Hostname: page-component-7479d7b7d-fwgfc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-08T23:49:55.487Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

“Above the Written Law”: Iran-Contra and the Mirage of the Rule of Law

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 May 2024

Alan McPherson Open the ORCID record for Alan McPherson [Opens in a new window]
Alan McPherson*
Affiliation:
Department of History, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA, USA
*
Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Why have scandalous sprees of lawbreaking by U.S. government officials proven so seductive yet so difficult to prosecute? This article takes the Iran-Contra scandal of the Reagan–Bush era as an instructive case study and red flag in the attitudinal erosion of the belief in the rule of law among American conservatives. Before the scandal broke, officials and legal counsels willfully mis-interpreted a clear prohibition to fund counter-revolutionaries and fabricated a post-facto presidential permission in order to sell weapons to Iran without congressional oversight. Congress's assumption that government officials would obey its statutes resulted in neither wrongdoing being punishable by criminal sanctions. Conservatives therefore argued that ends justified neglecting certain laws while also denying they had broken any laws. Prosecutors found themselves compelled to prosecute Iran-Contra's defendants over more prosaic crimes such as lying and stealing rather than more abstract and damaging ones. President George H. W. Bush's pardon of Iran-Contra defendants contributed to an impunity that further eroded the American rule of law to this day.

Type
Original Article
Information
Law and History Review , Volume 42 , Issue 2 , May 2024 , pp. 393 - 415
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of American Society for Legal History

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Testimony of Elliott Abrams, Albert Hakim, David M. Lewis, Bretton G. Sciaroni, and Fawn Hall: Joint Hearings Before the Senate Select Committee on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition and the House Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran: June 2, 3, 4, 5, 8, and 9, 1987, 100th Congress, 1st Session, vol. 100-5 (Washington, D.C.: USGPO, 1988), 552.

2 Among those investigated but not charged were Vice President George H. W. Bush; Attorney General Ed Meese; White House Chief of Staff Donald Regan; U.S. Ambassador to Costa Rica Lewis Tambs; Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs Richard Armitage; CIA Deputy Director Robert Gates; Colin Powell, Weinberger's senior military assistant; Donald Gregg, national security adviser to Bush; an anonymous senior CIA field officer in Central America; James Adkins, chief of a CIA facility in Central America; Army Colonel James Steele, the military group commander at the U.S. embassy in El Salvador; Fawn Hall; Ambassador to El Salvador Edwin Corr; William Zucker, the Enterprise's Swiss financial manager; and various officers and employees of the National Endowment for the Preservation of Liberty. See Walsh, Lawrence E., Iran-Contra: The Final Report (New York: Times Books, 1994)Google Scholar.

3 Marshall, Jonathan, Scott, Peter Dale and Hunter, Jane, The Iran Contra Connection: Secret Teams and Covert Operations in the Reagan Era (Boston, MA: South End Press, 1987)Google Scholar; Mayer, Jane and McManus, Doyle, Landslide: The Unmaking of the President, 1984–1988 (Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1988)Google Scholar; Koh, Harold Hongju, The National Security Constitution: Sharing Power after the Iran-Contra Affair (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1990)Google Scholar; Draper, Theodore, A Very Thin Line: The Iran-Contra Affairs (New York: Hill and Wang, 1991)Google Scholar; Wroe, Ann, Lives, Lies and the Iran-Contra Affair (London: I. B. Tauris & Co Ltd, 1992)Google Scholar; and Lynch, Michael and Bogen, David, The Spectacle of History: Speech, Text, and Memory at the Iran-Contra Hearings (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1996)Google Scholar.

4 Byrne, Malcolm, Iran-Contra: Reagan's Scandal and the Unchecked Abuse of Presidential Power (Lawrence: University of Kansas Press, 2014)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5 Newland, Chester A., “Faithful Execution of the Law and Empowering Public Confidence,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 21, no. 4 (Fall 1991): 673Google Scholar.

6 Timbers, Edwin, “Legal and Institutional Aspects of the Iran-Contra Affair,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 20, no. 1 (Winter 1990): 36Google Scholar.

7 See, for instance, Saul B. Shapiro, “Citizen Trust and Government Cover-Up: Refining the Doctrine of Fraudulent Concealment,” Yale Law Journal 95, no. 7 (June 1986): 1477–99; Morris J. Blachman and Kenneth Sharp, “De-Democratising American Foreign Policy: Dismantling the Post-Vietnam Formula,” Third World Quarterly 8, no. 4 (October 1986): 1271–308; James M. McCormick and Steven S. Smith, “The Iran Arms Sale and the Intelligence Oversight Act of 1980,” PS 20, no. 1 (Winter 1987): 29–37; Robert F. Turner, “The Constitution and the Iran-Contra Affair: Was Congress the Real Lawbreaker?” Houston Journal of International Law 11 (1988): 83–127; Jules Lobel, “Emergency Power and the Decline of Liberalism,” The Yale Law Journal 98, no. 7 (May 1989): 1385–433; Marshall Silverberg, “Separation of Powers and Control of the CIA's Covert Operations,” Texas Law Review 68, no. 3 (February 1990): 575–622; William Shendow, “An Analysis of Foreign Affairs Powers: A Perspective for the Public Administrator on the Iran-Contra Affair,” Public Administration Quarterly 15, no. 2 (Summer 1991): 171–87; Sandra Jordan, “Classified Information and Conflicts in Independent Counsel Prosecutions: Balancing the Scales of Justice after Iran-Contra,” Columbia Law Review 91, no. 7 (November 1991): 1651–98; John Canham-Clyne, “Business as Usual: Iran-Contra and the National Security State,” World Policy Journal 9, no. 4 (Fall–Winter 1992): 617–37; Rob S. Ghio, “The Iran-Contra Prosecutions and the Failure of Use Immunity,” Stanford Law Review 45, no. 1 (November 1992): 229–61; Brian C. Kalt, “Pardon Me? The Constitutional Case Against Presidential Self-Pardons,” Yale Law Journal 106, no. 3 (December 1996): 779–809; Mark J. Rozell, “Executive Privilege in the Reagan Administration: Diluting a Constitutional Doctrine,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 27, no. 4 (Fall 1997): 760–72; Stephen G. Dormer, “The Not-So Independent Counsel: How Congressional Investigations Undermine Accountability Under the Independent Counsel Act,” Georgetown Law Journal 86, no. 6 (July 1998): 2392–419; Herbert J. Miller, Jr. and John P. Elwood, “The Independent Counsel Statute: An Idea Whose Time Has Passed,” Law and Contemporary Problems 62, no. 1 (Winter 1999): 111–29; Loch K. Johnson, “The Contemporary Presidency: Presidents, Lawmakers, and Spies: Intelligence Accountability in the United States,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 34, no. 4 (December 2004): 828–37; Laura A. Dickinson, “Government for Hire: Privatizing Foreign Affairs and the Problem of Accountability Under International Law,” William and Mary Law Review 47, no. 135 (2005): 135–237; Stuart P. Green, “Uncovering the Cover-Up Crimes,” American Criminal Law Review 42, no. 1 (Winter 2005): 9–44; Philip J. Meitl, “The Perjury Paradox: The Amazing Under-Enforcement of the Laws regarding Lying to Congress,” Quinnipiac Law Review 25, no. 3 (2007): 547–72; Laura Dickinson, “Outsourcing Covert Activities,” Journal of National Security Law & Policy 5 (2012): 521–37.

8 Elliott Abrams, Undue Process: A Story of How Political Differences Are Turned into Crimes (New York: Free Press, 1993), 6.

9 Continuing Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 1985, Pub. L. No. 98–473, §8066(a), 98. Stat. 1837, 1935 (1984).

10 “Representative Boland,” CIA, cable, October 19, 1984, Digital National Security Archive [hereafter DNSA] Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

11 “H.R. 5399,” CIA, memo, August 23, 1984, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

12 Cited in Draper, A Very Thin Line, 24.

13 “H.R. 5399,” CIA, memo, August 23, 1984, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

14 “Representative Boland,” CIA, cable, October 19, 1984, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

15 Testimony of Donald T. Regan and Caspar W. Weinberger: Joint Hearings Before the Senate Select Committee on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition and the House Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran: July 30, 31, and August 3, 1987, 100th Congress, 1st Session, vol. 100-10 (Washington, D.C.: USGPO, 1988), 79.

16 Ronald Reagan, The Reagan Diaries, ed. Douglas Brinkley (New York: Harper Perennial, 2007), 231.

17 Testimony of Robert C. McFarlane, Gaston L. Sigur, Jr. and Robert W. Owen: Joint Hearings Before the Senate Select Committee on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition and the House Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran: May 11, 12, 13, 14, and 19, 1987, 100th Congress, 1st Session, vol. 100-2 (Washington, D.C.: USGPO, 1987), 5.

18 Cited in Wroe, Lives, Lies and the Iran-Contra, 185.

19 “The Boland Amendment,” Executive Office of the President President's Intelligence Oversight Board, report, April 6, 1983, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

20 Dewey Wallace Jr. and A. Gerson, “The Dubious Boland Amendments,” Washington Post, June 5, 1987.

21 Louis Gordon Crovitz, “Crime, Constitution, and the Iran-Contra Affair,” Commentary 84, no. 4 (October 1987), 25.

22 Berry to North and Cannistraro, August 8, 1985, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

23 Bretton Sciaroni to Robert McFarlane, President's Intelligence Oversight Board, memo, September 12, 1985, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

24 Testimony of Elliott Abrams, Albert Hakim, David M. Lewis, Bretton G. Sciaroni, and Fawn Hall, 390. See also the “Intelligence Authorization Act,” Congressional Record, transcript, October 11, 1984, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

25 Steven Berry to Henry Hyde, August 8, 1986, in Appendixes to Parts I and II: Joint Hearings Before the Senate Select Committee on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition and the House Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran: July 7, 8, 9, 10, 13, and 14, 1987, 100th Congress, 1st Session, vol. 100-7, Part 3 (Washington, D.C.: USGPO, 1988), 488. On Reagan, see Michael Barnes to Robert McFarlane, August 16, 1985, Appendixes to Parts I and II, 493.

26 EO 12333 §1.2(a).

27 Cited in Draper, A Very Thin Line, 24–25.

28 Michael Barnes to Robert McFarlane, August 16, 1985, Appendixes to Parts I and II, 493.

29 Timbers, “Legal and Institutional Aspects,” 32.

30 Continued Testimony of Oliver North and Robert C. McFarlane: Joint Hearings Before the Senate Select Committee on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition and the House Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran: July 10, 13, and 14, 1987, 100th Congress, 1st Session, vol. 100-7, Part 2 (Washington, D.C.: USGPO, 1988), 124.

31 Robert McFarlane, United States House of Representatives Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, testimony, December 10, 1986, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

32 Cited in Walter Pincus and Joe Pichirallo, “Memo on Honduran Deal Cites Bush,” Washington Post, April 12, 1989, A1.

33 Oliver North to John Poindexter, August 19, 1985, Appendixes to Parts I and II, 495.

34 Testimony of Oliver L. North: Joint Hearings Before the Senate Select Committee on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition and the House Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran: July 7, 8, 9, and 10, 1987, 100th Congress, 1st Session, vol. 100-7, Part 1 (Washington, D.C.: USGPO, 1988), 278.

35 Testimony of John M. Poindexter: Joint Hearings Before the Senate Select Committee on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition and the House Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran: July 15, 16, 17, 20, and 21, 1987, 100th Congress, 1st Session, vol. 100-8 (Washington, D.C.: USGPO, 1988), 205.

36 Testimony of Regan and Weinberger, 7, 78.

37 “National Security Planning Group Meeting June 25, 1984: 2:00–3:00 p.m. Situation Room—Subject: Central America,” NSC, minutes, June 25, 1984, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

38 Cited in Peter Baker and Susan Glasser, The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III (New York: Doubleday, 2020), 229.

39 “National Security Planning Group Meeting June 25, 1984,” DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair; Lawrence Walsh, Firewall: The Iran-Contra Conspiracy and Cover-Up (New York: Norton, 1997), 2.

40 Testimony of George P. Shultz and Edwin Meese, III: Joint Hearings Before the Senate Select Committee on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition and the House Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran: July 23, 24, 28, and 29, 1987, 100th Congress, 1st Session, vol. 100-9 (Washington, D.C.: USGPO, 1988), 17.

41 Stanley Sporkin, CIA, memo, June 26, 1984, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

42 “H.R. 5399—Section 107, Prohibition on Covert Assistance for Military Operations in Nicaragua,” to Stanley Sporkin, CIA, memo, August 23, 1984, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

43 Cited in Byrne, Iran-Contra: Reagan's Scandal, 83.

44 Testimony of Robert C. McFarlane, 6.

45 Ronald Reagan, An American Life (New York: Threshold Editions, 1990), 485.

46 John G. Tower, Edmund S. Muskie and Brent Scowcroft, The Tower Commission Report: The Full Text of the President's Special Review Board (New York: Bantam Books, 1987), 78.

47 Draft National Security Decision Directive, “U.S. Policy toward Iran,” ca. June 11, 1985, with cover note by Robert McFarlane, June 17, 1985, and Robert McFarlane, memo for George Shultz, “Israeli–Iranian Contact,” July 13, 1985, both in Peter Kornbluh and Malcolm Byrne, eds., The Iran-Contra Scandal: The Declassified History (New York: The New Press, 1993), respectively 220 and 225.

48 Tower, Muskie, and Scowcroft, The Tower Commission Report, 78.

49 22 U.S.C. §§2751–2796c (1982 and Supp. III 1985, as amended by an Act to require that congressional vetoes of certain arms export proposals be enacted into law, Pub. L. No. 99–247, 100 Stat. 9 (1986); by the Omnibus Diplomatic Security and Antiterrorism Act of 1986, Pub. L. No. 99–399, 100 Stat. 853 (1986); by the Continuing Appropriations Act, 1987, Pub. L. No. 99–591, 100 Stat. 3341 (1986); by the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1987, Pub. L. No. 99–661, 100 Stat. 3816 (1986)).

50 David J. Scheffer, “U.S. Law and the Iran-Contra Affair,” The American Journal of International Law 81, no. 3 (July 1987): 699–705.

51 Pub. L. No. 98–618, §801, 98 Stat. 3298, 3304 (1984).

52 Cited in Robert C. McFarlane and Zofia Smardz, Special Trust (New York: Cadell and Davies, 1994), 35.

53 John J. (Jay) Taylor, interview by Charles Stuart Kennedy, April 25, 2000, transcript, Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training.

54 50 U.S.C. §413.

55 Davis Robinson, Department of State Office of the Legal Advisor, memo, October 2, 1981, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

56 William Smith to William Casey, Department of Justice, letter, October 5, 1981, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

57 Draft of finding, November 25, 1985, in Testimony of Glenn A. Robinette, Noel C. Koch, Henry H. Gaffney, Jr., Stanley Sporkin, and Charles J. Cooper and Presentation by W. Neil Eggleston: Joint Hearings Before the Senate Select Committee on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition and the House Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran: June 23, 24, and 25 1987, 100th Congress, 1st Session, vol. 100-6 (Washington, D.C.: USGPO, 1988), 424.

58 Meese testimony to Tower Commission, January 20, 1987, folder EM III testimony (redacted) January 20, 1987, box 568, Edwin Meese Papers, Hoover Institution, Stanford University, Stanford, CA.

59 Cited in Testimony of George P. Shultz and Edwin Meese, 31, 32.

60 Cited in Byrne, Iran-Contra: Reagan's Scandal, 106, 107.

61 Testimony of Regan and Weinberger, 140.

62 Cited in Draper, A Very Thin Line, 229.

63 Byrne, Iran-Contra: Reagan's Scandal, 156.

64 Cited in Joseph E. Persico, Casey: The Lives and Secrets of William J. Casey: from the OSS to the CIA (New York: Viking, 1990), 491.

65 John Poindexter, Memorandum for the President, “Covert Action Finding Regarding Iran,” with Signed Finding Attached, January 17, 1986, in Kornbluh and Byrne, eds., The Iran-Contra Scandal: The Declassified History, 233.

66 Cited in Mary McGrory, “The Takeover of Stanley Sporkin,” Washington Post, June 25, 1987.

67 Stanley Sporkin to William Casey, CIA, memo, January 15, 1986, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

68 Testimony of John M. Poindexter, 17. The finding itself is Exhibit SS-19, Testimony of Richard V. Secord, 465.

69 Cited in Mayer and McManus, Landslide: The Unmaking, 185–86.

70 Cited in Draper, A Very Thin Line, 255–56.

71 See also Testimony of Glenn A. Robinette, 195–96, 198, 204.

72 50 U.S.C. §§2401–2420 (1982 and Supp. III 1985, as amended by the Omnibus Diplomatic Security and Antiterrorism Act of 1986, Pub. L. No. 99–399, 100 Stat. 853 (1986); by the Export Administration Act of 1979, Authorization, Pub. L. No. 99–633, 100 Stat. 3522 (1986)).

73 Pub. L. No. 96–450, Sec. 407 (October 14, 1980).

74 18 U.S.C. §960.

75 31 U.S.C. §1341.

76 Testimony of Dewey R. Clarridge, C/CATF, and Clair George: Joint Hearings in Executive Session as Declassified Before the Senate Select Committee on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition and the House Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran: August 4, 5, and 6, 1987, 100th Congress, 1st Session, vol. 100-11 (Washington, D.C.: USGPO, 1988), 222, 223.

77 Mayer and McManus, Landslide: The Unmaking, 191.

78 18 U.S.C. §1001.

79 18 U.S.C. §1505.

80 Pub. L. No. 95–591. See also McCormick and Smith, “The Iran Arms Sale,” 29; William Weld to Edwin Meese, Department of Justice, memo, November 14, 1986, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

81 Jane Mayer and Andy Pasztor, “Deciding What Laws Apply to Iran-Contra May Be as Difficult as Finding Who Broke Them,” Wall Street Journal, December 15, 1986, 60.

82 Continued Testimony of North and McFarlane, 122–23.

83 Ghio, “The Iran-Contra Prosecutions,” 229.

84 Walsh, Iran-Contra: The Final Report, 31.

85 Dormer, “The Not-So Independent Counsel,” 2391.

86 Walsh, Iran-Contra: The Final Report, 49, 50; “Excerpts from Committee Hearing,” March 11, 1987, folder Iran-Contra Affair Miscellany (3 of 3), box 415, George Lardner Papers, Manuscripts Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

87 Cited in David Rosenbaum, “Delay on Immunity for North is Seen,” New York Times, March 11, 1987, A21.

88 Walter Pincus and Dan Morgan, “Immunity Vote Likely for Poindexter, North,” Washington Post, March 7, 1987, A1.

89 Paul Trible, “Grant Immunity to North and Poindexter-Now,” Washington Post, March 11, 1987, A19.

90 David Rosenbaum, “Panels in Senate and House Differ on Immunity Tactic,” New York Times, March 10, 1987, A17.

91 Walsh, Iran-Contra: The Final Report, 555.

92 Cited in Joe Pichirallo and George Lardner, Jr., “Justice Aide Tried to Provide Prohibited Data, Walsh Says; Iran Prober's Assistant Cut Reynolds Off,” Washington Post, April 28, 1988, A1.

93 Continued Testimony of North and McFarlane, 45.

94 Testimony of Robert C. McFarlane, 276, 375, 377, 390.

95 Testimony of Oliver L. North, North on 276, Brendan Sullivan on 4.

96 Continued Testimony of North and McFarlane, 31–32.

97 Testimony of Oliver L. North, 278.

98 Testimony of Adolfo P. Calero, John K. Singlaub, Ellen C. Garwood, William B. O'Boyle, Joseph Coors, Robert C. Dutton, Felix I. Rodríguez, and Lewis A. Tambs: Joint Hearings Before the Senate Select Committee on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition and the House Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran: May 20, 21, 27, and 28, 1987, 100th Congress, 1st Session, vol. 100-3 (Washington, D.C.: USGPO, 1988), 350, 353.

99 Testimony of Elliott Abrams, 557.

100 Report of the Congressional Committees Investigating the Iran-Contra Affair, with Supplemental, Minority, and Additional Views, U.S. House of Representatives Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran and U.S. Senate Select Committee on Secret Military Assistance to Iran and the Nicaraguan Opposition, 100th Congress, 1st Session, S. Rep. 100–216 (Washington, D.C.: USGPO, 1987), 11, 19.

101 Report of the Congressional Committees, 437, 449.

102 Cited in Walsh, Iran-Contra: The Final Report, 23.

103 Cited in Mayer and McManus, Landslide: The Unmaking, 300, 301.

104 Kathleen Watson to George Clarke, CIA Office of the General Counsel, memo, November 19, 1986, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

105 Jo Ann Farrington to Gerald McDowell, Department of Justice, memo, November 22, 1986, DNSA Collection: Iran-Contra Affair.

106 Reagan, The Reagan Diaries, 453.

107 Reagan, The Reagan Diaries, 453.

108 Crovitz, “Crime, Constitution,” 23.

109 Cited in Jeffrey Toobin, Opening Arguments (New York: Viking, 1991), 35.

110 50 U.S.C.A. §§401–432 (Supp. 1987).

111 See also Testimony of Glenn A. Robinette, 214.

112 Aaron Epstein, “Criminal Case Likely, Perilous,” Miami Herald, July 17, 1987, 1A.

113 Byrne, Iran-Contra: Reagan's Scandal, 309.

114 Arthur L. Liman with Peter Israel, Lawyer: A Life of Counsel and Controversy (New York: Public Affairs, 1998), 349, 350.

115 C. J. Mixter, “New Draft of Final Report,” September 14, 1992, folder General Investigative Reagan: CJM 3/91 Memo re Criminal Liability 1, box 41 General Investigative Files, Records of John Q. Barrett Attorney Files, RG 449, National Archives II, College Park, MD.

116 Henry Hyde and George Mitchell, “Pardoning Ollie North: Was Reagan Wrong Not to Grant a Pretrial Pardon?,” ABA Journal 75, no. 2 (February 1989): 42–43.

117 David Johnston, “Bush Pardons 6 in Iran Affair, Aborting a Weinberger Trial; Prosecutor Assails ‘Cover-Up,’” New York Times, December 25, 1992, A1.

118 “Independent Counsel's Statement on the Pardons,” New York Times, December 25, 1992, A22.

119 Crovitz, “Crime, Constitution,” 26.

120 Koh, The National Security Constitution, 21.

121 Taylor, interview by Kennedy, Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training.

122 See the National Security Decision Directive 276 at https://irp.fas.org/offdocs/nsdd/nsdd-276.htm.

123 Draft of memo?, Shultz to Reagan, July 28, 1987, folder Speeches and writings 1987 Geo. Shultz to Ronald Reagan on Iran/Contra, box 35, Charles Hill Papers, Hoover Institution, Stanford University, Stanford, CA.

124 Koh, The National Security Constitution, 21.

125 Cited in James T. Currie, “Iran-Contra and Congressional Oversight of the CIA,” International Journal of Intelligence and Counter-Intelligence 11, no. 2 (1998): 199–200, 202, citation on 203.

126 Robert Busby, Reagan and the Iran-Contra Affair: The Politics of Presidential Recovery (London: Macmillan Press, 1999), 17.

127 Scott Spencer, “Walsh's Last Battle,” New York Times Magazine, July 4, 1993, 11, 28–30, 33, 30.

128 Carl Bernstein, “Conspiracy Without End: The Legacy of Watergate,” Los Angeles Times, January 10, 1993.

129 Sidney Blumenthal, “The Conservative Crackup,” Foreign Policy 69 (Winter 1987–1988): 166.

130 For example, Byrne, Iran-Contra: Reagan's Scandal, 337.

131 Cited in Christopher H. Pyle, “The Law: Barack Obama and Civil Liberties,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 42, no. 4 (December 2012): 868, 876.

132 James P. Pfiffner, “The Constitutional Legacy of George W. Bush,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 45, no. 4 (December 2015): 727–41.

133 Pub. L. 76–252.

134 Michael Gerson, “Public Integrity? Blah, Blah, Blah,” Washington Post, November 8, 2019, A21.

135 David Frum, “Last Exit from Autocracy,” The Atlantic, October 14, 2020, https://medium.com/the-atlantic/last-exit-from-autocracy-664a5b437f79.

136 James P. Pfiffner, “Donald Trump and the Norms of the Presidency,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 51, no. 1 (March 2021): 110.

137 Rebecca Solnit, “President Trump is at War with the Rule of Law. This Won't End Well,” The Guardian, October 9, 2019.