unanswered, doubts unresolved, and Ford still struggling to find a way of exorcising the wraith of Nixon that haunts his presidency.

Good Reasons. The questions about the pardon were posed by a subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee, the body that had so diligently weighed the evidence against Nixon before recommending his impeachment.

The subcommittee had originally submitted its queries to the White House; what it got in reply was a handful of presidential statements and transcripts of news conferences. When committee members bristled at that response, Ford resolved to appear before the group himself, stubbornly prevailing over the fears of some of his lieutenants.

The President, in fact, had good political reasons for going up to the Hill. His decision to grant the pardon had shaken public confidence in his candor and judgment and damaged the chances of G.O.P. candidates in the November elections. Indeed, the initial reaction from Democrats in Congress to Ford's self-invitation was anger at Subcommittee Chairman William L. Hungate for inadvertently giving Ford the chance to get off the hook.

Appearing in the imposing room where the impeachment hearings were held, Ford was completely at ease. For the most part, he was treated with reverence by subcommittee members, who looked down from the top row of the long tiers of desks. Speaking earnestly and confidently, Ford hammered home his answers to the two basic questions. Was there a deal between Nixon and himself? "I assure you that there never was at any time any agreement whatsoever concerning a pardon to Mr. Nixon if he were to resign and I were to become President," said Ford in his opening statement. Later he added: "There was no deal, period, under no circumstances."

Why, then, had Ford pardoned Nixon? He was afraid that possible criminal proceedings against the former President, which could have dragged out for years, would have riven the country. Said Ford: "I wanted to do all I could to change our attentions from the pursuit of a fallen President to the pursuit of the urgent needs of a rising nation."

Ford did admit that the question of pardoning Nixon had come up while he was still Vice President. On Aug. 1 Alexander Haig, then White House chief of staff, mentioned it to Ford as one of a number of options being considered in the White House. But Ford insisted to the subcommittee that he had not replied yea or nay to Haig's comments.

Nor had he committed himself to consider them. The very next day, he said, he told Haig that he was making no recommendation whatsoever about anything having to do with a possible Nixon resignation or a pardon.

Ford also admitted that he had misled the public during that period--although he managed to paint the prevarication white. The President recounted how he had learned from Haig on Aug. 1 about the presidential tape of June 23, 1972 that, under the Supreme Court's decision, was soon to go to Federal Judge John Sirica for use in the conspiracy trial of Nixon's former aides.

The tape was to force Nixon's resignation because it clearly demonstrated how he had tried to obstruct the investigation of Watergate. When he heard about the tape, said Ford, he was "stunned." For months he had been saying that the President was not guilty of any impeachable offense.

Despite his knowledge of the tape's contents, Ford continued to say that he believed in the President's innocence while making a three-day tour of Mississippi and Louisiana. Ford's rationalization: any change in his position might lead the press to conclude "that I wanted to see the President resign to avoid an impeachment vote in the House and probable conviction vote in the Senate."

Sudden Change. As Ford himself reminded the subcommittee, he declared at his first presidential press conference, held on Aug. 28, that he would make no decision on pardoning Nixon prior to some kind of legal conclusion. Why then did he issue the pardon on Sept. 8? Ford did not really explain his sudden change of heart, except to say that he had become increasingly worried that the prosecution of the former President would generate passions that "would seriously disrupt the healing of our country from the wounds of the past."

Why had Ford not insisted that Nixon confess his guilt before giving him his pardon? The President replied that he did not think it was proper for him to have made such a demand. But he also made it clear that he felt that Nixon had admitted guilt by the simple fact of accepting the pardon.

Some of the members of Congress were worried about what Ford's pardoning of Nixon did to the nation's standards of equality under the law. California's Don Edwards, a liberal Democrat, wondered how Ford would explain American justice to his students if he were a high school teacher in Watts or Harlem. Ford's reply was that Nixon was the only President to resign in shame and disgrace; that, he implied, was punishment enough. South Carolina's James R. Mann, a conservative Democrat, asked if Ford agreed with "the maxim that the law is no respecter of persons." Ford's reply: "Certainly it should be." The gentle, courtly Mann seemed about to follow up the question but hesitated and then said softly, "Thank you, Mr. President."

The only member to talk tough to the President was Brooklyn's Elizabeth Holtzman, a first-term liberal Democrat, who delivered a speechlet about the need to dig further into the whole affair, which had raised "very dark suspicions ... in the public's mind." Among a series of questions, she wondered if Ford would be willing to turn over to the subcommittee all the taped recordings of conversations between himself and Nixon. Ford did not answer directly, although exactly what bearing such tapes would have on the issue of the pardon was unclear. Nixon pulled the plug on his recording system in mid-July 1973 while he was still determined to tough it out in office. Spiro Agnew was then Vice President, and Ford was the House minority leader.

At the time of the pardon, Ford gave the former President control over the tapes and related documents. Tradition, said Ford, made them Nixon's property, a view that is now being sharply challenged (TIME, Sept. 30). When Special Prosecutor Leon Jaworski protested that he needed access to the materials, the White House temporarily suspended the agreement. In recent weeks, Ford's and Nixon's lawyers have tried to reach a new agreement on how the tapes should be handled, but to no avail. On the day of last week's hearing, Nixon went to court to get an order enforcing the original deal. Ford's position remained that he would not give up the tapes until the special prosecutor was satisfied with the arrangement.

Cleared Air. When he was through testifying Ford said, "I hope at least that I have cleared the air." The Republicans on the committee agreed that he had ("I, for one, think he was telling the truth," said Indiana's David W. Dennis). But Democrats both on and off the subcommittee wanted to know more. "I just don't believe the whole story holds together," said Manhattan Congresswoman Bella S. Abzug, who was a co-sponsor of the resolutions that prompted the inquiry, although she is not on the Judiciary Committee.

Had there been any further reasons for deciding so abruptly to give Nixon his pardon? What precisely was the role of Haig in the whole affair? One former top White House aide has said that he believes Ford gave the pardon so early because he did not want the case dragging through the courts when he ran for election in 1976.

Faced with such questions and theories, Subcommittee Chairman Hungate declared: "I'm not sure just what we'll decide to do, but we've still got a lot to do. We'll decide after the recess." When Congress reconvenes following the elections, Hungate's subcommittee could vote to hold more hearings. A probable star witness: Alexander Haig. For Jerry Ford and the G.O.P., the problems of the pardon are far from over.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.