The MacNeil/Lehrer Report; Bert Lance's Resignation

ROBERT MacNEIL: Good evening. Late this afternoon, in the most emotional public moment of his presidency, Jimmy Carter announced the resignation of his Budget Director, Bert Lance. The President said he believed that Mr. Lance had done nothing wrong, in office or before, but he thought for personal reasons it was the right decision. But this emotional climax to the long, drawn-out examination of Mr. Lance`s financial and-banking practices clearly leaves opinion in the nation -- and in Washington -- as divided as the conflicting sentiments in the President`s own breast. Tonight, with two members of the Senate committee which led the investigation, and a leading political columnist, we examine the questions the resignation leaves. First, this is how Mr. Carter announced the decision at a White House news conference:

PRESIDENT CARTER: I would like to read first a letter that I have just received from Bert Lance. "My Dear Mr. President, there is no need for me to go into the events of the last few weeks. You know them well, as do the American people. You also know that previously I had said three things to you about the importance of the so-called `Lance affair.` I will recall those for you. "First, it was, and is, important that my name and reputation be cleared -- for me, my wife, my children, my grandchildren and those who have trust and faith in me. And I believe that this has been done. As I said at the Senate hearings, my conscience is clear.

"Second, it was, and-is, important for me to be able to say that people should be willing to make the necessary sacrifices and be willing to serve their government and country. This I can still say, and say proudly.

"Third, I believe in the absolute need for government to be able to attract good people from the private sector. We must find ways to encourage these people.

"As to my position as Director of the Office of Management and Budget, I hope the American people feel that during my eight months in office I have met well my responsibilities and performed well my tasks. This has been an important aspect of the entire matter. However, I have. to ask the question: At what price do I remain?

"My only intention in coming to Washington in the first place was to make a contribution to this country and to you. I am convinced that I can continue to be an effective Director of the Office of Management and Budget. However, because of the amount of controversy and the continuing nature of it, I have decided to submit my resignation as Director of OMB. I desire to return to my native state of Georgia.

"It has been a high privilege and honor to be a part of your administration. Hopefully I have made a contribution which will be of lasting value. "Respectfully yours, signed, Bert Lance."

Bert Lance is my friend. I know him personally as well as if he was my own brother. I know him without any doubt in my mind or heart to be a good, and an honorable man. He was given this past weekend a chance to answer thousands of questions that had been raised about him, unproved allegations that had been raised against him. And he did it well. He told the truth. And I think he proved that our system of government works, because when he was given a chance to testify on his own behalf he was able to clear his name.

My responsibility along with Bert`s has been and is to make sure that the American people can have justified confidence in our own government, and we also have an additional responsibility which is just as difficult, and that is to protect the reputation of decent men and women. Nothing that I have heard or read has shaken my belief in Bert`s ability or integrity. There have been numerous allegations which I admit are true, that a lot of the problem has been brought on Bert Lance by me because of the extraordinary standards that we have tried to set in government and the expectations of the American people that were engendered during my own campaign, in my inauguration statement and as has been so strongly supported by Bert in his voluntary sacrifice, financially and otherwise, to come to Washington.

It was I who insisted that Bert agree to sell his substantial holdings in bank stock. Had he stayed there, in a selfish fashion, and enriched himself and his own family financially, I`m sure he would have been spared any allegations of impropriety. But he wanted to come to Washington and serve his government because I asked him to. And he did.

I accept Bert`s resignation with the greatest sense of regret and sorrow; he`s a good man. Even those who have made other statements about Bert have never alleged on any occasion that he did not do a good job as the Director of the Office of Management and Budget. He`s close to me, and always will be, and I think he`s made the right decision because it would be difficult for him to devote full time to his responsibilities in the future. And although-I regret his resignation, I do accept it.

MacNEIL: The Senate`s Governmental Affairs Committee, which questioned Mr. Lance for three days last week, was divided -- largely, but not strictly, along party lines. It often appeared that the Republicans were the prosecutors and the Democrats the-counsel for the defense. One of the Republicans who sometimes appeared in the prosecutor`s role was Senator William Roth of Delaware. Senator, was this the right decision?

Sen. WILLIAM ROTH: Yes, I do think it was the right decision, both for Mr. Lance and for the President. As a matter of fact, I went to a breakfast at the White House this morning, at which I gave the President a letter in which I urged this course of action.

MacNEIL: You did. How do you read the President`s judgment that Mr. Lance had done nothing wrong, but resignation was the right thing?

ROTH: Well, I can only speak for my own judgment. And what I said in the letter to the President is that I was deeply disturbed by a number of Mr. Lance`s answers in the testimony, by a number of his acts. At least, in my judgment it raised some very substantial questions about standards of ethics. And to me the great strength of this administration has been that it was insisting on a very high standard of ethics.

MacNEIL: What would have been the result, Senator, if the President had "hung in there," or "toughed it out," as he was being urged to do?

ROTH: Of course, there was nothing the committee could do. The ultimate decision had to be that of the President and Mr. Lance. There was no way...

MacNEIL: What would the political consequence have been if he had done that? Was it a viable political option for him, do you think?

ROTH: Well, I think it would have hurt if it dragged on. We`ve got a lot of serious problems -- energy, and so forth -- and I think the longer this matter dragged on our attention was diverted from the energy and other problems to this, and for that reason I think it would have been most unfortunate.

MacNEIL: Was it in you mind, Senator, when you handed that letter recommending resignation to the President today that to your knowledge allegations against Mr. Lance were going to continue to accumulate, or that everything that was going to be known was already known?

ROTH: Well, as you well know, both yesterday and today there were a number of new matters reported in the press. I had no personal opportunity to study or evaluate them, but it appeared that things would keep popping out.

MacNEIL: Did you, as a Republican, examining your own conscience in this, ever-have a faint feeling that perhaps in this case the Democrats were getting a bit of their own back after Watergate?

ROTH: No, I don`t think that was the issue; I would hope not.

MacNEIL: Where does this leave Mr. Carter in his own presidential credibility? Is it severely damaged? Damaged at all? What do you think?

ROTH: Well, I think in all candor, of course it`s hurt the President some, but I don`t think irreparably. I think now we`ll settle back and get to some of these other problems, like energy, as I was just mentioning, and I would hope that each one of us certainly -speaking for this Senator -- I intend to decide those on the merits.

MacNEIL: And one final question. How do you read the argument that Mr. Carter just repeated Mr. Lance making about the difficulty perhaps, from here on in, of getting able people from business to come and serve in government if they were going to be subjected to that kind of scrutiny?

ROTH: Well, I think there`s a certain amount of merit to that statement. Undoubtedly it`s going to make it more complex. At the same time, I think we had an obligation to look into the facts, and I would hope that in the future we would treat everybody with fairness.

MacNEIL: Thank you, Senator. The Senator who appeared to many as Mr. Lance`s chief defender on the committee was Democrat Sam Nunn of Georgia. At one point Senator Nunn said if the committee were a court of law, he would move for a dismissal of charges on grounds of insufficient evidence. Senator Nunn, do you still feel that way?

Sen. SAM NUNN: Well, of course I made it plain that it wasn`t a court of law and I wasn`t the defense attorney, but I do believe that on the basis of the evidence we actually heard before the committee -- and I`m not talking about the editorials or the broadcasts or the newspapers or the radio or television, I`m talking about the evidence before the committee -- did not indicate that there had been any violation of the law by Bert Lance, and I think that it indicated very clearly that our committee was on notice back before the confirmation about all of these charges that we`ve been hearing so much about in the last thirty to forty-five days, with the exception of the airplane. And I happen to agree with Senator Danforth`s statement that a card laid is a card played. I think we should have judged Mr. Lance on his performance in office once we determined that there was no fraud in the inducement -- that is, the confirmation process.

MacNEIL: Has he been, in your view, unfairly hounded from office?

NUNN: Well, I wouldn`t want to use that word, Robert, but I don`t believe this day will go back as one of the glorious days in the history of our republic or in the history of `the news media, or the U.S. Senate, for that matter.

MacNEIL: One of your Democratic colleagues said on the Senate floor just after the President made the announcement, he accused the new media of going after Bert Lance`s scalp, and he said, "Well, they`ve gotten his scalp, but there`s a serious question whether the best interests of this government have been served." Do you agree with that?

NUNN:I think there`s a serious question whether the best interests of this government have been served. Bert Lance is an honorable man, he`s a dedicated man, he`s dedicated to balancing the budget, he was leading the President`s reorganization team, he was trying to do something about the proliferation of paperwork that has harassed our small businessmen all over the country; so I share many of his philosophical goals. I certainly don`t think that the federal government is better off for his leaving.

MacNEIL: Did you urge Mr. Carter to keep him?

NUNN: No, I felt that was a decision that the President and Bert Lance had to make. It was clear that I was a friend of Bert Lance; I make no apology to that. I told all the members of the committee that to begin with. It was also clear that I was going to do everything possible to make sure he had a fair hearing in his day in court; but after doing that I felt that the final decision had to be the President`s and Bert Lance`s.

MacNEIL: Could he have stayed, politically?

NUNN: Well, Robert, if you drew a line right now and you said that`s the end of the allegations and that`s the end of the investigations and that`s the end of the Congressional hearings, yes; no doubt about it. I was flooded with calls from people all over the United States, and I think other offices were also, in great support of Mr. Lance. But the way the real world is, perhaps we would have seen a continuation of the same thing we`ve seen for the last forty-five days: charge after charge after charge; and if that had continued, it would have been very difficult if not impossible for him to have performed his job as he would have liked to.

MacNEIL: Senator, what went wrong here in the system? What happened, in your view?

NUNN: I don`t know; I`ve been doing a lot of thinking about that and I`m going to do a lot more. I`ve made some statements in recent days about it. I think that we have to have a national examination of where we stand in the post-Watergate era, I think the national news media has to examine their own role. I think we have to be concerned about preserving the First Amendment and freedom of the press, but I think the news media has to realize that that`s not the only part of the U.S. Constitution. So we do have a lot of self-examination, I think, in Congress and in the media and in the American public because we`ve got to be able to attract good men in office, good women, and we`ve got to ensure that they will be treated with at least a modicum of fairness and equity once they`re there and that they will not be charged on matters that are totally false by sources that have not been corroborated or confirmed, and I`m afraid that`s been the case with the Lance matter.

MacNEIL: That is the charge you would make explicitly to the new media or some part of it, would you?

NUNN: Well, there`s no doubt about the fact that almost every broadcast and every newspaper in the country carried a charge of embezzlement against Mr. Lance that was made by a person in the federal penitentiary with no corroborating evidence whatsoever. That charge has since been, I think, withdrawn by all the persons who gave it credibility to begin with, and I think it`s been shown to have no corroboration; it`s been rebutted by the attorney who represented him, by the person who prosecuted him, by the bonding company who was trying to find something wrong with the bank so they wouldn`t have to pay the bank. So it`s been thoroughly refuted, but it was broadcast all over this country, and I think great harm was done; even in my state, where people know Bert Lance and like him, there was a great deal of harm done in that charge. So there`s no doubt about that; the record is clear on that.

MacNEIL: Thank you, Senator. Let`s hear now from a political columnist in Washington who spent many years documenting the rise and fall of politicians, Democratic and Republican. Robert Novak is one half of the nationally syndicated Evans and Novak team. Bob, how do you read the political logic in Mr. Carter`s statement that Mr. Lance had done nothing wrong but it was right to resign? Let me rephrase that in a different way. He said he needed his day in court, he got his day in court; in effect the verdict was "not guilty", but he should go.

ROBERT NOVAK: Robin, I think it is illogical, and I think in many ways the President gets the worst of two worlds. Because by defending Bert Lance to the very end and saying he`s a good man he displeases those who want to establish a new post-Watergate standard that is probably impossible to achieve and run a government with anybody but men of no experience whatever. On the other hand, by in effect succumbing to the pressure from the establishment, if I might say -- not merely the press, but the politicians on the Hill of both parties and leading editorial writers, columnists -- the President does not come off as a man who is going to stand up for his lieutenants who are in trouble to the bitter end. So I think that in many ways, as you imply, there is illogic in his position, and he ends up, I think, getting the worst of two worlds politically.

MacNEIL: Given the swing in public opinion after the hearings, and divided opinion in Washington on the Hill, could Mr. Carter have decided to fight it out? Was that a realistic political option?

NOVAK: Probably not, for this reason, the same as Senator Nunn mentioned: if there was a cutoff in the allegations against Mr. Lance I do believe he could have stuck it out, but there was going to be no cutoff. For example, this morning a wire service put out an account that the SEC was taking an action against one of Lance`s banks. This was later denied by the SEC categorically, that no action was going to be taken. But most people I talked to today didn`t ever see the denial, they saw only the allegation and said, "Ah, it`s going to continue on forever." That`s the kind of what Senator Eagleton called "guilt by accumulation" that I think would continue. So I think that practically, President Carter had no choice but to get rid of Mr. Lance. Of course, everybody`s wondering whether Mr. Lance jumped or was kicked out the window today; and the White House insists that he did it voluntarily, but I believe if he had done it voluntarily he would have been pushed.

MacNEIL: What do you feel about how the press has performed in this affair?

NOVAK: I don`t think they`ve performed very well, although I`m probably in a minority position in my own trade on this matter. But I believe that I detected a certain glee and a certain nostalgia of being back in the heady days of Watergate around town when of course this wasn`t Watergate at all or anything close to it. I think the fact that my colleague Bill Safire of the New York Times called it "Lancegate" and that a lot of my colleagues have since used that phrase indicates a distortion of values in picking up an accumulation of charges that I think are unique in causing the fall of a cabinet level officer and attributing to them something equivalent to the scandal that would have impeached -- caused the impeachment of a President and did force his resignation.

MacNEIL: I`d like to ask all of you now, to come back to you, Senator Roth: has Mr. Lance, as the President said, cleared his reputation and exonerated himself?

ROTH: Well, just speaking for myself, what concerned me, sitting through the hearings, was that in a number of circumstances his conduct, his acts, did not meet what I would hope would be my standard of ethics. I was very much bothered by the pattern of overdrafts, I was bothered by his double collateral. One of the things that bothered me the most in the testimony of Mr. Lance was that a number of times he said, "Well, I probably wouldn`t do it again." But the reason seemed to be, in my judgment, because it embarrassed him. It wasn`t a question of right or wrong, and that bothered me very much, and I did mention that to the President in my letter to him.

MacNEIL: Senator Nunn, do you believe that Mr. Lance has exonerated himself and cleared his reputation?

NUNN: Well, I think it depends on everybody`s standard. If you`re looking for angelic behavior and if you want the standards to be such that no human being can qualify for that position, I would say that he did not clear himself. But if you concede that everyone going through life makes mistakes, that everyone has certain blemishes and that if everyone were put under a microscope, like the perfect diamond there would be flaws, then I think he has exonerated himself. Blemishes, yes. Mistakes, yes. Violations of honor or integrity or ethics or a violation of any kind of criminal law in this country, no. There was no evidence whatsoever of that.

MacNEIL: What do you think about Mr. Carter taking some of the blame on himself for in effect asking for perfect diamonds in office?

NUNN: Of course, if anyone had asked me before the Carter administration came into power I would have told them frankly, we`re not going to be ruled by angels. It depends on the expectations. Jimmy Carter is a dedicated person, he`s a good person, he`s an honest person, he`s going to do his very best to have honor and integrity in government. Bert `Lance is the same kind of person, but all of us are going to stumble; and again, those of us in government and I think the American people, have to realize that perfection is something that we`re not going to accomplish and if we drive everyone out of high office that falls short of perfection then we`re going to have a very hard time in this country.

MacNEIL: Senator Roth? Do you have a response to that?

ROTH: Yes. What bothers me -- I agree, we can`t expect perfection. But I must say, I don`t think in this particular instance we were talking about perfection. A number of the answers of Mr. Lance did not meet the standard of ethics that I have found in being a lawyer and advising businessmen, and to me there were some very substantial serious charges raised. I think right now we`ve had erosion of confidence in public servants, a very serious one. I agree with Sam that we can`t expect angels. But I. do think, as the President himself has stated in the past, that we had to have people that were trustworthy, that knew right from wrong; otherwise we`re going to continue to suffer an erosion of confidence on the part of the people.

MacNEIL: You`re both members of the committee that will -- unless some new committee is set up, as there is talk -- will have to investigate and confirm any successor and other Presidential appointees. Is this standard going to make the work of that committee, either the present one or a new one, impossible? Senator Nunn?

NUNN: Certainly it`s not going to make it impossible. Government is going to go on, we`re going to confirm a new OMB director at some point in our history. I`m sure that whoever is asked to take this job is going to go back and do a little searching into their own record as to whether they want everything they`ve ever done in their life to be exposed, because I would predict there will be an over confirmation examination this time; if there was an under examination of Mr. Lance, who ever`s coming in next time better count all the problems that they might have in their background. So it is going to be very difficult. And I think the key here is -- I don`t disagree with my good friend`s aspirations for the kind of qualifications we need in office, but when the Senate committee has basically ninety to ninety-five percent of all the allegations that have come out against Bert Lance in the last two months prior to confirmation, prior to confirmation, and by the clear record does not pursue this and does not ask him detailed questions and does not really conduct a rigorous confirmation process, then we have to ask ourselves, do we have the right, really, to basically ask for his resignation because we didn`t do the job we should have done? And I think the relevant question should have been, before our committee, once we established that there was no misleading by Mr. Lance, no fraud in the inducement of the committee in the confirmation process, then the real question should have been, was he doing a capable job in office? And the interesting thing was in the whole summer, the long summer for the Lance family, there have been no allegations of impropriety by Bert Lance as Director of OMB.

MacNEIL: Just quickly, gentlemen, in conclusion: Bob Novak, is this the end of the Lance affair?

NOVAK: I don`t think so, because I was talking to some White House aides earlier this evening and they believed that there is going to be an attempt to extend the scandal, extend the inquiry, to President Carter. So I think really on three scores it`s going to continue: question of whether the President`s financial involvement is connected with Lance`s; secondly, whether there is a lower level of morality and ethics in the administration; and third, I think that the surrender of the President, or the fact that he decided he must get rid of Mr. Lance, fits a pattern that on almost every issue in the eight months that he`s been President where Mr. Carter has been seriously confronted he`s retreated, and people are beginning to see that.

MacNEIL: I wish we could take that up, Bob, but we`re out of time.

Thank you all, Senators and Bob Novak in Washington. Jim Lehrer and I will be back tomorrow night and we`ll examine what the Senate is doing to the President`s energy bill, and why. I`m Robert MacNeil. Good night.