The Breach

by Peter Baker

  Democrats were seething too. Livingston told Gephardt at a 1 P.M. meeting that he would delay the vote for a day but would not commit to holding off until hostilities in the Gulf were completely over. The members of Gephardts caucus were apoplectic that the Republicans would even entertain the notion of going forward while the country was at war. The thought of undercutting the commander in chief at such a critical moment seemed almost treasonous.

  At 5 P.M., the Republican caucus gathered in a basement room on Capitol Hill while televisions showed the streaks of tracer lights across a green back ground over Baghdad. Antiaircraft guns had just begun firing into the sky to defend the besieged capital, and at 5:06 P.M. (1:06 A.M. Iraqi time), the first of two hundred American cruise missiles smashed down on targets around the city. With a stack of pizzas available for hungry Republicans, dozens of congressmen spoke out, angrily insisting that the vote had to go forward or reluctantly urging that they hold off. Among those determined to brook no postponement was DeLay. Livingston did not at first disclose that he had already committed to Clinton and Gephardt to delay the debate by a day and instead let his members vent. After an hour, word came that the president was about to address the nation, and a television was wheeled in so the members could watch. In a telling sign of how wide the partisan breach had opened in Washington, Livingston felt compelled to admonish his Republican colleagues not to boo or hiss at the screen because reporters waiting outside the closed doors might overhear and portray that as a sign of disrespect for the president.

  From the Oval Office, a haggard-looking Clinton explained to a national television audience that he had ordered the attack to prevent the spread of chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons. He addressed the question of timing only obliquely near the end of his fifteen-minute speech. Saddam Hussein and the other enemies of peace may have thought that the serious debate currently before the House of Representatives would distract Americans or weaken our resolve to face him down. But once more, the United States has proven that, although we are never eager to use force, when we must act in Americas vital interests, we will do so.

  The Republicans in the conference room were unimpressed. They still wanted to go forward as scheduled. Congress continued to meet during the Civil War, some pointed out, and elections were still held during World War II. They suspected Clinton only wanted to delay long enough to push the decision into the next Congress, which would take office in January, when he would have five more Democrats in the House. The subtext of the discussion was that for once they had the momentum and did not want to let up lest they lose it.

  Finally, though, Nancy Johnson, a pragmatic congresswoman from Connecticut who only that week had announced she would vote for impeachment, rose to say that a delay would not change her decision or the outcome. This conference will impeach the president, she declared. That calmed some nerves. Congressman Jim Greenwood of Pennsylvania, another moderate who had been on the fence, suggested that, since this was their new Speakers first crisis, they owed it to Livingston to defer to his judgment.

  After two and a half hours of heated debate, Livingston emerged from the Republican conference to announce what he had already decided a day earlier: The House would delay its impeachment debate for a day. Pressed by reporters, Livingston would not say what he thought privately, that the whole military operation was a political sham by a president on the brink of impeachment. But other Republicans were not so reticent. While I have been assured by administration officials that there is no connection with the impeachment process in the House of Representatives, I cannot support this military action in the Persian Gulf at this time, Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott said in a statement to the media. Both the timing and the policy are subject to question. Dick Armey, the House majority leader, said, After months of lies, the president has given millions of people around the world reason to doubt that he has sent Americans into battle for the right reasons.

  As the defense secretary and the only Republican in the cabinet, Bill Cohen volunteered to refute such insinuations at an extraordinary closed meeting with congressmen on the floor of the House later that evening. Joined by George Tenet of the CIA and Hugh Shelton of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Cohen spent ninety minutes describing for the members the rationale for the attack and its timing. Cohen, who had risen to national prominence as a member of the House Judiciary Committee some twenty-four years earlier by voting to impeach Nixon, offered his word that the strike was not politically motivated.

  From behind a table a few feet away, DeLay stood and demanded, Is there any reason why we shouldnt go ahead with the impeachment debate?

  Cohen tried to duck, saying it was not for him to dictate how the House conducted its business.

  DeLay persisted. Was there any national security reason the House cannot proceed while the military was in combat?

  Its been the tradition throughout history that when we have people out there with the risk of dying, its good to have good bipartisan support, a visibly exasperated Cohen responded, prompting applause around the chamber. Unity and bipartisan support is important for the morale of the troops.

  The House convened at 10 A.M. on Thursday, December 17, emotions roiling on all sides. Democrats were still outraged that the Republicans were even thinking of going ahead with the impeachment debate after just a days delay, while the Republicans chafed at having their motives questioned once again. On the floor, some GOP members put forth a resolution supporting the troops to make clear that their criticism of the commander in chief should not be misread, a statement approved 4175. And Newt Gingrich emerged from his self-imposed political hibernation to try to reframe the dialogue away from questioning the attack, in contrast to Lott and Armey. We have a chance today to say to the world: no matter what our constitu tional process, whether it is an election eve or it is the eve of a constitutional vote, no matter what our debates at home, we are, as a nation, prepared to lead the world, he said on the House floor. At the White House, Clinton was vindicated for insisting on praising Gingrichs internationalism in the statement issued after his resignation announcement the month before.

  From the lectern in the House chamber, Livingston announced that the impeachment debate would begin the next morning even if the bombing continued. This is a terribly unpopular measure and no one wants to deal with impeachment, but it is before us and we must deal with it, he told his colleagues, noting that Watergate proceedings went forward during the Vietnam War. Theres no way to know when the troops will have completed their mission. That was the public explanation. Privately, he believed they simply could not wait a week to vote in the midst of Christmas, and he worried there would be no way for them to regroup after the New Year.

  The Democrats were in full attack mode and staged a rally off the floor to highlight the impropriety of impeaching a commander in chief while he directed armed conflict with another country.

  That is wrong! shouted Dick Gephardt. That is wrong! That is wrong! That is wrong!

  If his colleagues thought the worn look on Livingstons face indicated the stress of the impeachment-and-war debate, they had barely begun to scratch the surface. The public battle Livingston was waging with Gephardt and the president barely compared with the anguish he was going through in private. He was assuming the mantle of leadership at a time when he would be charged with presiding over the impeachment of a president for crimes that had their origin in the same human frailty he possessed. The possibility that he might be exposed had naturally occurred to him when he decided to run for Speakera friend even warned him before the election that someone seemed to be nosing around in Louisiana. But in a classic case of self-denial, Livingston assumed that no one would ever actually follow through, and he refused to think about it. Now he had no choice. His past had come back to haunt himpossibly, he thought, at the instigation of the White House or its allies. Livingston decided the only course was to come clean. Amid all the broader debate on war and peace, he found a few moments to fill in DeLay about his dil
emma and then marched into a meeting of the House GOP leadership to confess.

  Ive been Larry Flynted, he announced.

  In a matter-of-fact tone, Livingston explained that he had had some personal relationships in the past with women other than his wife and that he was sure one of them was about to go public with her story in Hustler maga zine. While he did not offer to resign, he hinted that was an option if the situation warranted. Then he went around the room, asking each of the leaders, What do you think?

  Armey, the burly House majority leader who had been largely invisible through much of the impeachment saga, spoke up first and said it should not matter. They should not be deterred from doing their duty. The other leaders followed suit. Any qualms they had about following an admitted adulterer into an impeachment debate generated by a presidents sexual dalliances were left unspoken. Livingston had their loyalty, at least for now.

  The Speaker-to-be found a somewhat more volatile crowd two hours later when he met with the full Republican conference. The members thought they had been called together to plot strategy for the opening debate in the morning, and for ninety minutes they did just that. Livingston even delivered another lecture about how to behave once they went to the floor: Look, this is one of the toughest times this country has faced. We cant let this country think this is a railroad job. Our decorum matters. Dont let yourself be goaded into showing disrespect for the president.

  Finally, Livingstons press secretary, Mark Corallo, stepped into the room and approached his boss. The press has got it, he whispered to Livingston. Theyre beginning to run the story.

  Livingston steeled himself and signaled to Congressman J. C. Watts, the chairman of the conference, who was presiding over the meeting. Watts had been in the earlier meeting and knew what was coming when he introduced Livingston. The Speaker-to-be pulled a two-page statement out of his pocket and began reading: I have on occasion strayed from my marriage, and doing so nearly cost me my marriage and my family. I sought marriage and spiritual counseling and have received forgiveness from my wife and family, for which I am eternally grateful. This chapter was a small but painful part of the past in an otherwise wonderful marriage.

  The room erupted in disbelief and astonishment. How could this be happening? First war, now this? The Republican members were beside themselves. One exasperated congressman, Donald Manzullo from Illinois, jumped to his feet and asked how Livingston could do this to them. Why had he not disclosed this before? Manzullo demanded.

  In the next row, Charles Canady, the bookish Floridian on the Judiciary Committee, leapt up too and got in Manzullos face, telling him to shut up. Take it easy, Canady said. Things will work out.

  DeLay came to Livingstons defense, as did others, all pointing out that cheating on your wife was different from lying under oath.

  My fate is in your hands, Livingston told the group.

  CHAPTER TEN

  There are people in my partywho just hate you

  The galleries were strangely empty when members began gathering on the floor of the House of Representatives at 9 A.M. on Friday, December 18, 1998. The drawings of the impeachment of Andrew Johnson always featured galleries jam-packed with spectators, hanging over the railings and hanging on every word, conveying the impression that the nations future really stood in the balance. But 130 years later, only two of the fourteen sections reserved for the public and dignitaries overlooking the House floor were filled, as people who wanted to watch were kept waiting in a line outside the Capitol. Members milled around on the floor, more edgy than solemn. Without knowing any better, a casual visitor might assume this was the markup for a highway bill in which congressmen had plenty of pork at stake, but not the judgment of history. It would take a while for that to sink in.

  Shortly after 9 A.M., Congressman Ray LaHood, an Illinois Republican tapped by Newt Gingrich and Bob Livingston to preside over the debate because neither wanted the dubious distinction for himself, gaveled the chamber to order. The chaplain, the Reverend James David Ford, led the lawmakers in a short prayer: Where there is hatred, let us sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is discord, union; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy.

  There was, to be sure, plenty of injury, discord, and even hatred this day just one week before Christmas and little prospect for pardon, union, or love. Feelings on both sides of the aisle were raw, and the sense of grievance overwhelming. For the Democrats, it seemed unfathomable that this day had come, that they were there to impeach their president over what amounted to a peccadillo, that the majority was so hell-bent on doing so that it would not even wait until U.S. troops were out of harms way, that their own party had been rendered so impotent that they were reduced to plan ning a five-minute walkout to protest. For the Republicans, the shock had not dissipated from the revelation the night before that their own new leader had been unfaithful to his wife, a disclosure that for some fed into the doubts they harbored over what they were about to do and for others hardened their hearts out of the conviction that they had somehow been victimized again by White House dirty tricks. Nearly eleven months after the news of Clintons affair with Monica Lewinsky had first roiled national politics, despite all the power of the presidents office, despite all the efforts of the gray-haired wise men who once ruled Washington and hoped to avert this constitutional confrontation, the moment of decision had arrived. Was Clinton a capable leader who had understandably stumbled and was now being persecuted by his political enemies? Or was he a scoundrel who had so dishonored the presidency that he no longer deserved to hold it?

  As the session was getting under way, Tom DeLay summoned nearly twenty members of his staff to his conference room just off the floor. We all have to understand what we are about to do, he told his aides. Its not about winning or losing. Its not about politics. This is a very serious moment. We need to pray for strength. Everyone in the room joined hands. His head bowed, DeLay prayed for the country, for the members, and even for the president. Tears streaked down his cheeks. Please know that were not happy about doing this, he said. We see this as our responsibility.

  On the floor, a clerk, Paul Hays, read the four articles aloud in their entirety, booming out the stark accusations in his deep baritone. Willfully corrupted. Disrepute on the presidency. Betrayed his trust as president. For each article, the clerk concluded, Wherefore, William Jefferson Clinton, by such conduct, warrants impeachment and trial, and removal from office and disqualification to hold and enjoy any office of honor, trust, or profit under the United States.

  Before beginning the two-day debate, LaHood tried to set down some ground rules. While the impeachment matter is pending on the floor, he announced from the rostrum, the chair would remind members that although the personal conduct of the president is at issue, the rules prohibit members from engaging in generally personal abusive language toward the president and, also, from engaging in comparisons to personal conduct of sitting members of either House of Congress. In other words, Democrats should not talk about Livingstons affairs or, for that matter, Gingrichs ethics case. Hoots of derision arose from the Democratic side of the chamber as LaHood read his announcement. Livingston sat on the Republican side, his hands folded, his face impassive. Gingrich was nowhere to be seen.

  With all this, it was 9:50 A.M. before the articles themselves were addressed, and Henry Hyde tried to defuse the Democratic argument from the start. The question before this House is rather simple, he said, standing at a lectern and facing the rostrum. It is not a question of sex. Sexual misconduct and adultery are private acts and are none of Congresss business. It is not even a question of lying about sex. The matter before the House is a question of lying under oath. This is a public act, not a private act. This is called perjury. The matter before the House is a question of the willful, premeditated, deliberate corruption of the nations system of justice.

  Without dwelling on the details of the allegations, Hyd
e issued a rhetorical call to arms to defend the rule of law, invoking the spirit of the Ten Commandments, Mosaic law, Roman law, the Magna Carta, Bunker Hill, Concord and Lexington, Abraham Lincoln, and the soldiers who fought and won World War II. What we are telling you today are not the ravings of some vindictive political crusade, but a reaffirmation of a set of values that are tarnished and dim these days, but it is given to us to restore them so our Founding Fathers would be proud, he said. Finishing with a flourish, he added, Listen, it is your country. The president is our flag bearer. He stands out in front of our people and the flag is falling. Catch the falling flag as we keep our appointment with history.

  The Republican members jumped to their feet to applaud, while the Democrats sat and stewed. The Ten Commandments? The falling flag? It was all too much for many of them. And yet, they worried. Hyde had a mesmerizing effect at times, and if he struck them as a little grandiloquent, he presented the public with a noble face for what they saw as an ignoble cause.

  Dick Gephardt took the lectern on the other side of the aisle to open the Democratic side of the argument, but he decided to hold on to what he felt was the moral high ground of the daythe timing of the debate. Mr. Speaker, this vote today is taking place on the wrong day, and we are doing it in the wrong way. By moving forward, he warned, we send the wrong message to Saddam Hussein, to the British, to the Chinese, and to the Russians. Having made his point, Gephardt then reached out to the Republicans with an implicit reference to Livingstons crisis and tried to tie it into what the GOP caucus was doing to the president. The events of the last days sadden me. We are now at the height of a cycle of the politics of negative attacks, character assassination, personal smears of good people, decent people, worthy people. It is no wonder to me and to you that the people of our country today are cynical and indifferent and apathetic about our government and about our country. The politics of smear and slash and burn must end. At this, members on both sides of the aisle stood and applauded, a rare moment of unity on a divisive day. Livingston remained in his seat, motionless.