1973 Watergate Hearings; 1973-07-25; Part 3 of 3

in it's brainwashing and pike continues its coverage of hearings by the senate select committee on presidential campaign activities here again correspondent robert mcneil as we go back to that hearing senator evelyn mr wilson are resuming the legal debate

over authorization for the so called ellsberg break in it's big despite the robbery that's right

picasso represents the nation's one of the most ancient and universal human heart one of the profit warning and place where a man my mom would make the frame and then there's more than one of the greatest it's b and i'm renee montagne

he sent this report good about all of it maybe pouring it's the women and well the stronger you know the rain they'll what the pain of all the support that and yeah well no the greatest twenty fourteen

oh well for them right now so the set up of military commission and they tried to sit in and monitor your ancestor de

escalation problem out of the supreme court now you said that the rest of it now the political debate maybe the government it is no civilian like civilian courts like to

be or grand jury report people writing or alumni group that the president had to hear about this as you will recall the great emergency which existed at that time when the country was torn apart the supreme court unanimously rejected the law all of the competition and dave davies weyrauch and that

would be put in jail unless suspended by european law and then he proceeded to say that and why and also in a way down this race they know about the embargo more pernicious consequences during a really great experiences of bell yeah wow green at present you as they fly up

and to have our recommended oh oh at just about the patient and some violation of the national security now hear it in one of his record he has included all the national defense and operators will find our moral issue a pick about maybe especially with his patient without wearing an inhalation and i think that's so

racist up on compton is something which removes all the imagination lift pump below now we need right right o'neill do you think the same questions and in a situation set aside for prisons were you knew there was going to be an atomic attack tomorrow and that really measure of that that might be less now between some point where in between there's a long long line depends obviously on one thing to do and i can sell here today i think the thing that you're

really chooses to avoid the league you have a delightful for our own practice of interrupting something that you don't want to hear i like the fact that the nation's the connection course the plain psyched that his records in the psychiatric pro and the determination of what other laws aspiring or a foreign conspiracy which had taken these top secret documents and deliver them to a ford pop it seems to me is an unbroken chain of circumstances now i recognize that you're retired that it's fun to

say a man's emotional state be equated with national security but in fact there is a direct linkage step by step by step and that's what i think we have to lay on the table in libya now as this is going and putting a gun in somebody's i think conceivable set of circumstances a different kind of national security situation such as this impending attack or something and i can hypothetically was such a measure might very well be the very frank that the president might determine was necessary and you'll recall that the congress in recognizing this virus at such means as the president showed the term and that i think has just wasn't pointed out this morning was endorsed by the committee which you are the terms well you said that and as

a person oh man and security as jack and i get it that i think this morning in part the judge field case which is suspect and on this cunningham again yes yes what was

suspected based upon that the constitutional right i don't know i don't know if it was one of the pilot the homicide justifiable homicide just about now i'm unintelligible the roulette wheel of a long have a right to kill not to the more

lawless areas there is a murder case with that bill cosby for the second day john ehrlichman has insisted on his complete innocence and apparently he could relive the entire watergate situation you would make few if any changes in his own actions that means position stands in contrast with most of the other witnesses so far even john mitchell grab of the committee very little did admit that he might have made the wrong decision in keeping news of the watergate from the president in terms of his total protestations of innocence can be compared to only with finance committee chairman murray stands there is still a lot of questions for john ehrlichman and his continuing appearances a

witness could throw the whole committee calendar out of kilter as things now stand the committee plans to hear about a dozen more witnesses including charles colson an h r haldeman within the next seven days but there now appears to be a possibility of development alone would take this entire week and parliament had taken equal length of time gentlemen nevertheless says he still hopes the committee can conclude this phase of the hearings by august third the full day of legal arguments long breaks or senate votes but then don't live from john ehrlichman for a long time longtime observer of congressional investigations is back with us in john kramer the georgetown university law center once the hearing was that i thought he had to say for yourself first it was about saying to me that day was tremendously interesting and coupled with the testimony yesterday marked the movement of these hearings i think in a

very very ominous direction think that the legislative branch of the government is on a collision course with the executive branch and that has very serious a very serious plot turns out for our country the nature of this controversy has more not only by the president's refusal to provide the tapes but by his refusal even enter into our conversation conference with senator levin the chairman of the committee and it's not so why buy the very great gravity of the constitutional principles that are at stake here on the one hand there's a recession and that the president is not limited by the constitution of the united states when he asserts that the national security requires him to act outside the constitution to assume powers which option

that night to him buy provisions of the bill of rights center there haven't made a magnificent magnificent argument against that theory today for my own part i think that there has not been a sacred since the time of king george the theories the notion that a man's house finance office may be invaded offices a film or without a warrant when an executive research that that's national security just before easter not since the roots of assistance and general warrants which the founders of this republican building dams has to be in persona so extravagant and so outrageous and the session of executive authority over to that you did not agree then that this authority exists in any way above and beyond the facts of the ellsberg cases are department will say it i think that it is a contradiction of the

very essence of our politics of character of our political system hours as a system of limited powers powers limited by the charter the constitution of the united states and the essential difference between a free society in a totalitarian society is a free society is one in which the governor with limited powers which it may exercise i did go back on monday and after the suppression of judicial philosophy which i certainly agree with a political philosophy and i should point out that in twenty some odd years ago the supreme court decided that it was a soviet spy had privacy rights in his hotel room wastebasket witchey the way by throwing things in it which seems to be a little more than this year mr wilson are willing to give this iconic has more samples of suspected today's hearings i think you see despite what might continue in the next few days of john ehrlichman against the world and i think the restaurant and perhaps regain is woody's takes on

today yesterday was the comeback obviously very sympathetic figure and it goes after a <unk> hoover and some people may not like for some reasons but not normally for the reason cited by mr erlichman because of hoover a bureaucrat guilty of window dressing and he's reaching out there just differently about one that he doesn't really need in fact all of his religious testimonies and seemed to contradict almost everything everybody else that it could be right and they could be well what is that a lot of people to stand up against for example there are some clashes in the afternoon and in the morning testimony the concierge mr grenier said that the president spoke to him that having talked about medical center about clemency for the watergate seven those are on tapes that committee is trying to get this close mr wittman denies any such discussions of france in fact as the president back in july talk about policy but said don't talk about it when he's asked why the president into law but what's safe in the context mr adams as we also have it in there watching safely open and therefore we've

never done anything with the contents of a safe thing says we're going to one sixth of the great documents mr rickman to know that he ever told was degraded by the doctor to get rid of the documents is that way if you're not involving the watergate itself directly said he did what about living in hot like the end of the day with morning what happened there oregon destroyed and they disappear for his release at it from the white house around the edges of cameroon later returned great about six or seven months later clinton has to be you have to get approval from the acropolis forgotten that at least the quake well those points out to greet john that because of the delays today the senate votes on those long initial argument that we do have some bourbon just came back two at the close that the rigorous cross examination of mr rickman to pursue these and other points though still has yet to come and outcomes more i think certain says they hope to finish of mr lippman the mock seems to stop puppy and rather unlikely that the current officials say

john thank you very much during one of the recesses today senator allen offered his comments on the strained relations between the white house and the senate committee he was asked about reports that president nixon thinks the committee is out to get him welcome amy and ali you're not going to make me happy in the white house

that the president had no connection with authorizing the watergate on and no connection that problem i just take one of jon cryer response a little further it really is a very strange argument that john erlichman is making of appeals or breaking he claims the president has an inherent power to authorize such an act other was illegal in the name of national security it also blames the president didn't authorize the burglary of the psychiatrist's office and neither did he ehrlichman he says mr nelson did authorize the plumbers had to find out everything they could as about ellsworth is a matter of the highest priority and urban says the improved in writing the poem is called a covert operation are examined the psychiatric records he didn't mean burglary says and if he'd known that's what an outlet intended he wouldn't have approved it was from california why was he surprised the minority is such an entry was justifiable as he

claims why did they exercise bad judgment such an action could be justifiable on national security grounds if i run or move them off the case now because it was too important to find out about albert mr nixon also told us on may twenty second that it was important to find out about ellsberg but he didn't play when a constitutional justification for the rhetoric mr nixon said it was illegal so why is mr erlichman now making an argument to justify an act both he and the president say they didn't approve and what's the president thought was illegal it just doesn't get out unless it's just a lot of baby easily arouse constitutional law watchdog looking in samara if the object were to distract the committee from questioning about other matters it were today or is mr erlichman trying to suggest in a roundabout way but the president did approve the burglary after all i repeat it just doesn't add up we'll be back tomorrow

night for peter gaytan jim lehrer says robert mcneill good night for impact from washington and you've been watching gavel to gavel videotape coverage of hearing about the senate select committee on presidential campaign activities as coverage is made possible by grants for special event coverage from the corporation for public broadcasting and the ford foundation and has been a production of unpacked and a vision of a greater washington educational telecommunications association so lenin fb to pay