Speaking Truth to Power

by Anita Hill

  Within minutes of completing the polygraph examination, I was back in the car. For a brief period I enjoyed the free feeling one feels out of doors before we retraced our route and returned to my hotel room—the sanctuary that was quickly becoming a prison. I rushed straight to the television, concerned that I may have missed something of importance. Because the scheduling of testimony had been haphazard, I was uncertain what I had missed. Fortunately, the committee conducted little business in the morning, so that we returned in time to see the end of the testimony of the panel of my friends, the corroborating witnesses.

  For about an hour they had been testifying that I had told them of Thomas’ behavior well before the confirmation process began. The hostility to them had soon become apparent. “I want to know,” demanded Senator Charles Grassley, Republican from Iowa, “do you want to see Judge Thomas on the Supreme Court? And I would start with you, Judge Hoerchner.”

  “Senator, I am only here to tell the truth about what I was told back in the early 1980s. You have heard the truth today, and it is up to you to decide what to do with it,” the judge responded.

  Senator Grassley continued his search for political animus. “Ellen Wells?”

  “I echo what the judge says. I am here to give you this information that I know to be the truth, and for me to sit here and to say what my personal opinions may be about Judge Thomas’s qualifications for the Supreme Court, I think would not be appropriate, it would not answer to what I am here for,” Ellen Wells offered.

  “Professor Paul?” the senator asked, moving on to the third panelist, law professor Joel Paul.

  “Senator, as a legal scholar and an attorney, I have been asked the question many times prior to these allegations, whether or not Judge Thomas should be confirmed. I did not take a position then, I am not taking a position now. I am simply here to tell the truth about what I was told by Professor Hill four years ago, that she was sexually harassed by her supervisor at the EEOC,” Paul explained.

  This response seemed to provoke the senator more than any. “I am kind of puzzled. If you have reason to believe that Judge Thomas is a sexual harasser or guilty of sexual harassment, why wouldn’t you sign a letter against the nomination?”

  “First of all, Senator, I was asked to sign a letter prior to these allegations. Second of all, Senator, I believe that Professor Hill told me the truth in 1987, but I believe that you, Senator, and the other members of this committee sitting here trying to determine the facts should wait to hear all the evidence, before making a determination. As I said in response to Senator Simpson’s question, if Judge Thomas, in fact, committed the acts alleged, then I don’t think he should be confirmed. If he did not commit the acts alleged, I have no position.” Paul’s response was noncommittal and lawyerlike—not one upon which he could be indicted. Perhaps this is what angered Senator Grassley all the more.

  “It seems to me like people in your position ought to have a personal view of whether or not Judge Thomas ought to be on the Supreme Court and that you would welcome an opportunity to express it, and that you would think that, for a non-lawyer like me, it would be important for me to know it to determine whether or not you have got any bias.”

  The senator’s lecture to Joel Paul and the rest of the panel assumed that they would allow any questions they had about Thomas’ qualifications for the Supreme Court to control their recollection about what they had been told. This was a decidedly Washington insider perspective—politics controls over any moral or ethical sense of right or wrong.

  Clearly, both Senators Grassley and Simpson were trying to put the panel members in a no-win position. It was impossible to explain to professional politicians that one may have a political difference with someone and not act on it. And lawyers, in particular, often have substantive differences, yet choose not to act on them to oppose a court appointment. Moreover, I know of no lawyer who would risk disbarment by fabricating a story to prevent a presidential appointment. If any of the witnesses said that they were against the nomination, then the senators would claim it was that bias that led to their testimony. If they said that they favored the nomination, the senators could use that to undermine the seriousness of Thomas’ behavior. The witnesses were right to keep their opinions out of it.

  Grassley and the others had the benefit of many legal scholars, who in the first round of the hearing had talked about Thomas’ qualifications to be on the Court. In the end, Professor Paul got the better of the exchange with Grassley and provided perhaps some comic relief at the senator’s expense. In response to Grassley’s remark about the importance of forming an opinion about Judge Thomas’ qualifications, Professor Paul shot back in a professorial form designed to put an end to questioning. “Senator, I didn’t have the opportunity during the original round of hearings to review the record, but if you would like me to review the record, I will be happy to come back and present you with my opinion.”

  Immediately following Professor Paul’s retort, Senator Leahy reminded Grassley that only members of the Senate had taken an oath requiring them to vote on the nomination of Judge Thomas. Referring to himself and his Senate colleagues, Senator Leahy asserted, “We are the only ones who must state an opinion.”

  Finally, the questions turned to the substantive issues of the hearing. Both Susan Hoerchner and Ellen Wells testified that they had discussed the behavior I described in my testimony with me when it occurred in 1982. Neither had a political or personal axe to grind with Clarence Thomas or any of the senators. And both had undertaken to testify at considerable risk. Hoerchner held a job that was a highly public, appointed position. Wells lived and worked in Washington in jobs that constantly interfaced with the federal government.

  Having failed at efforts to attack their credibility, instead of accepting the testimony as credible, members of the committee now sought to shame them for not originally encouraging me to file a complaint. Senator Simpson, in his questioning of Judge Hoerchner, expressed disbelief that Hoerchner, acting as “a counsel or friend,” hadn’t advised me to “do something” about the harassment I experienced. Senator Grassley echoed Simpson’s assessment and offered his own that it confirmed nothing about “any sexual harassment by Judge Thomas of Professor Hill.” Ironically, individuals who had taken great risk to offer testimony were now being admonished for irresponsibility in not giving counsel to pursue the claim earlier and dismissed with the conclusion that what they had to say, truthful or not, did not matter anyway.

  From my perspective those who testified to corroborate my account were wonderful friends. They came forward and held firm in the face of unwarranted hostility from the Republicans. Thomas’ supporters developed huge dossiers on the political and social activities through their investigators. And each of the witnesses risked the further wrath of the Republicans even in the aftermath of the hearings, a wrath manifested in challenges to the employment of at least two of the witnesses, Susan Hoerchner and Joel Paul. Moreover, they risked the response of an angry public. They, too, received threatening letters and phone calls in response to their participation in the hearing. One vile individual actually mailed fecal matter to Judge Hoerchner at her office.

  But far more important to the process than their loyalty as friends was the integrity of these members of the panel. And it was that, as much as anything, which brought them forward, each separately and against the odds, to testify. Judge Hoerchner was the only member of the panel who, prior to the leak, had been aware of the statement I sent to the Senate. John Carr, with whom I hadn’t spoken in years, wrote a letter reminding me that I had told him about Thomas. It arrived in Oklahoma the day following my press conference. And after attempts to reach me in Oklahoma failed, Ellen Wells came to the offices of Pepper, Hamilton and Scheetz the day before the hearing to confirm her recollection of the harassment. My last prior contact from Ellen had been a Christmas card she mailed the year before. Joel Paul contacted the Senate directly, through his own attorney, and spoke with the press even
before any member of my team had spoken with him. He and I had not been in contact in years. None of the witnesses knew each other, having met for the first time in the Senate building during the hearing. The very idea that these four people, living in three different cities and coming from four different walks of life, could have conspired to come together in that setting is preposterous.

  When I heard them testify, I consoled myself in the realization that no matter what the senators on the committee concluded, those who knew me during the time knew that I was telling the truth. Late in the hearing, on Sunday afternoon, when many members of my team balanced precariously on the edge of bitterness, Senator Kennedy summed up the import of their testimony eloquently:

  [Some people] just don’t want to believe you and they don’t want to believe Professor Hill. That is the fact of the matter, and you may be detecting some of that in the course of the hearing and the questions this afternoon. But I hope … that after this panel we’re not going to hear any more comments, unworthy, unsubstantiated comments, unjustified comments about Professor Hill and perjury, as we heard in this room yesterday. I hope we’re not going to hear any more comments about Professor Hill being a tool of the various advocacy groups after we’ve heard Ellen Wells and John Carr and Joel Paul, all who have volunteered to come forward after they heard about this in the newspapers, comments about individual groups and staffers trying to persuade her. I hope we’re not going to hear a lot more comments about fantasy stories picked out of books and law cases after we’ve heard from this distinguished panel or how there have been attempts in the eleventh hour to derail this nomination. I hope we can clear this room of the dirt and innuendo that has been suggested [about] Professor Hill, as well, about over the transom information, about faxes, about proclivities. We heard a good deal about character assassination yesterday. And I hope we’re going to be sensitive to the attempts at character assassination on Professor Hill. They’re unworthy. They’re unworthy. And, quite frankly, I hope we’re not going to hear a lot more about racism as we consider this nominee. The fact is that these points of sexual harassment are made by an Afro-American against an Afro-American. The issue isn’t discrimination and racism, it’s about sexual harassment. And I hope we can keep our eye on that particular issue.

  That speech helped me to realize that I had not failed and neither had my witnesses. Nevertheless, the speech, as heartfelt and well delivered as it was, would neither lift the Republicans from the mire in which they willingly wallowed nor rally the Democrats to the higher cause of redeeming the nomination process. The fact was that the public had heard the cries of racism, perjury, conspiracy, and untruthfulness. And however unfounded, those cries hit their mark. Even had all dirt been cleared from the hearing room at that moment, it could not have been swept away from the public’s mind. Kennedy’s involvement in the recent rape trial of his nephew, William Kennedy Smith, made him vulnerable, and the Republican senators could and would in the end dismiss his admonitions. With no Democrat on the hearing panel to take up the cause, Senator Kennedy’s speech was too little, too late.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  To know that Wells, Hoerchner, Paul, and Carr were willing to stake their reputations to testify was one of the most moving events of the hearing. But even before I knew of the investigations that were being conducted into their lives, I had decided that I could not ask any more of my friends to face the treatment that the Republicans had dealt out. Though several people had volunteered to come forward and vouch for my character, I felt it would have been a senselessly brutal act to send them into the hearing. Tactically, some felt this was a mistake. But I do not believe that another panel would have convinced the committee, and by late Sunday afternoon, the time allowed for the hearing was drawing to an end.

  The only witness whose testimony could have been crucial whom the committee hadn’t called was Angela Wright. Hearing from her would be far more significant than bringing on another panel of character witnesses for me. After all, this proceeding was about the question of Thomas’ behavior and character, not mine.

  All weekend long we had waited to hear from Angela Wright, a woman at the EEOC whose experience with Thomas had been similar to mine. Even as late as Sunday afternoon, the committee’s chairman was uncertain about the remaining course of the proceeding. But what happened in fact differed from what Biden had previously outlined. Angela Wright never appeared. She had been subjected to attacks about her credibility even though she had not been called. Judge Thomas himself had said that she was a “worthless” employee whom he had to fire. Various panel members described her as disgruntled and her testimony as unreliable. We heard a variety of stories about why she did not testify. The one offered the most was that Wright had gotten cold feet and was afraid of being exposed by the Republicans. Later we learned that the stories we heard had been untrue. It was Chairman Biden himself who withdrew Wright’s subpoena.

  What appears to have happened was that the committee simply refused to call her. The chairman claimed that they had run out of time, even as panels of women testifying for Thomas continied to appear. Again the committee’s action raises the question of relevance. Like the testimony of John Doggett and many of the quotes from newspapers, the comments from women claiming that Thomas had behaved inoffensively toward them were simply irrelevant to the question of whether he had behaved offensively toward me. Since I had not claimed that Thomas treated all of the women on his staff in a sexual manner, in a legal proceeding on sexual harassment their testimony would not have been admitted. I can think of no legal proceeding or quasi-legal proceeding where persons who are not victims of an alleged offender are called to testify that they were nonvictims of the offense.

  Angela Wright’s testimony, on the other hand, was relevant for several reasons. In the face of my testimony, Thomas had claimed that he never treated anyone on his staff in the manner described by me. Angela Wright’s testimony would be enough to rebut that claim, as would the testimony of Sukari Hardnett, a woman who served as Thomas’ special assistant in the mid-1980s and gave the committee a statement asserting that she, too, had witnessed similar behavior by Thomas. But Angela Wright’s testimony was relevant on its own without my testimony. According to Angela Wright, Thomas had commented often on the anatomy and appearance of women in the office, making many derogatory remarks about women’s figures. He had asked her the size of her breasts and commented that certain parts of her appearance “turned him on.” Wright would also testify that Thomas showed up, uninvited, at her apartment one evening. And though according to Wright, Thomas’ suggestions had not “bothered” her, Wright’s corroborating witness, Rose Jourdain, would describe how Wright had come into her office crying in response to remarks by Thomas. Regardless of whether Wright was describing Thomas’ behavior as sexual harassment, it was relevant to the confirmation hearing because it reflected on the judgment and professional character of the nominee.

  Similarly, Sukari Hardnett asserted that Thomas attempted to date her and that when she refused, his attitude toward her became less friendly. According to Hardnett, he then attempted to enlist her help in getting friends of hers to date him. In addition to rebutting Thomas’ claim that he treated female staff members as professionals and took no personal interest in them, Hardnett’s observations, like Wright’s, reflect on Thomas’ carriage and demeanor in the workplace.

  Hardnett’s and Wright’s testimonies would have been relevant as support to my claim, in establishing a pattern of sexual advances and comments in the workplace and directed toward his assistants. In considering the conduct, much can be made of the similarities between Hardnett, Wright, and me. We were all roughly the same age at the time of the incidents—all younger than Thomas. We were all single women and thus could be easily viewed as vulnerable. We are all from southern or rural backgrounds with relatively few connections to power in Washington. And we are all black.

  In the end, the Senate seemed hostile to hearing from any of us. Neither
Wright nor Hardnett was called, and I was allowed to testify only after public pressure mandated it. Later I learned that a fourth woman, Kaye Savage, had also tried to contact the Senate, to testify to Judge Thomas’ fascination with pornography. At the time I lived in Washington, Kaye, who worked in the Reagan White House as a political appointee, was a mutual friend of mine and Thomas’. The committee dismissed her without even taking her statement. And in addition to rejecting the information offered by these witnesses, the committee refused to hear from experts in the field of sexual harassment. Dr. Louise Fitzgerald, a noted psychologist and academician who has worked for years studying sexual harassment, was ready and available to provide the committee, formally or informally, with information about sexual harassment. Dr. Fitzgerald did provide the committee with a fact sheet on the issue. But the committee would later cite lack of time as a basis for not calling her.

  By late afternoon the morning clouds had turned to drizzle. After hearing from the panel of corroborating witnesses, the committee took a brief recess. Back at the hotel, having returned from church, my family waited, unaware of my activity that morning. Emma Jordan hurriedly gathered them for an announcement about the polygraph examination and the press conference, while outside the Senate building, Paul Minor and Charles Ogletree held a press conference to announce the results of the polygraph examination. After explaining his credentials and administration of the test, Minor announced that “there was no indication of deception to any relevant questions.” Scientific evidence now refuted the conjecture of the Republican senators that I was lying. There was elation and even weeping among some individuals of the crowd. Just as intense was the reaction from the Republicans. Senator Hatch assailed Ogletree and the examination as “exactly what a two-bit lawyer would do.” Senator Danforth’s response was more calculated. He shifted from accusing me of lying to a theory that he and a Connecticut psychiatrist, Dr. Jeffrey Satinover, had been exploring since the prior evening.