Next week the Senate Rules Committee is scheduled to hold a hearing on a subject that boils down to: "Is it permissible to lie to get elected?" Maintaining a lifelong habit of fearless forecasts, not all of which have been wrong, I predict the answer to be delivered by the ponderous heavyweights of the Senate will boil down to: "Yes, it is permissible to lie to get elected."
The principal in these philosophical ruminations is Sen. Bob Packwood, R-Ore., who was re-elected in November after vigorously denying to the Washington Post claims that he had sexually harassed his employees and others. After the election he apologized, sort of, for sexually harassing his employees and others. When the Post broke the story, more than two weeks after that election, it was obvious that the senator had been lying all over the lot.Putting aside the cherished belief in some quarters that lying to The Washington Post is a fine thing to do, we come back to the basic issue: Can one lie to get elected? The Constitution says, "No person shall be a senator who shall not have attained to the age of 30 years, and been nine years a citizen of the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an inhabitant of that State for which he shall be chosen." Nothing about sexual harassment here, nor about telling lies.
Packwood did not invent either the concept of sexual harassment by members of Congress or lying to press and public. Not since George Washington allegedly told the truth about chopping down the cherry tree have we had a chief executive who didn't tell the folks what they wanted to hear, but the cherry tree incident (which probably never happened) was long before Washington got into politics.
This, however, is 1993: Sexual harassment is not politically correct, and the Senate Rules Committee, always fine-tuned to the slightest prevailing breeze, is about to hold a hearing. The fig leaf that covers its political performance is that clause of the Constitution stating that, "Each House shall be the judge of the elections, returns, and qualifications of its own members." The Supreme Court decided in 1969 that the House could not add to the qualifications set up by the Constitution.
The Senate can't either, but members feel politically compelled to go through their dance. The Senate Rules Committee will decide that it's OK to lie to get elected, and if they decide otherwise the Supreme Court will tell them they're wrong. Packwood, who was sworn in on Jan. 5 "without prejudice," meaning the Senate could later change its mind, will have the legal prejudice removed. The political prejudice is permanent. Those who are appalled by this outrage can take comfort in the fact that when the Senate Rules Committee's show is over, the Senate Ethics Committee is waiting in the wings with an even greater spectacle. They will get into breathless prime-time coverage of all the steamy, seamy details of Packwood's moves on his reluctant victims. Next week's show is only a warmup for the main event.