No. 3: Stans

In the entire cast of Watergate characters, none had posed so serenely above the mess as Maurice Stans. Although he had headed Richard Nixon's campaign-finance committee in 1972, Stans blithely professed no knowledge of the illegal Watergate activities that the money had financed, which led Chairman Sam Ervin of the Senate Watergate Committee to ask in frustration: "Can you explain to a simple-minded man like me the mental processes by which you can determine how much money ought to be spent for a particular project unless you know what the project is?" Replied Stans coolly: "Mr. Chairman, there is no yardstick by which you judge the necessities of a political campaign."

Born in the small Minnesota town of Shakopee, Stans had used his accounting skills and suave manner to climb to the top of the Eastern Republican Establishment. He was Dwight Eisenhower's budget director and Nixon's Secretary of Commerce, and raised more money ($60 million) than any other political fund raiser in U.S. history. But as one corporation after another pleaded guilty to making illegal campaign contributions (see ECONOMY & BUSINESS), one Watergate mystery lingered: How could the man in charge of soliciting all that cash not be guilty too?

The answer came in a Washington courtroom last week as Stans, 66, pleaded guilty to five misdemeanors. Stans insisted that his criminal violations of the campaign-funding laws were "not willful." Because the special prosecutor had agreed to lodge no other Watergate charges against him, Stans argued that this "established once and for all that I had no guilty involvement" in the Watergate burglary or its coverup.

The federal prosecutor, Thomas F. McBride, did not entirely agree, arguing in court that Stans either "knew or acted in reckless disregard of the corporate origin" of the illegal funds he had raised. Federal Judge John Lewis Smith Jr. observed that this sounded much like "willfulness" to him. And while Stans may not have known how the illicit money was to be used, the loose treatment of huge amounts of cash helped make Watergate possible.

Specifically Stans admitted having failed to report two contributions ($30,000 from Ernesto Lagdameo, former Philippine Ambassador to the U.S., and $39,000 from former Montana Governor Tim Babcock, who has been sentenced to prison for concealing the source of this money; having failed to report the disbursement of $81,000 to Frederick C. LaRue, a Nixon re-election committee aide who had arranged some of the payments to the arrested Watergate burglars; and having accepted two illegal corporate contributions ($40,000 from Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. and $30,000 from Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Co.). Each violation carries a maximum sentence of one year in prison and a $1,000 fine. Judge Smith deferred sentencing Stans.

Good Name. Stans, who had once pleaded righteously with the Senate Watergate Committee in televised hearings "to give me back my good name," thus found his name irrevocably linked with two other Nixon Cabinet members convicted of crimes. They are former Attorneys General John Mitchell and Richard Kleindienst.

In contrast to the jaunty Stans, a subdued and sorrowful LaRue last week learned the penalty he must pay for conspiring to obstruct justice in the Watergate coverup. The mild-mannered Mississippi oil heir had admitted taking part in the payoffs to the burglars and had testified for the Government in the trial that led to the convictions of H.R. Haldeman, John Ehrlichman, Robert Mardian and Mitchell. LaRue, a former aide to Mitchell at Nixon's re-election committee, was sentenced by Federal Judge John J. Sirica to six months in jail.

Faring far better was Gordon Strachan, 31, a former Haldeman aide who had been indicted for conspiracy in the coverup. His trial had been separated from that of the convicted conspirators because of legal complications arising from partial grants of immunity given to secure his testimony before the Senate Watergate Committee. Strachan emerged wholly free as Special Prosecutor Henry S. Ruth Jr. revealed that the Government was no longer interested in prosecuting him. Testimony at the conspiracy trial had shown that Strachan's involvement, if any, had been peripheral and as a messenger for Haldeman.

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