Ed Meese, Call Home

By Jerome Cramer/Washington

Cronyism in office. Leaks and lie-detector tests. Softness on white collar crime. The Justice Department during Watergate? Edwin Meese at his worst? No, it's the list of charges against Attorney General Dick Thornburgh, and the reason he has become the Bush Administration's first high-level personnel problem.

, Thornburgh's most recent snafu involved George Bush's declaration of a stepped-up war against savings and loan crooks. Just days later, Assistant Attorney General Edward Dennis Jr., a key player in the S&L prosecutions, quit. Dennis' bail-out was only the latest in a series of high-level shake-ups at Justice.

As successor to the embattled Meese in August 1988, Thornburgh came to Washington with a reputation as a moderate former Republican Governor of Pennsylvania. But he brought along a tight-knit group of cronies from Harrisburg and shut out almost everyone else. Even Deputy Attorney General Donald Ayer, a Washington attorney, was excluded from the 8:30 a.m. staff meeting. Moreover, Thornburgh's sometimes imperious manner grated with Congress, the press and Justice employees. Problems mounted quickly:

-- He riled both congressional liberals and conservatives early with two disastrous nominations. His first pick for Deputy Attorney General, Robert Fiske Jr., was withdrawn when conservatives objected to Fiske's affiliation with the American Bar Association's allegedly liberal judicial screening committee. Soon after, liberals voted down Thornburgh's choice for director of the civil rights division, William Lucas, a black conservative, on charges that he was unqualified.

-- Thornburgh then ordered an investigation into a damaging leak about an FBI probe of the office of Philadelphia Democratic Congressman William Gray III, which proved to be ham-handed. Deputy Attorney General Ayer resigned when Thornburgh refused to turn the investigation over to the office charged with examining internal wrongdoing. Press secretary David Runkel and Robert Ross Jr., Thornburgh's right-hand man for internal affairs, fumbled on lie-detector tests and were reassigned. Even leak-buster Thornburgh strapped himself to a polygraph to prove he was cleaner than Caesar's wife.

-- Thornburgh has angered the civil rights community with a strong stance against the pending Kennedy-Hawkins legislation, which would make it easier to prove job discrimination. Calling the measure a "quota bill," he has refused to compromise on his opposition to language that would give women and minorities the right to sue for damages. Ralph Neas, director of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, says Thornburgh's "statement and positions have been extremely harsh."

-- Smelling blood, Democrats have gone after the Attorney General for being slow to prosecute savings and loan criminals. Thornburgh protests that Justice has launched 27 S&L task forces and has increased the number of prosecutors by half.

White House aides complain that Thornburgh has got a bad rap from the press. Thornburgh recently sent George Bush a copy of a quote that he loves: "Any Attorney General who isn't making enemies probably isn't doing his job right." Thornburgh has made enemies, to be sure, but he insists that he will weather the current round of criticism. His plan for survival: "I'm a team player. I'm the President's man."