The PR benefits of these sorts of showdons often backfire, I suspect most people would see Congress as scandal mongering. We'll see. I find these sorts of things amusing, but that's me.

This isn't exactly settled law...

It is settled law. The authority for Congress to issue subpoenas is limited to matters for which they may legislate. The internal workings of the White House are clearly not an area where Congress can exercise any legislative authority.

The authority for Congress to issue subpoenas is limited to matters for which they may legislate. The internal workings of the White House are clearly not an area where Congress can exercise any legislative authority.

Really? Hmmmm...

One of the foremost non-legislative functions of the Congress is the power to investigate and to oversee the executive branch. This power is usually delegated to committees--standing committee, select and special committee, select committees, or joint committee composed of members of both houses. Investigations are conducted to gather information on the need for future legislation, to test the effectiveness of laws already passed, and to inquire into the qualifications and performance of members and officials of the other branches. Committees may hold hearings, and, if necessary, compel individuals to testify by issuing subpoenas. Witnesses who refuse to testify may be cited for contempt of Congress, and those who testify falsely may be charged with perjury. Most committee hearings are open to the public; important hearings are widely reported in the mass media.

Can the Congress dictate the internal workings of how the White House runs? No, but they can clearly investigate said inner workings if the need arises. And so they are.

Somewhere in my soul, there's always Rock -n- Roll... Joe Strummer

Can the Congress dictate the internal workings of how the White House runs? No, but they can clearly investigate said inner workings if the need arises

Your citation from Wikipedia is incomplete and largely irrelevant. Yes, Congress can investigate the executive branch, but there are some exceptions to that power. The most notable and clear-cut exception is when the president has claimed executive privilege and the matter concerns the inner workings of the White House. What you and most others here seem to be confused about are the fact that some organs of the executive branch are under the purview of Congress because they were created by legislation (e.g., departments and cabinet secretaries) while others are completely exempt from routine congressional examination because they derive from the Constitution (e.g., the goings on in the Oval Office).

Congress clearly has the authority to call up officials in a cabinet department, such as the Justice Department, and compel them to testify. That, in fact, has already occurred in this case. The attorney general has duties that are set out by the rules for the government as stipulated by Congress, but officials such as the president's chief of staff report solely to the president, and are not subject to congressional oversight.

As I have pointed out elsewhere in this discussion, executive privilege is not unlimited or absolute. Executive privilege generally cannot successfully be invoked avoid a court subpoena, for example.

Those aides were asked to testify about criminal matters, this is a political dispute, and none of Clinton's White House Chief's of Staff were ever called to testify.

Those aides were asked to testify about criminal matters, this is a political dispute, and none of Clinton's White House Chief's of Staff were ever called to testify.
Claiming that the Clinton investigations weren't politically-based borders on the ridiculous, even for you.

Back to the present. Misleading Congress is a crime. Did Gonzales lie to Congress?

Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales met with senior aides on Nov. 27 to review a plan to fire a group of U.S. attorneys, according to documents released last night, a disclosure that contradicts Gonzales's previous statement that he was not involved in "any discussions" about the dismissals

It certainly looks like Gonzales is lying, perhaps we'll know for sure once the inevitable investigation gets launched. Well, whaddaya know:

Justice Department officials also announced Friday night that the agency's inspector general and its Office of Professional Responsibility had launched a joint investigation into the dismissals, including an examination of whether they were improper and whether any Justice Department officials misled Congress about the matter

Oh, here's a list of previous White House flunkies who've been called before Congress, including a Clinton White House Chief-of-Staff (Al Gore's):

In fact, public testimony by White House aides to congressional hearings has not been rare over the years. According to a 2003 Congressional Research Service (CRS) study, White House aides have given public testimony on the Hill at least 73 times since 1944. If Bush is looking for precedents, he need look no further than the White House tenure of Bill Clinton, whose aides testified repeatedly in public hearings at the demand of the then-Republican-led Congress.

Jonathan Daniels, administrative assistant to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, appeared before the Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry on Feb. 28 and March 7 and 8, 1944, to discuss his involvement in the personnel policies of the Rural Electrification Administration.

Wallace H. Graham, physician to President Harry S. Truman, appeared before the Senate Committee on Appropriations on Jan. 13, 1948, to testify about information to which he might have been privy regarding the commodities market.

Bruce A. Kehrli, special assistant to President Richard M. Nixon, appeared before the Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities on May 17, 1973, to discuss matters related to the Watergate scandal. Kehrli had been tasked by presidential lawyer John W. Dean III to empty Watergate burglar E. Howard Hunt's safe two days after the break-in and turn the material over to Dean.

Patrick J. Buchanan, a special consultant to Nixon, appeared before the Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities on Sept. 26, 1973, to discuss efforts by the Nixon White House in 1971 to investigate Daniel Ellsberg, who had leaked the Pentagon Papers.

Rose Mary Woods, Nixon's personal secretary, appeared before the Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities on March 22, 1974, to discuss recordings made by Nixon of his Oval Office conversations around the time of the Watergate break-in.

Alexander M. Haig Jr., senior aide to Nixon, appeared before the Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities on May 2 and 15, 1974, to discuss matters related to Watergate, including a $100,000 cash payment made by billionaire Howard Hughes to Nixon crony Charles G. "Bebe" Rebozo.

Leonard Garment, assistant to Nixon, appeared before the Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities on May 17, 1974, to discuss matters related to the Watergate incident, in particular Nixon's Oval Office tape recordings.

Lloyd Cutler, counsel to President Jimmy Carter, testified before a Senate Judiciary subcommittee on Sept. 10, 1980, on efforts by the president's brother, Billy Carter, to influence the federal government on behalf of the government of Libya.

Samuel Berger, assistant to President Bill Clinton for national security affairs, appeared before the Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs on Sept. 11, 1997, to discuss campaign fundraising practices for Clinton's 1996 presidential campaign.

Lisa M. Caputo, press secretary to first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, testified before the House Committee on Banking, Finance, and Urban Affairs on July 28, 1994, about whether White House aides had inappropriately learned details of a government investigation of the failed Madison Guaranty Savings and Loan in Arkansas. Harold Ickes, deputy chief of staff to Clinton, appeared at the same hearing. So did Bruce Lindsey, a senior Clinton aide, John D. Podesta, Clinton's staff secretary, and George R. Stephanopoulos, a senior policy adviser. A week later, Thomas F. McLarty III, White House counselor, testified before the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs on the Madison Guaranty investigation.

John M. Quinn, assistant to Clinton and chief of staff to Vice President Al Gore, appeared before the Senate Special Committee to Investigate the Whitewater Development Corporation and Related Matters on Aug. 7, 1995, to answer questions on numerous topics.

Lanny A. Breuer, special counsel to Clinton, testified before the House Committee on Government Reform and Oversight on Nov. 7, 1997, on White House compliance with committee subpoenas issued in the course of an investigation into alleged fundraising abuses.

This is hardly unprecedented territory. About the only thing unprecedented here is Bush not having a rubber stamp congress to look the other way.

Somewhere in my soul, there's always Rock -n- Roll... Joe Strummer

It would be unprecedented. As the above examples demonstrate, even when criminal activities are being investigated, which is not the case here, the President's Chief of Staff has not been called in front of Congress to testify under oath.

"I'd love to see that on TV"

"I do not believe they have been charged with anything"

Exactly, this all about grandstanding, which is why the White House should ignore the subpoenas in the unlikely event they are issued.

And how do you propose that Congress FIND OUT about what they have or haven't done, if they can't ask questions?  It's not grand standing.  There is an actual accusation that they did something at least slimy if not illegal.  Congress' job is to find out if this is true.  For this, they need data from the people who actually participated in the activity, honest data.

Ignoring Congressional subpoenas certainly makes mockery of the concept of co-equal branches of government, doesn't it?

There is an actual accusation that they did something at least slimy if not illegal.

Funny, I seem to recall this not being a good enough excuse when it came to searching for, you know, terrorists. Is it OK for the Justice Department, FBI and so on to go back to using all those methods which caused such an outcry if they say they need to FIND OUT if "something slimy" was going on?

There is an actual accusation that they did something at least slimy if not illegal.  Congress' job is to find out if this is true

Where does Congress get its authority to find out if something "slimy" was done? (Don't bother trying to answer; that was a rhetorical question. Congress has no such authority.)

If something illegal was done, then it is the role of the Justice Department to discover the facts, and to refer the matter to the courts if appropriate. If we were talking about a subpoena for a criminal matter then the president could not claim executive privilege*. But this is not a criminal matter in the courts - it is a political matter being conducted by a political body.


*See US v. Nixon which sets out the sole exception to executive privilege: subpoenas issued in connection to a criminal trial.  

Funny, I don't recall this level of deference when Clinton White House folks were asked to testify, 47 times.  This is not nearly as unprecedented as you seem to think, and the legal community does not believe that this is a resolved issue.  If you read US v. Nixon, you will find that it does not set out a "sole exception" but rather rejects the idea of an "absolute privilege" and addresses the particular example of the judicial need for materials in a criminal trial.    

Thalia

As I noted elsewhere in this thread, none of Clinton's White House Chief's of Staff were required to testify, and the subpoenas were related to criminal investigations.

"particular example of the judicial need for materials in a criminal trial."

Which is a completely different situation than this one.

If these subpoenas are issued, and then are ignored, good luck even getting a court to rule on the issue.

Funny, I don't recall this level of deference when Clinton White House folks were asked to testify, 47 times

The "47 times" you are referring to were events when President Clinton did not invoke executive privilege.(1)  Those "47 times"(2) came about because President Clinton allowed the testimony, not because Congress compelled it.

This is not nearly as unprecedented as you seem to think, and the legal community does not believe that this is a resolved issue

That testimony you link to supports my claim, Thalia, not yours. (You really ought to read it.) It says, for instance,

Generally, a congressional committee with jurisdiction over the subject matter, which is conducting an authorized investigation for legislative or oversight purposes, has a right to information held by the executive branch in the absence of either a valid claim of constitutional privilege by the executive or a statutory provision whereby Congress has limited its constitutional right to information

[emphasis mine]

The testimony goes on to list many examples of presidential advisers testifying before Congress. What you have failed to mention (or perhaps fail to understand) is that in none of those examples  was there a claim of executive privilege made by the president. The testimony goes on to cite several examples of advisers or other high government officials who refused to testify before Congress on specific issues, or who agreed to testify but only in a closed, informal session.(3)

The report also states the reason that a presidential adviser might be compelled to testify, but it makes it clear that it would be due to a desire of the president to avoid "political embarrassment" and that it would be a situation for the president to choose, not for Congress to mandate.

If you read US v. Nixon, you will find that it does not set out a "sole exception"

US v. Nixon sets out the only exception to executive privilege that has been recognized by the courts. That exception is based on 1) the constitutional authority of the courts, and 2) the fact that there are constitutional rights (the 5th and 6th Amendments) that may come into conflict with a claim of executive privilege. I'll concede that there may be other exceptions to executive privilege, but it is obvious that such exceptions as they may apply to Congress must be based on the constitutional authority of Congress.(4)  In the present case Congress wishes to investigate the circumstances surrounding events that everyone agrees fall under the authority of the executive branch. Congress may investigate those events to its heart's content, but it may not usurp the constitutional authority of the executive in the process.



1. I'm not sure what source you are using for the claim that Clinton Administration advisers testified "47 times," but I am assuming you are not including the time when President Clinton attempted to claim executive privilege when it clearly did not apply.

2. I realize you have not looked into the "47 times" yourself, but are simply parroting a meme that you have read on some blog somewhere. The "47 times" argument is, in any event, only relevant here as a political argument, not a legal one.

3. On one occasion Tom Ridge, the director of Homeland Security, refused to testify before Congress in a public setting, but agreed to testify informally in closed session. That instance is roughly similar to what the White House is offering in the present case.

4. One obvious example would be the authority to compel testimony in a presidential impeachment proceeding.

Congress was given an offer to ask questions, also the White House released 20,000 pages of emails. But this isn't about finding the truth.

"There is an actual accusation that they did something at least slimy"

That's a political accusation.

"if not illegal."

There's no evidence anything illegal happened. Your argument is like saying requiring search warrants are an unfair burden, because how do the police no if there's something illegal going on in your house until after they search it.

"Ignoring Congressional subpoenas.."

No, attempting to use subpoena power to harass the Executive makes a mockery of seperation of powers.

The problem is, you see, that the officials of this administration have a history of lying to Congress.  See for example J. Steven Griles, who pleaded guilty on Friday to lying before a Senate committee about his ties to Jack Abramoff, the disgraced lobbyist who is now in prison.  I presume your suggestion is that he too should have avoided testifying under oath (aka lying under oath) to Congress?

As to the legality or illegality of the underlying actions is questionable.  Really legal scholars are analyzing the action and despite your affirmative declarations, it is not "clearly not illegal."  I do wish you folks would stop making such assertions with no backup what-so-ever.  U.S. v. Nixon did not address criminal cases as the "sole" exception to executive privilege, and the dismissal of U.S.Attorneys is not "clearly not illegal."  

As I previously inquired, where was the outrage when the Republican Congress subpoenaed Clinton White House officials?  Or are the rules different if Republicans are in power?

Thalia

"As to the legality or illegality of the underlying actions is questionable"

And Democrats want to keep it that way. By not making any formal allegations that can be refuted they can create the aura of a scandal without there being one.

"where was the outrage when the Republican Congress subpoenaed Clinton White House officials?  Or are the rules different if Republicans are in power?"

Given that Clinton's White House Chief of Staff wasn't required to testify despite actual criminal activities taking place (Whitewater, Madison Gauranty, ChiCom Illegal Campaign Bribe Scandal), it's Democrats who want a much lower standard for Republicans.