The Case for the Christic Lawsuit | Sojourners

The Case for the Christic Lawsuit

[If] any of these little left-wing outfits like the Christic Institute have something [on me], let's see what it is. Let the American people have it examined and have a fair resolution made.--Vice President George Bush, May 27,1988

Whether the vice president was bluffing or, like many Reagan administration officials, has professed his ignorant innocence so many times that he actually believes it, George Bush deserves to be taken up on this statement. Let us, the American people, see the long-hidden facts behind the Iran-contra scandal and our country's long-secret foreign policy. Let us analyze the evidence.

That, despite some factual weaknesses and rhetorical flights of fancy, was what the Christic Institute's much-maligned "contragate" lawsuit was all about. It sought to make government officials and private individuals accountable to the law of the land and to the people of this country.

Such accountability is needed to restore the integrity of our constitutional system because, while some have ridiculed general counsel Danny Sheehan and others at the Christic Institute for their "conspiracy theory" of U.S. foreign policy, conspiracy is exactly what the maintenance of a national security state requires: a conspiracy of secrecy and deceit.

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