[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.
But the two legal proceedings that might have shed some light on our secret government currently offer little promise. The comprehensive Christic suit, which charged 29 men with conspiring to wage an illegal war against Nicaragua with money made from drug smuggling, and sought to subject the privatization of U.S. foreign policy to intense public scrutiny, has been derailed by a federal judge.
And the long-awaited Iran-contra trials, postponed until next spring, will examine only the narrow question of whether four men defrauded the U.S. government by diverting to their own pockets and those of the Nicaraguan contras funds from secret U.S. arms sales to Iran. Oliver North, John Poindexter, Richard Secord, and Albert Hakim will not stand trial for defrauding the American people or subverting our system of government.
During last summer's Iran-contra hearings, these four justified their money-laundering and gun-running schemes in the name of anti-communism. But in the courtroom, each defendant is expected to argue that administration higher-ups knew and approved of his activities, and, therefore, he should not be held accountable for them.
There is every reason to expect that the Iran-contra trials will have more to do with the fine points of courtroom lawyering than the basic principles of democracy. Key questions about the Iran-contra affair will likely remain unanswered even as the secret government continues its work.
Only the Christic Institute lawsuit has presented the Iran-contra scandal as just one part of a long history of privatized military actions against freely elected governments, and only the Christic staff has untangled and exposed the sordid and intricate web of hired assassins, contra drug runners, secret bank accounts, and shaky deals. But Chief U.S. District Court Judge James Lawrence King, in a ruling fraught with apparent legal errors and political bias, has dismissed the Christic Institute's "contragate" lawsuit.
The judge's ruling, issued just four days before the trial was to begin in late June, ensures that George Bush will not be dogged by potentially damaging evidence from a Miami courtroom as he travels the presidential campaign trail this fall. But more significant than that are the many questions that will remain unanswered should current appeal efforts fail and the Christic suit ultimately fail to get to trial. Will we ever know the full truth about the Reagan administration's secret war against Nicaragua?
THE CHRISTIC INSTITUTE filed its lawsuit in May 1986 on behalf of journalists Tony Avirgan and Martha Honey. Avirgan had been seriously wounded in the May 1984 bombing of an Eden Pastora press conference at La Penca, Nicaragua, that killed eight people and injured dozens. Avirgan and Honey later discovered and reported, more than six months before the Iran-contra scandal broke, a plot by U.S. government officials and private individuals to kill Pastora and to establish a secret "southern front" in the war against Nicaragua.
When the Christic Institute began its own investigation into the La Penca bombing, its trail led to a "secret team" of Americans Secord, Hakim, Theodore Shackley, Thomas Clines, John Singlaub, John Hull, and others with a long record of destabilizing foreign governments. It was this concept of a "secret team" of shady characters behind decades of U.S. covert action that drew tens of thousands of people to the Christic cause.
But the courtroom has never been a particularly effective platform for political movements. Some have argued that the further the Christic case strayed from the La Penca bombing the weaker it became. Yet La Penca did remain the core of the Christic case, and over two years several other journalists corroborated many of its fundamental claims.
Videotapes exist that tie Libyan terrorist Amac Galil, posing as Danish journalist Per Anker Hansen, to the bombing, and numerous journalists have commented on the curious failure of the State Department or the CIA to explain the bombing. One State Department document obtained by Christic investigators had been entirely blacked out except for a handwritten note that reads, "La Penca: delib[erate] CIA effort to throw people off track of real perpetrators."
Christic depositions with key aides to Vice President Bush have also raised serious questions about Bush's role in the secret arming of the contras, and Christic attorneys have obtained documents from Bush's office that were not released to the Iran-contra committees. Yet, despite all this and other volumes of evidence, Judge King dismissed the Christic suit for lack of sufficient evidence.
However, it appears that King's ruling was rife with legal errors. King ruled on issues not raised by the defendants in their requests for summary judgments; he ruled before the completion of the plaintiffs' evidence-gathering period; he usurped the jury's role by judging the facts of the case; and he rejected the admissibility of some evidence. Because of King's apparently improper legal rulings, Christic attorneys are confident that their appeals will succeed and that their case finally will go to court.
Even as it strives to overcome a significant setback, the Christic Institute deserves continued support in its efforts. The deep, dark secrets of U.S. foreign policy--official and unofficial--must be brought to light, and those responsible for crimes against democracy must be held accountable. The Christic suit represents the only real opportunity to expose the truth about the Reagan administration's dirty war and to restore a basic level of accountability of a government to its people.
But, on many levels, the Christic suit has already succeeded. Tens of thousands of Americans now know the covert nature of our foreign policy, the ruthlessness and immorality that have characterized our anti-communist crusades, and the true nature of our national security state and the dangers it poses to our democracy. These people are informed and active and, inside and outside the courtroom, they will continue to insist that their government uphold the Constitution and be honest with its people.
And that's what democracy is about.
Vicki Kemper was news editor of Sojourners when this article appeared.
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