[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 86 (Tuesday, May 23, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H5386-H5387]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


          TIME FOR AN OUTSIDE COUNSEL IN SPEAKER'S ETHICS CASE

  (Mr. BONIOR asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. BONIOR. Mr. Speaker, why is the Ethics Committee making the 
special exception in the case of Speaker Newt Gingrich?
  In every single high-profile ethics case since 1979, both the 
Democrats and the Republicans on the committee have voted to appoint an 
outside counsel. But last Sunday, according to the Washington Post, all 
five Republican members of the Ethics Committee broke with 15 years of 
bipartisan tradition and voted to make a special exception for Newt 
Gingrich and block an outside counsel. [[Page H5387]] 
  Mr. Speaker, these are all honorable people caught in a difficult 
position because they all have close personal ties to the Speaker. Mr. 
Speaker, the Ethics Committee has had this since last December. It will 
never get resolved any other way.
  It is not just Dave Bonior and others here who are calling for it. 
Public Citizen, the New York Times, Richard Phelan, Roll Call, Robert 
Scheer in the L.A. Times, Al Hunter in the Wall Street Journal, Common 
Cause, the Hartford Courant, the San Francisco Chronicle, the list goes 
on and on. The Atlanta Constitution, his home newspaper. All have 
called for an independent outside counsel. It is time that we had one.


                          ____________________