Decision Points

by George W. Bush

  Two other messages came from our consultations on Capitol Hill. The first was that I should think about picking a lawyer from outside the bench. The second was that I seriously consider my White House counsel, Harriet Miers. Several senators had been very impressed by Harriet as she shepherded John Roberts through his interviews on Capitol Hill.

  I liked the idea of nominating Harriet. She had been a legal pioneer in Texas—the first woman president of a major Texas law firm, the Dallas Bar Association, and the State Bar of Texas. She had been elected to the Dallas City Council, directed the Texas Lottery Commission, and served nearly five years in top White House positions. There was no doubt in my mind that she shared my judicial philosophy and that her outlook would not change. She would make an outstanding justice.

  With Harriet Miers in the Oval Office. White House/Eric Draper

  I asked Harriet if she had any interest in the job. She was surprised—more like shocked—but she said she would serve if I asked. I raised the idea with other members of the search group. Harriet’s colleagues loved and respected her, and some thought she would be a good choice. Others argued that it was too risky to pick someone with no established record on the bench, or that we would be accused of cronyism. Several told me bluntly that she was not the right choice. None told me to expect the firestorm of criticism we received from our supporters.

  The decision came down to Harriet and Priscilla Owen. I decided to go with Harriet. I knew her better. I thought she had a better chance to be confirmed. And she would bring a unique perspective to the Court as someone outside the judicial fraternity. Initially, a number of senators and judges praised the selection. Their voices, however, were quickly drowned out. On the right, initial whispers of disbelief turned to howls of incredulity. How could I name someone with so little experience? How could they trust the judicial philosophy of someone they didn’t know?

  It seemed to me that there was another argument against Harriet, one that went largely unspoken: How could I name someone who did not run in elite legal circles? Harriet had not gone to an Ivy League law school. Her personal style compounded the doubts. She is not glib. She is not fancy. She thinks hard before she speaks—a trait so rare in Washington that it was mistaken for intellectual slowness. As one conservative critic condescendingly put it, “However nice, helpful, prompt, and tidy she is, Harriet Miers isn’t qualified to play a Supreme Court justice on The West Wing, let alone to be a real one.”

  All of these criticisms came from so-called friends. When the left started criticizing Harriet, too, I knew the nomination was doomed. After three terrible weeks, I got a call in my office in the Treaty Room, where I was working late in the evening. The White House operator told me Harriet was on the phone. In a steady, composed voice, she informed me that she thought it best that she withdraw from consideration for the Supreme Court. As much as it pained me, I agreed.

  While I know Harriet would have made a fine justice, I didn’t think enough about how the selection would be perceived by others. I put my friend in an impossible situation. If I had it to do over again, I would not have thrown Harriet to the wolves of Washington.

  The morning after the announcement, Harriet reported to work, just like on any other day. She went office to office in the West Wing, lifting the spirits of the many colleagues, junior and senior, who were saddened to see a person they admired treated so wrongly. When she came to the Oval Office, I said, “Thank goodness you withdrew. I still have a great lawyer.” She smiled and said, “Mr. President, I am ready to lead the search for your next nominee.”

  I had to get the next pick right. While the idea of selecting a woman still appealed to me, I could not find any as qualified as Sam Alito. Sam is as reserved as they come. When we first sat down for the interview, he seemed ill at ease. I tried the old common-ground icebreaker—in this case, baseball. Sam is a huge Philadelphia Phillies fan. As we talked about the game, his body language changed. He opened up a little about his life and the law. He was scholarly, but practical. He had been a federal prosecutor in New Jersey before moving to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in 1990. His opinions were well grounded and tightly argued. There was no doubt he would adhere strictly to the Constitution.

  With Sam Alito. White House/Paul Morse

  Four days after Harriet withdrew, I met with Sam in the Oval Office and offered him the job. He accepted. Our supporters were elated. Our critics knew they would not be able to block Sam’s confirmation, but they subjected him to a nasty hearing anyway. They tried to paint him as a racist, a radical, a bigot, anything they could think of—all based on zero evidence. I was disgusted by the demagoguery. As one senator recounted the false charges, Sam’s wife, Martha Ann, broke into tears. Her reaction was so genuine that even some Democrats realized they had gone too far.

  After the Senate confirmed Sam to the Court, I invited him and his family to the White House for his swearing-in. Before we went out for the ceremony, I had a moment alone with Sam. I thanked him for enduring the hearings and wished him well on the Court. Then I said, “Sam, you ought to thank Harriet Miers for making this possible.” He replied, “Mr. President, you’re exactly right.”

  The most emotional personnel decision I had to make was the last one of my presidency. The roots of my dilemma stretched back to the summer of 2003. Our troops in Iraq had not found the weapons of mass destruction we all expected, and the media’s scramble for a scapegoat had commenced. In my 2003 State of the Union address, I had cited a British intelligence report that Iraq sought to buy uranium from Niger. The single sentence in my five-thousand-word speech was not a major point in the case against Saddam. The British stood by the intelligence.*** Yet those sixteen words became a political controversy and a massive distraction.

  In July 2003, former ambassador Joseph Wilson wrote a New York Times column alleging that the administration had ignored his skeptical findings when he traveled to Africa to investigate the Iraq-Niger connection. There were serious questions about the accuracy and thoroughness of Wilson’s report, but his charge became a prime talking point for critics of the war. Shortly after Wilson’s op-ed, longtime Washington columnist Bob Novak reported that Wilson had been sent to Niger not by Dick Cheney or any senior member of the administration, as Wilson had suggested, but on the recommendation of his wife, Valerie Plame, who worked at the CIA.

  Then it came out that Wilson’s wife’s position was classified. Critics alleged that someone in my administration had committed a crime by intentionally leaking the identity of a CIA operative. The Justice Department named a special prosecutor to investigate.

  I was inherently skeptical of special prosecutors. I remembered how Lawrence Walsh had politicized his investigation of Iran-Contra during the 1992 campaign. But an intelligence leak was a serious matter, and I directed my staff to cooperate fully. U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald interviewed most of the team, including me. Early in the process, Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage informed Fitzgerald that he had provided Novak with the information about Plame. Nevertheless, the special prosecutor continued to investigate.

  Over the course of more than two years, Fitzgerald brought numerous administration officials before a grand jury, including Dick’s chief of staff, Scooter Libby. After two appearances by Scooter, Fitzgerald produced an indictment for perjury, obstruction of justice, and making false statements. Scooter went to trial and was convicted. In June 2007 he was sentenced to thirty months in prison.

  I faced an agonizing decision. I could let Scooter go to jail. I could use my power under the Constitution to grant him a pardon. Or I could commute his sentence, meaning his conviction would stand but his prison sentence would not. Some in the White House, led by the vice president, pushed aggressively for a pardon. Their argument was that the investigation should never have proceeded after Fitzgerald had identified Novak’s source. On the other hand, most advisers believed that the jury verdict was correct and should remain in place.

  I decided it would
send a bad message to pardon a former staff member convicted of obstructing justice, especially after I had instructed the staff to cooperate with the investigation. But the punishment Scooter had received did not fit the crime. The protracted investigation and trial had already caused personal, professional, and financial damage for Scooter and his family. In early July 2007, I announced my decision: “I respect the jury’s verdict. But I have concluded that the prison sentence given to Mr. Libby is excessive. Therefore, I am commuting the portion of Mr. Libby’s sentence that required him to spend thirty months in prison.”

  The reaction from the left was blistering. “President Bush’s action today tells America that it’s okay to lie, mislead, and obstruct justice, as long as you are loyal to his administration,” one congressman said. Another said, “I call on House Democrats to reconsider impeachment proceedings.” Not everyone in the White House liked the decision, either. Dick continued to advocate a full pardon.

  One of the biggest surprises of my presidency was the flood of pardon requests at the end. I could not believe the number of people who pulled me aside to suggest that a friend or former colleague deserved a pardon. At first I was frustrated. Then I was disgusted. I came to see massive injustice in the system. If you had connections to the president, you could insert your case into the last-minute frenzy. Otherwise, you had to wait for the Justice Department to conduct a review and make a recommendation. In my final weeks in office, I resolved that I would not pardon anyone who went outside the formal channels.

  In the closing days of the administration, Dick pressed his case that Scooter should be pardoned. Scooter was a decent man and dedicated public servant, and I understood the ramifications for his family. I asked two trusted lawyers to review the case from top to bottom, including the evidence presented at the trial for and against Scooter. I also authorized them to meet with Scooter to hear his side of the story. After careful analysis, both lawyers told me they could find no justification for overturning the jury’s verdict.

  I spent our last weekend at Camp David wrestling with the decision. “Just make up your mind,” Laura told me. “You’re ruining this for everyone.” Ultimately, I reached the same conclusion I had in 2007: The jury verdict should be respected. In one of our final meetings, I informed Dick that I would not issue a pardon. He stared at me with an intense look. “I can’t believe you’re going to leave a soldier on the battlefield,” he said. The comment stung. In eight years, I had never seen Dick like this, or even close to this. I worried that the friendship we had built was about to be severely strained, at best.

  A few days later, I talked to another person about the pardon process. On the ride up Pennsylvania Avenue on Inauguration Day, I told Barack Obama about my frustrations with the pardon system. I gave him a suggestion: announce a pardon policy early on, and stick to it.

  After President Obama’s Inauguration, Laura and I choppered to Andrews Air Force Base. Our final event before boarding the plane home to Texas was a farewell ceremony in front of three thousand friends, family, and former staff. Dick had agreed to introduce me. He had injured his back moving boxes, so Lynne had to push him onto the stage in a wheelchair. Dick grabbed the microphone. I had no idea what he would say. I hoped he would be able to get past the disappointment he felt. His words were heartfelt and kind: “Eight and a half years ago, I began a partnership with George Bush that has truly been a special honor. … If I have one regret, it is only that these days have ended and that all the members of this fine team, now, must go their own way.”

  The man I picked that hot day in July remained steady to the end. Our friendship had survived.

  *Arguably, my home state provided an exception in 1960, when John F. Kennedy chose Lyndon Johnson as his running mate. There was no similar benefit in 1988, when Michael Dukakis tapped Texas Senator Lloyd Bentsen.

  **I later heard that General Shinseki’s staff had not invited Don to attend. I think he should have gone anyway.

  ***In 2004, the nonpartisan Butler Report concluded that the statement was “well-founded.”

  n the heart of central London sat a thirty-four-story gray building. One floor contained a large, open space known as the Fertilizing Room. Inside, technicians meticulously mixed eggs and sperm in test tubes to produce the next generation. The hatchery served as the lifeblood of a new world government, which had mastered the formula for engineering a productive and stable society.

  That scene was not the creation of Jay Lefkowitz, the bright lawyer reading aloud to me in the Oval Office in 2001. It came from Aldous Huxley’s 1932 novel, Brave New World. With the recent breakthroughs in biotechnology and genetics, the book now seemed chillingly relevant. So did its lesson: For all its efficiency, Huxley’s utopian world seemed sterile, joyless, and empty of meaning. The quest to perfect humanity ended in the loss of humanity.

  In April of that same year, another piece of writing turned up in the Oval Office. Describing what she called a “wrenching family journey,” the author urged me to support the “miracle possibilities” of embryonic stem cell research to provide cures for people like her husband, who was suffering from Alzheimer’s. She closed, “Mr. President, I have some personal experience regarding the many decisions you face each day. … I’d be very grateful if you would take my thoughts and prayers into your consideration on this critical issue. Most sincerely, Nancy Reagan.”

  The juxtaposition of Mrs. Reagan’s letter and the Huxley novel framed the decision I faced on stem cell research. Many felt the federal government had a responsibility to fund medical research that might help save the lives of people like President Reagan. Others argued that supporting the destruction of human embryos could take us off a moral cliff toward an uncaring society that devalued life. The contrast was stark, and I faced a difficult decision.

  “Sometimes our differences run so deep it seems we share a continent, but not a country,” I said in my Inaugural Address on January 20, 2001. “We do not accept this, and we will not allow it. Our unity, our union, is the serious work of leaders and citizens in every generation. And this is my solemn pledge: I will work to build a single nation of justice and opportunity.”

  After a luncheon with dignitaries at the Capitol, Laura and I made our way to the White House as part of the official Inaugural parade. Pennsylvania Avenue was lined by well-wishers, along with a few pockets of protesters. They carried big signs with foul language, hurled eggs at the motorcade, and screamed at the top of their lungs. I spent most of the ride in the presidential limo behind thick glass windows, so their shouting came across in pantomime. While I couldn’t make out their words, their middle fingers spoke loudly: The bitterness of the 2000 election was not going away anytime soon.

  Laura and I watched the rest of the parade from the reviewing stand at the White House. We waved to the marchers from every state and were thrilled to see high school bands from Midland and Crawford. After the parade, I went to check out the Oval Office. As I walked over from the residence, the room looked like it was glowing. Its bright lights and gold drapes stood out in vivid contrast from the dark winter sky.

  Each president decorates the Oval Office in his own style. I hung several Texas paintings, including Julian Onderdonk’s renditions of the Alamo, a West Texas landscape, and a field of bluebonnets—a daily reminder of our ranch in Crawford. I also brought a painting called Rio Grande from an El Paso artist and friend, Tom Lea, and a scene of a horseman charging up a hill by W.H.D. Koerner. The name of the piece, A Charge to Keep, echoed a Methodist hymn by Charles Wesley, which we sang at my first inauguration as governor. Both the painting and hymn reflect the importance of serving a cause larger than oneself.

  The Oval Office as it looked during my presidency. White House/Eric Draper

  I decided to keep the Rembrandt Peale portrait of George Washington that Dad and Bill Clinton had placed over the mantel. I added busts of Abraham Lincoln, Dwight Eisenhower, and Winston Churchill—a gift on loan from the British government courtesy of P
rime Minister Tony Blair. I had told Tony that I admired Churchill’s courage, principle, and sense of humor—all of which I thought were necessary for leadership. (My favorite example of Churchill’s wit was his reply when Franklin Roosevelt caught him coming out of the tub on a visit to the White House in December 1941. “I have nothing to hide from the president of the United States!” he said.) After 9/11, I realized the three busts had something in common: All depicted wartime leaders. I certainly didn’t have that in mind when I chose them.

  One space on the wall was reserved for the president’s most influential predecessor. I chose Lincoln. He’d had the most trying job of any president, preserving the Union. Some asked why I didn’t put Dad’s portrait in that spot. “Number forty-one hangs in my heart,” I said. “Sixteen is on the wall.”

  The centerpiece of the Oval Office was the Resolute desk. I had chosen the desk because of its historical significance. Its story began in 1852, when Queen Victoria dispatched the HMS Resolute to search for the British explorer John Franklin, who had been lost looking for the Northwest Passage. The Resolute was trapped in ice near the Arctic and abandoned by its crew. In 1855 it was discovered by an American whaling ship, which sailed the Resolute back to Connecticut. The vessel was purchased by the U.S. government, refitted, and returned to England as a goodwill gift to the queen. When the Resolute was decommissioned two decades later, Her Majesty had several ornate desks made out of its timbers, one of which she gave to President Rutherford B. Hayes.

  Most presidents since Hayes have used the Resolute desk in one capacity or another. Franklin Roosevelt commissioned a front panel door with a carved presidential seal, which some historians believe was intended to hide his wheelchair. Little John F. Kennedy, Jr., poked his head out that door in the most famous Oval Office photo ever taken. Dad had used the Resolute in his upstairs office in the residence, while Bill Clinton returned it to the Oval. Sitting behind the historic desk was a reminder—that first day and every day—that the institution of the presidency is more important than the person who holds it.