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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
The battles of Sam Dash,
This review is from: Chief counsel: Inside the Ervin Committee--the untold story of Watergate (Hardcover)
In 1973 attorney and law professor Sam Dash was chosen by North Carolina Senator Sam Ervin to be chief counsel - head lawyer of a team of about 100 investigators - for the Senate Watergate Committee. `Chief Counsel' is Dash's inside story of his experiences on that committee.As an indication of the interest the growing Watergate scandals generated the Committee's hearing were, in the pre-cable spring and summer of 1973, broadcast live on public television and repeated on the networks the same evening. The audience, a sizable one, witnessed at least two seismic revelations developed by the Committee - first when former White House aide Alexander Butterfield revealed the existence of a secret taping system inside the White House, and later when John Dean's week-long testimony implicated Richard Nixon directly in the Watergate cover-up. Dash covers both events fully and, in Dean's case, extensively, but to be honest he doesn't add much to what's already known. Interestingly, in light of Dash's claims (and demands) of impartiality, he recounts a evening he spend with Dean, at Dash's home, in which he counseled and consoled the nervous Dean prior to a pending criminal trial. I doubt John Ehrlichman or H.R. Haldeman ever found their way onto Dash's invite list. If Dash is blind to his own commissions of partiality he's acutely sensitive to it in others. Republican Tennessee Senator Howard Baker was co-chair of the Committee - the Democrats were the majority party in 1973 - and Dash makes it clear, repeatedly, that he suspected Baker of leaking stories to the press and covertly cooperating with the White House. While it's probably true, as Dash suggests, that Baker's famous question, asked of John Dean - `What did the president know, and when did he know it?' - was more put-up-or-shut-up than the plaintive echo of a soul questing for Truth, Dash's disingenuous naiveté grows tiresome. His righteous peckishness reaches its greatest height, perhaps, when newly appointed Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox asks him to terminate the public hearings so as not to prejudice upcoming criminal trials - `I left the Justice Department building,' Dash writes, `feeling I'd just witnessed an unprecedented display of arrogance. In effect, Cox had told me that now that he, "Mr. Clean," had come to Washington, everybody else had to stop what he was doing and get out of Cox's way to let him attack the Watergate dirt all by himself.' For Watergate wonks `Chief Counsel' holds a few rewards. Having survived a cover-to-cover slog through the Senate Watergate Report I appreciated closing chapter explanations of some of the least remembered, though exhaustively investigated, aspects of the Nixon Administration. One area of investigation by Dash's staff was the `White House comprehensive plan to exploit the incumbency - called the Responsiveness Program' which `would dramatically expose an arrogant abuse of presidential power.' Basically, the Responsiveness Program was an initiative by the Nixon Administration to grant and withhold federal largesse from minority organizations in exchange for political support. In other words, pretty much business as usual. Also discussed for ten pages or so is the Milk Fund investigation, which involved Texan John Connally and an alleged deal to increase milk prices in consideration of a sizable contribution from the milk producers. Perhaps the most Byzantine investigation was that of the Bebe Rebozo -Howard Hughes $100,000 cash contribution. The Committee investigators tried, unsuccessfully, to tie the contribution into a Justice Department decision to okay a casino purchase by the Hughes Corporation, as well as investigating whether any of the money were used for Nixon's personal benefit. Although the Senate investigators were the good guys back then, it's illuminating - and somewhat sobering - to read accounts of the chief counsel arguing with the head of the IRS for access to Mr. Rebozo's tax returns. Although Dash doesn't characterize it, we can assume the denial was an arrogant one. `Chief Counsel' was published in 1976 and has been out-of-print for years. Unlike many Watergate books I've never read it, had to go out of my way to find it, and didn't know what to expect. Save for the Watergate wonk stuff I have to admit a certain disappointment, and less than glittering admiration for the author. Dash's zeal and, yes, arrogance, seep through the pages. Firsthand accounts of important episodes in history are inherently important, and it's on that basis - solely on that basis - I tepidly endorse this book.
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