In dismissing Paula Jones’s sexual-harassment suit against President Bill Clinton before it went to trial, Judge Susan Webber Wright sounded a note of clarity amidst the din of accusations surrounding the president. Judge Wright, a Republican appointed by President George Bush, ruled that even if Jones’s allegations were true, such behavior, however crude, did not constitute sexual harassment under Arkansas law. The spuriousness of Jones’s case was long noted by commentators familiar with sexual harassment law and not necessarily sympathetic to Clinton. Moreover, Judge Wright’s decision confirms the public’s suspicion that, however morally flawed Clinton may be as a husband, the attempt to criminalize his private life is largely politically motivated. In the absence of any plausible evidence linking Clinton to criminal acts, the American public rightly continues to give him the benefit of the doubt. At this juncture it is impossible to know how much truth, if any, there was in Jones’s allegations concerning a vulgar sexual proposition. But one thing does seem clear. Financed and managed by right-wing groups whose transparent interest was in damaging Clinton politically, Jones sadly appears to have allowed herself to be as exploited by her advocates as she alleges she was by the then governor of Arkansas.
Several other aspects of Clinton’s ongoing problems are also clearer in the wake of the Wright decision. First, last year’s Supreme Court ruling allowing Jones to bring suit against Clinton is an open invitation for politically motivated attacks against any sitting president. The decision, which implausibly argued that such suits would not be an undue distraction to presidents, should be reversed. Given the president’s unique role in the American constitutional system, impeachment should remain the mechanism for holding a president accountable to the law. Private civil suits should be postponed until the office holder finishes his or her elected term.
Second, the Jones decision throws a harsh light on the four-year, and so far essentially fruitless, investigation of Independent Prosecutor Kenneth Starr. Initially appointed to determine if the president was responsible for any Whitewater-related crimes, Starr recently has piggy-backed his efforts to the Jones case. In turning to the murky questions surrounding Clinton’s sexual behavior, Starr has resorted to highly questionable tactics-including forcing the mother of Monica Lewinsky, Clinton’s alleged paramour, to testify under oath about her daughter as well as subpoenaing records of Lewinsky’s book purchases-and further undermined his own credibility. At this late date, Starr’s foraging into Clinton’s sex life seems desperate; his methods chilling. Rumors abound concerning what charges Starr may finally bring against Lewinsky or Clinton and others. But whatever Starr comes up with, the burden of proof should remain with him and with the House Judiciary Committee that receives his report concerning the president. Clinton may be guilty of lying under oath or obstruction of justice. But as the Jones case demonstrates, given the inherently political nature of anything touching on the presidency, it is as naive to presume a president’s guilt as it is to believe his every protestation.
Finally, the independent prosecutor law must be rethought or allowed to expire. No president, Democrat or a Republican, can do the job he or she is elected to do if made the object of an open-ended criminal investigation that itself is virtually unaccountable to any other branch of government.
