I suppose this shouldn’t come as a surprise. Dick Cheney urged a pardon for Scooter Libby, one that George W. Bush chose not to give.

In the waning days of the Bush administration, Vice President Dick Cheney launched a last-ditch campaign to persuade his boss to pardon Lewis (Scooter) Libby - and was furious when President George W. Bush wouldn't budge. Sources close to Cheney told the Daily News the former vice president repeatedly pressed Bush to pardon Libby, arguing his ex-chief of staff and longtime alter ego deserved a full exoneration - even though Bush had already kept Libby out of jail by commuting his 30-month prison sentence. "He tried to make it happen right up until the very end," one Cheney associate said. In multiple conversations, both in person and over the telephone, Cheney tried to get Bush to change his mind. Libby was convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice in the federal probe of who leaked covert CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity to the press. Several sources confirmed Cheney refused to take no for an answer. "He went to the mat and came back and back and back at Bush," a Cheney defender said. "He was still trying the day before Obama was sworn in."

Now looking at this situation, I see three reasons for this decision by Bush. I’d like to comment on each of them.

1. Last minute pardons can be controversial and tarnish the reputation of the president who grants them. Consider not just Clinton’s Marc Rich pardon, but also the pardons issued by George H. W. Bush shortly before he left office. Why should he have opened himself up to even more controversy? Besides – why risk damaging the presidency with such a pardon?


2. Pardons, especially of recently decided cases, can be seen as undermining respect for the law and jury verdicts. As the governor of Texas, Bush had a very limited power to pardon – n part because the Texas Constitution is designed to keep the executive from running roughshod over the decision of juries. Bush carried that philosophy with him to Washington – and so while he may have modified some punishments he felt were excessive, he held back on pardons in general.


3. Accepting pardons keeps the recipients from clearing their names. Libby, like Border Patrol agents Ramos and Campeon, is appealing his conviction in an effort to clear his name. A pardon would have mooted the appeal – and acceptance of a pardon is generally seen as an admission of guilt. Libby remains free to work to clear his name in the courts – and to possibly receive a pardon by a future president if that effort fails.

Personally, I view the last of these as the most important one – and it is why I consider Bush’s decision not to issue pardons to either Libby or Ramos and Campeon to be the proper one, despite my belief that in both cases there was a grave miscarriage of justice in both the decision to prosecute and the decision to convict.

H/T Hot Air