Right Voices

Think Progress is in a tizzy because U.S. Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan has no plans to resign:

Indeed, when a new president is elected, U.S. attorneys of both parties generally submit their resignations to make way for the new appointees.

But let’s travel back to 1993:

Attorney General Janet Reno fired all 93 U.S. attorneys, a very unusual practice. Republicans charged the Clintonites made the move to take U.S. Attorney Jay Stephens off the House Post Office investigation of Ways and Means Chairman Dan Rostenkowski. The network response: ABC and CBS never mentioned it. CNN’s World News and NBC Nightly News provided brief mentions, with only NBC noting the Rosty angle. Only NBC’s Garrick Utley kept the old outrage, declaring in a March 27 “Final Thoughts” comment: “Every new President likes to say ‘Under me, it’s not going to be politics as usual.’ At the Justice Department, it looks as if it still is.”

“Washington Area to Lose 2 High-Profile Prosecutors; All U.S. Attorneys Told to Tender Resignations,” read a front page story in the March 24, 1993 Washington Post. Two days later, in an article on page A-22, according to Nexis, “Clinton Defends Ousting U.S. Attorneys; GOP Steps Up Criticism of Attorney General’s ‘March Massacre,’” Dan Balz cited how then-Clinton operative George Stephanopoulos, who appeared on Tuesday’s Good Morning America and World News to comment on the current controversy, defended Bill Clinton’s decision:

President Clinton yesterday attempted to rebut Republican criticism of the administration’s decision to seek resignations from all U.S. attorneys, saying what he was asking was routine and less political than piecemeal replacements.”All those people are routinely replaced and I have not done anything differently,” Clinton told reporters during a photo opportunity in the Oval Office. He called the decision more politically appropriate “than picking people out one by one.”

But Republicans in Congress pressed their criticism of the decision, announced Tuesday by Attorney General Janet Reno, with Senate Minority Leader Robert J. Dole (R-Kan.) describing the decision as “Reno’s March Massacre.”

Rep. Richard K. Armey (R-Tex.) urged the administration to allow Jay B. Stephens, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, to stay on the job until he completes his investigation of the House Post Office scandal and the role House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dan Rostenkowski (D-Ill.) may have played in it.

Stephens said Tuesday he was about a month away from “a critical decision with regard to resolution” of the probe….

Presidential spokesman George Stephanopoulos said it was not unusual for a president to ask for such resignations, although Republicans said presidents in the past have not asked for mass resignations, replacing them over a period of time as replacements were found.

Stephanopoulos said only those U.S. attorneys who are in the middle of trials will be allowed to continue working and said an interim appointee could capably pick up Stephens’s investigation of the House Post Office scandal, with no serious disruption or political interference….

Bozell Column: Bush’s Eight vs. Clinton’s 93