Banner Graphic, Volume 11, Number 107, Greencastle, Putnam County, 7 January 1981 — Page 6

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The Putnam County Banner Graphic, January 6,1981

Bribery still legal sometimes By ROBERT FE AR c. 1981 N.Y. Times WASHINGTON The Justice Department issued guidelines Monday under which the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation could, in some cases, authorize undercover agents to offer a bribe to a public official “even though there is no reasonable indication that that particular individual has engaged, or is engaging,” in a crime. The guidelines, approved by Attorney General Benjamin R. Civiletti, were prepared jointly by officials of the bureau and the department. The rules state that “entrapment should be scrupulously avoided” in all undercover operations. Entrapment is defined in the guidelines as "the inducement or encouragement of an individual to engage in illegal activity in which he would otherwise not be disposed to engage.” The Justice Department, in a statement accompanying the rules, said they were “significantly more restrictive” than the law of entrapment or the constitutional principles requiring "due process of law” in federal investigations. The law of entrapment, now somewhat murky, is almost certain to be clarified by the courts in cases arising from the Abscam investigation. In those cases, undercover federal agents, posing as representatives of wealthy Arab sheiks, offered bribes to members of Congress and other officials selected by “middle men” cooperating with the bureau. A federal judge in November set aside the convictions of two Philadelphia officials after finding that the Abscam investigators had “stretched” the law and “entrapped” the defendants. The standards issued Monday have been in preparation for 18 months. Justice Department officials said the final review may have been expedited slightly to insure publication before the Carter administration leaves office Jan. 20. Irvin B. Nathan, deputy assistant attorney general who supervised the Abscam investigation, said it would have been “essentially the same” under the guidelines, though perhaps with “certain refinements and improvements in procedural matters.” The new rules, which could be changed by another attorney general, formalize existing procedures and do not make it significantly easier or more difficult for agents to gain approval for undercover investigatons. J. Edgar Hoover, longtime director of the bureau, disliked undercover techniques, but in the last three years, the bureau has increasingly used such techniques to investigate white-collar crime, political corruption and organized crime. Critics of Abscam, including many defense lawyers, have said that undercover agents went “fishing” for officials willing to sell their influence. Justice Department officials said they had sound reasons for choosing their targets. The new guidelines define the type of information that the bureau must have before beginning an undercover investigation, and establish a multi-level system of review requiring higher authorization for the use of particularly sensitive techniques. The guidelines say that certain types of undercover operations may not be approved by an FBI field supervisor and must be referred to Washington, where a committee of Justice Department and bureau officials will review the proposal. Investigations in this category include those requiring the expenditure of more than $20,000, those lasting more than six months and those focusing on the activities of a public official, a foreign government or a news organization. “Under the law of entrapment,” the guidelines say, “inducements may be offered to an individual even though there is no reasonable indication that that particular individual has engaged, or is engaging, in the illegal activity that is properly under investigation.” Before authorizing the offer of a bribe or other inducement to commit a crime, the review committee must have reason to believe that the recipient “is engaging, has engaged or is likely to engage in illegal activity.” Alternatively, the committee must conclude that the people being offered an opportunity to commit some crime were “predisposed” to do so. Even if neither of these conditions is satisfied, the director of the bureau may still authorize the payment of a bribe, subject to general restrictions found elsewhere in the guidelines. Philip B Heymann, assistant attorney general in charge of the Justice Department’s criminal division, said the purpose of this exception was to leave an “escape hatch.”

Watt like goat guarding cabbage patch

Here's hoping Reagan gets fight he seems to be inviting

By TOM WICKER c. 1981 N.Y. Times News Service NEW YORK - The Senate has customarily taken the attitude that a president is entitled to choose his own official family; hence it has not often exhibited a stern view of its constitutional duty to “advise and consent” on Cabinet nominations. But maybe this is a year when even a Republican-controlled Senate will decide to get tough. If one of Ronald Reagan’s Cabinet nominees should be rejected, however, it would be the first time a president’s choice had been thwarted since the defeat of Lewis L. Strauss for secretary of commerce in 1959. The Democrats then controlled the Senate, Dwight Eisenhower was in the White House and the fight against Strauss was led by an implacable enemy and tough infighter, Clinton Anderson of

opinion

LARRY GIBBS Publisher

How the president could deal with hostage impasse

By William F. Buckley Jr. Universal Press Syndicate As Inauguration Day approaches, the roundelay involving the hostages in Iran goes on. The United States government is now engaged in a “reformulation,” while we pursue a madcap policy of trying to determine how much money we should give to Iran for Iran’s hospitality to 50 Americans. Some of the money is indeed Iran’s; some of it, in the opinion of very active claimants, is not. In the normal course, a) the hostages would be returned; b) the courts would transact civil claims against Iran by assorted creditors; c) an international court would transact civil claims against Iran by the hostages; d) what was left would be returned to Iran. The existing mess is a perfect reflection of the cross-purposes and ambiguities of Mr. Carter’s foreign policy. MR. REAGAN WILL COME to the problem not exactly fresh, because too many cards have played out. But he will come to it unhindered by any commitments of his predecessor. Here is one course of action he might take: Demand the return of the hostages within two weeks. Announce that, if the hostages are not returned, the president will ask Congress to declare war on the government of Iran. President Reagan would remind the world community that for one hundred years we have sought to make the World Court a functioning instrument, assigning to it the responsibility for adjudicating conflicts that might otherwise lead to war. The World Court has twice pronounced the detention of the American diplomats to be unlawful under any code of law.

School closings

Opportunities lost in nationwide rush to unload surplus buildings?

By FRED M. HECHINGER c. 1981 N.Y. Times News Service NEW YORK School closings have turned into a nationwide epidemic. As enrollments continue to drop, local districts, already under fiscal pressure, rush to board up, rent or sell surplus school buildings. The current estimate offered by Educational Facilities Laboratories, a nonprofit agency that studies school utilization, is that by the end of the 1980 s some 10,000 schools may have been closed. Only the Southern Sunbelt with its still growing population remains largely unaffected. Frank J. Macchiarola, chancellor of the New York City school system, recently said the city, which has already closed 78 of its approximately 900 schools in the past five years, would have to eliminate another 14 in the near future. Prince Georges County, on the periphery of Washington, last month projected the closing of 44 schools in the three years ahead. Massachusetts has closed several hundred schools in the last five years. Philadelphia, Boston and Washington have each closed more than 20. Parents in Great Neck, N.Y., last week were contemplating demonstrations against a school closing plan. But, for the most part, the abandonment of educational real estate appears to run into little opposition, suggesting that people’s minds are on more immediate bread-and-butter concerns. Yet, many school administrators, taking a longer view of the scene, are troubled by the rush to get rid of surplus schools. Some

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New Mexico. Even so, the fight was long and bitter and the final vote close. But the power of advice and consent is in the Constitution for a reason checking the president’s executive power and it

ERICBERNSEE Managing Editor

t W Iranian internal <3ison3er may he influencing the hostage r

PRESIDENT REAGAN would remind the world community that for 35 years we have sought to give some strength to the Security Council of the United Nations, with a view to using its leverage to dissipate friction and prevent war. The Security Council of the United Nations has twice pronounced the detention of the

point to the possibility that enrollments may increase in the late 1980 s, when the children of the huge post-World War II crop of babies enter school. More immediately, administrators deplore what they see as two particular opportunities the schools have passed up. The first would have been to build new coalitions with the rest of the community by sharing the extra space, and the cost of maintaining it, with senior citizen centers, pre-school programs, preventive health and dental care for youngsters, adult education programs and other community services. In some instances of schools joining forces with other community services, neighborhood support for the

7 years worth $200,000, wife claims

She paid the bills, he earned degree

(c) 1980 Chicago Sun-Times It’s a story of love gone sour and a contract unfulfilled. Sonia and Samuel Roda came to Chicago from the Philippines. They both were licensed physicians, but needed more schooling and training before they could practice here. They struck a deal—Sonia would support Samuel and their two children until he acquired his credentials, then Samuel would work while Sonia went to school, according to Sonia’s lawyer, Edward D. Rosenberg. But when the time came to switch

amounts to more than the approval or rejection of nominees. It can be used by the Senate to impose conditions: most commonly, forcing the divestment of potential conflicts of interest, inappropriate club memberships and the like. In one important instance, the Senate Judiciary Committee required of Elliot L. Richardson, as a condition of his confirmation as attorney general in 1973, that he agree to elaborate ground rules for a special, independent Watergate prosecutor. Later, when President Nixon ordered him to violate those rules by discharging Prosecutor Archibald Cox, Richardson resigned rather than so dishonor himself a major step in the ultimate collapse of the Nixon presidency. Confirmation hearings can be important in themselves. Tough, thorough investigation in 1973 not only led to the withdrawal of L. Patrick Gray 3d, Nixon’s nominee to head the FBI, but developed vital information about Watergate. Equally close inquiry might have uncovered Bert Lance’s tangled financial affairs and spared Jimmy Carter embarrassment later over Lance’s resignation. Reagan Cabinet controversy has centered on Gen. Alexander Haig, the nominee to be secretary of state and the former Nixon aide who passed along the order that caused Richardson to resign. But this nomination is more deplorable

TOM WICKER

American diplomats as unlawful. President Reagan would remind the world community that parctically all the governments of the world have importuned the ayatollah’s government to release the hostages. Pleas have been issued not merely by Western powers, but by Communist states and by Moslem

schools is reported to have improved. This is particularly true in “aging” communities, where older residents often resent the money spent on other people’s children. But in some instances, people who attend senior citizen centers in schools have become valuable teaching volunteers, and have remained supporters of the public schools. The second would have been to take a hard, nontraditional look at the conventional wisdom that says large schools are preferable to small because they offer a wider choice of courses and are more cost-efficient to run although comparative studies have long shown that discipline problems and learning retar-

roles, Samuel, who had gone into private practice as an internist, balked. “He found the good life and he dumped her,” Rosenberg said. So Sonia asked a Circuit Court judge for a legal separation and an order directing Samuel to keep his end of the bargain. Sonia, 43, has been working as a hospital medical technician at a about $19,000 annually. Meanwhile, Samuel, 49, earns at least sßo,oooa year. The suit, filed by Rosenberg, charges that Sonia has a financial and marital ownership right to Sam’s medical licen-

than vulnerable, primarily because Haig’s experience in the White House and as NATO commander gives him the technical competence to head the State Department probably more so than could have been claimed by, say, Edmund Muskie. To make a case warranting Haig’s rejection would require that a “smoking gun” be found in his hand in the matters of Watergate and the Nixon pardon. But even if such a damning piece of evidence exists, to find it would probably require a complete investigation, on a scale the Republican Senate is unlikely to permit and for which there is little evidence of public demand. Properly conducted Democratic opposition will nevertheless remind the public of some murky episodes in Haig’s background, call into question his credibility as an advocate and spokesman and perhaps expose what seems to be a certain devious quality. In fact, the real question about Haig’s nomination may be why Reagan wants a secretary of state who might have 30 or so Senate votes against him from the outset. But a far more vulnerable target among Reagan’s nominees is James G. Watt for secretary of interior. Unlike Haig, Watt may well not meet the basic minimum qualifications for his office. Why, Democrats as well as Republican moderates should ask, set a goat to guard the cabbage patch? In forcing rigorous inquiry into Watt’s

states. Everyone concedes the universal stake the world has in the inviolability of its diplomats. If Congress would declare war against the ayatollah’s government, judicial leverage would inure to the United States which is otherwise absent. The business of the Iranian assets would be instantly

dation have tended to be less severe in Britain, at least in part because schools there are smaller. It has been said that a school is too large when the principal no longer knows all the students by name. This may be a utopian view, but many experts are nevertheless convinced that elementary schools with well over 1,000 pupils are too large and impersonal and that high schools with 2,000 or more students are not only too impersonal but may also require far too many administrative personnel and procedures. There is also such a thing as a school too small to provide the full range of courses. The late James B. Conant, who studied the state of the high schools in 1959, recom-

se and a contractual right to his support while she gets her license. Rosenberg figures the seven years of support is worth about $200,000. Footnote: Rosenberg, a former Circuit Court judge now in private practice, has experience in these cases. A couple from Taiwan made a similar deal, but the wife-physician reneged on her husband-dentist after hubby had supported her schooling. Rosenberg convinced a judge to award alimony payments to the husband during the two years needed to get his credentials.

record and views, opponents would be on the firm ground of acting to protect the environment, the nation’s nonrenewable resources, federal lands, perhaps even the Indians whose welfare, though often ignored, is nevertheless an important responsibility of the Interior Department. Judged by what is known, Watt’s interest in all these subjects seems to have been limited mostly to their exploitation. The confirmation power exists precisely to ascertain whether or not that is true and, if it is, to check Reagan’s executive power either by rejecting his nominee or by confirming him only with restraining policy conditions. Since environmentalists’ and conservationists’ concerns overlap party lines, opposition to Watt is unlikely to be wholly partisan, or to be seen as such. As president of the Mountain States Legal Fund, Watt has been the representative of some of the most exploitative interests in the Western states mining, lumber, grazing, oil, utilities and of such right-wingers as Joseph Coors, the brewery president. If his nomination is a payoff to strong Reagan supporters (Sen. Paul Laxalt is reported to have chosen him) that is all the more reason why he should be opposed on merit, or the lack of it. Even more than in the case of Haig, the new president seems almost to have invited a fight by naming Watt. Here’s hoping he gets it.

cleared up: We would confiscate those assets. We would have power to intern Iranian citizens. We could prosecute the war with exactly such rigor as suited us (the declaration of war does not require that it be prosecuted at any set pace). THE GOVERNMENT of the United States could seriously consider recognizing a government in exile, for instance that headed by Shahpur Bakhtiar, the leader of the parliametary opposition to the shah who was briefly prime minister before the ayatollah dumped him. Bakhtiar has called for the deposition of the ayatollah and has considerable support within Iran. The hostages would now become prisoners of war; so would those Iranians in this country whom we decided to intern. The hostages would have the satisfaction of knowing that their country, recognizing its responsibility to its citizens, had taken the final juridical step: namely, to recognize their continued detention as a casus belli. They will say: But doesn’t this risk an alliance between Iran and the Soviet Union? We would answer: American immobility causes the consolidation of Soviet power with or without formal alliances. Our willingness to permit our hostages to grow old in Tehran itself weakens the health of the republic, leaving us increasingly an object of international obloquy. firming commitments made to the international order. Our allies would respect our determination. Our enemies would recognize that America had awakened from a long sleep.

mended that no high school should have a graduating class of fewer than 100. The Bulletin, the journal of the National Association of Secondary School Principals, recently published a special issue, “Spotlight on the Smaller Schools.” Among its conclusions were that students in smaller schools become involved in a greater number and variety of activities; assume a greater number of positions of responsibility and are less alienated. But the habit of bigness appears hard to break. Current reports indicate that the general answer to reduced enrollments is simply to consolidate, leaving the remaining schools as large as schools had been during the fat years. Under the circumstances, the most constructive approach appears to be the conversion of schools to new and productive, though mostly noneducational, uses. A report on “Abandoned School Facilities in New England Cities and Towns” cites such examples as: An old school in Boston, known as The School House, has been converted into condominium apartments ranging in price from $60,000 to $165,000. A school in Chicopee, Mass., has been turned into a restaurant. A school in East Haven, Conn., has been converted into a 60-bed health care facility. It is in large cities, however, that school closings have created the most serious problems. Empty schools become instant victims of vandalism. This not only means a loss of valuable property but often the destruction of the neighborhood