Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!americast.com!americast.com!americast-post Newsgroups: americast.twt.news From: americast-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: americast-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: Bush slow to use pardon privilege, granting just 38 Date: Tue, 10 Nov 92 15:13:22 EST Message-ID: \SE A;WORLD \HD Bush slow to use pardon privilege, granting just 38 \BY Carol Innerst \CR THE WASHINGTON TIMES President Bush, urged during his final days in office to pardon former Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger and others implicated in the Iran-Contra affair, has been stingy with his pardons. He has used executive clemency only 39 times during his presidency, granting 38 pardons and one commutation out of 1,296 applications received through Sept. 30. He hasn't issued a pardon since July, 1991, U.S. Department of Justice spokesman Matthew Jeanneret said yesterday. In contrast, Jimmy Carter granted 534 pardons and 32 commutations in his single term, and Gerald Ford issued 382 pardons and 27 commutations in his 2 1/2 years as president. Mr. Bush does not have to wait for supplicants to ask for a pardon. "The president under Article II, Section 2 of the Constitution has the right to grant clemency without going through normal Justice Department procedures," Mr. Jeanneret said. Mr. Weinberger, twice indicted by special prosecutor Lawrence Walsh's office, has not sought clemency through the department. Records show the bulk of Mr. Bush's pardons were extended to individuals convicted of white-collar crimes. The biggest "name" President Bush pardoned was the late oilman Armand Hammer, in 1989, when he was 91. Mr. Hammer had been convicted of making illegal campaign contributions in a sidelight to the Watergate scandal. Political analysts thought Gerald Ford's blanket pardon of Richard Nixon after the Watergate scandal cost him the 1976 election. Former President Ronald Reagan, who granted 393 pardons and 13 commutations, resisted pressure to pardon Iran-Contra figures Oliver North and Robert Poindexter. Sen. Orrin G. Hatch, Utah Republican, said at the time it "would take a lot of guts" for Mr. Reagan to absolve his former aides, because pardons in Iran-Contra could be perceived by voters as the final act of a White House cover-up. During his first term, Mr. Reagan denied pardons to two Watergate principals, Jeb Stuart Magruder and E. Howard Hunt Jr. He pardoned Eugenio Martinez, one of the men who took part in the 1972 burglary of the Democratic Party's offices, described as "perhaps the least culpable" of the Watergate participants. But before leaving office, Mr. Reagan pardoned New York Yankees baseball owner George M. Steinbrenner III. Mr. Steinbrenner had been convicted and fined $15,000 in 1974 for an illegal contribution to the 1972 re-election campaign of President Nixon. Mr. Reagan commuted the prison sentence of former Maryland Gov. Marvin Mandel in December 1981. Mandel began serving a three-year sentence in May 1980 after his conviction in a mail fraud and racketeering case. One of the most controversial pardons in the history of the presidency occurred on Christmas Eve 1921, when Warren Harding pardoned Eugene Debs, three-time Socialist candidate for president, jailed for wartime seditious activity in 1918. He had four more years to serve when he was pardoned, despite the opposition of Harding's Cabinet members. President Woodrow Wilson had refused to pardon Debs. Harding and his successor, Calvin Coolidge, stepped up pardons of "political prisoners" after the country's controversial participation in World War I. Harding pardoned 27 "Wobblies," members of the radical Industrial Workers of the World. The Constitution grants the president broad authority to issue pardons. The scope of the law was defined in an 1867 Supreme Court decision that involved Augustus Garland, a member of the Confederate Congress from Arkansas who had been granted a full pardon by President Andrew Johnson and was seeking restoration of his right to practice law. "When a pardon is full," the majority opinion said, "it releases the punishment, and blots out of existence the guilt." Then one of the nation's leading lawyers, Mr. Garland later served as Arkansas governor and as U.S. attorney general under President Cleveland. Franklin D. Roosevelt granted 2,721 pardons and 966 commutations in three full terms and a few weeks in office. President Truman granted 1,911 pardons and 133 commutations. Dwight Eisenhower followed with 1,110 pardons and 47 commutations, and John F. Kennedy gave 471 pardons and 104 commutations before he was assassinated. Lyndon B. Johnson granted 960 pardons and 227 commutations; Richard Nixon 863 pardons and 63 commutations. In one of the most renowned commutations, President Nixon commuted the prison sentence of Jimmy Hoffa, former Teamster leader who had been convicted of jury tampering and fraud, in 1971 for what he called humanitarian reasons and Mr. Hoffa's "excellent" prison record. In 1979 President Carter commuted Patty Hearst's sentence after she served 23 months of a seven-year prison term. ****PHOTO/BOX A PRESIDENTIAL PARDONS SAMPLER Some of the more notable presidential pardons in U.S. history: * George Washington in 1794 pardoned the Pennsylvania corn farmers who tarred and feathered federal revenuers during the Whiskey Rebellion. * Thomas Jefferson pardoned those convicted of violating the Alien and Sedition Acts enacted under John Adams. * Abraham Lincoln in 1863 and Andrew Johnson in 1868 proclaimed anmesty for Confederate soldiers and their Northern sympathizers. * Andrew Johnson in 1869 pardoned Dr. Samuel A. Mudd, who set the broken leg of John Wilkes Booth after he assassinated Abraham Lincoln. * Warren Harding in 1921 pardoned Eugene V. Debs, perennial Socialist candidate for president, who was jailed for seditious activity in 1918. Harding pardoned dozens who were jailed under the World War I sedition and espionage laws, including 27 "Wobblies," members of the radical Industrial Workers of the World. * Calvin Coolidge freed the few political prisoners Harding didn't pardon. * Lyndon Johnson in 1966 pardoned former D.C. drug czar Sterling Tucker, indicted for filing inaccurate income tax returns in the 1950s. * Richard Nixon in 1971 pardoned Teamsters union leader Jimmy Hoffa, convicted of jury tampering and fraud, with the condition that he would never again become involved in union activities. * Gerald Ford in 1974 granted a "full, free and absolute pardon" to Richard Nixon, forced to resign in the wake of the Watergate scandal. * Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter signed amnesties for draft evaders of the Vietnam War. * Ronald Reagan in 1989 pardoned New York Yankees baseball owner George Steinbrenner. He had been convicted and fined $15,000 in 1974 for an illegal contribution to the 1972 re-election campaign of President Nixon. * George Bush in 1989 pardoned oil man Armand Hammer, then 91, who was convicted of making illegal campaign contributions in a sidelight to the Watergate scandal. This article is copyright 1992 The Washington Times. Redistribution to other sites is not permitted except by arrangement with American Cybercasting Corporation. For more information, send-email to usa@AmeriCast.COM