Wednesday, april 29, 1981
page 4
daily nebraskan
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Agnew case verifies need to uphold public trust
Some form of justice may final
ly be coming to Spiro Agnew.
The former governor of Mary
land and vice president under
Richard Nixon has recently been
the focal point of some interesting
litigation in the Maryland courts.
Agnew resigned the vice presi
dency in October, 1973. The
Justice Department was .about to
hit him with a bribery indict
ment when his lawyers arranged a
plea bargain.
Agnew agreed to plead no
contest to one count of federal in
come tax evasion and resign his
vice presidency because of kick
backs he received from Maryland
road project engineers while he
was governor.
In 1973, three Maryland citi
zens filed suit urging the court to
force Agnew to return the illegally-obtained
money.
A judge then ruled that the citi
zens could not file the suit but
that the state could.
And Monday the judge ruled
that Agnew must return the
$248,735 in kickbacks that he re
ceived. In his ruling, the judge said
Agnew clearly "violated his public
trust."
And he violated that trust to
the tune of $147,500 received in
kickbacks and $101,235 in inter
est accumulated on the money.
Agnew has long maintained his
innocence of the charges brought
against him. In his book Go Quiet
ly or Else Agnew painted an
Agatha Christie-like scenario that
he implies drove him from office.
He implies that some Nixon
aides let it be known that Agnew
was an expendable part of his ad
ministration. He said his fear for
his own and his family's lives caus
ed him to resign.
While promoting his book,
Agnew said that he knew of infor
mation that would exonerate him
of all charges. Unfortunately, he
said he couldn't tell the waiting
world what the information was.
Agnew has made no comment
but his lawyer said an appeal on
Monday's ruling is planned.
It might be interesting to hear
Agnew tell under oath, how he
was singled out as the fall guy for
Nixon as the Watergate cover-up
crumbled around the former presi
dent. Agnew is the personification of
public corruption. He is the text
book example of a person who
used his public job and power for
his own personal benefit.
It was an injustice that Agnew
did not go to jail for the crimes he
committed. Our country has laws
that say no man is above the law,
but it is clear that both Richard
Nixon and Agnew were considered
above the law.
We hope the ruling against
Agnew is upheld and he is requir
ed to pay back the money he
wrongly took from the state of
Maryland.
Corruption in politics cannot be
encouraged or tolerated. Perhaps
rulings like the one against Agnew
will remind officials of the public
trust they are required to keep.
Tom Prentiss
The Three Racketeers: "All for one and me for all'
Honesty with self, others is well-learned lesson
By the time your college graduation rolls around, if
you haven't established some sound principles for your
self and integrity, then you can consider yourself a worth
less individual. If you have no idea what the meaning of
integrity is by the time you graduate, you can count on
being a slave to people who will bend and shape you into
what they want and will not give any consideration to
the person you really are.
o,
rkhardlson
Integrity seems to be a hot issue these days, especially
since a rash of cheating has been discovered at UNL and
because of the Janet Cooke syndrome. It seems as though
many people operate in ways that will only bring power
or a satisfactory end of some type.
But those individuals who achieve satisfaction by ly
ing or acquiring power in an unfair manner, will be re
paid in the end when their peers and others lose respect
for them. How long does it take before people discover
that a person did not act in a totally candid manner?
Not long.
Even if respect and the friendship of others is not
important, self respect is important. Before the tempta
tion of lying, cheating or deceiving wins you over, think
about if you'll be able to live with yourself later. Is a good
grade worth the self disappointment in knowing that you
got an "A" dishonestly? Is a job that you've lied for or
compromised your principles for worth it when you know
that you aren't the person that you've pretended to be?
I don't think so. And in my last article for the Daily
Nebraskan, I guess there is one important thing that I've
learned in the last three years and want to share. I've
learned the importance of being honest with others, more
over with myself.
Although I may not have come out the winner in all
circumstances, I am very satisfied with the way I have
performed. That's where the real winning comes into the
picture. If you've satisfied yourself, been honest with
yourself and others, then you're the real winner. And
those who haven't played the game with integrity may be
short-term winners, but they are not long-term winners.
Although three years ago, I would have thought that all
of this honesty stuff was hokey, after seeing a few situa
tions and circumstances of others, I believe in it. If you
think back on your own experiences, I'm sure you'll be
able to identify dishonest people and how their dishon
esty caught up with them.
Senate hearing teaches facts of life
The Daily Nebraskan has truly been a learning exper
ience, one that I wish more people would be able to
experience. Along with the lessons I've learned, I've met
and have become friends with a lot of people. But above
all, I've learned more about myself and the expectations
I have for myself and others. I expect more from people
now than friendship. People that I admire and are true
friends are those I ran trust to be honest and those that
have a high regard for their own principles.
I've demanded more of myself in the area of integrity
and I only hope that others will do the same. I think
everyone should be honest and truthful and maybe we
can all help make that become a reality by demanding
truth and honesty from ourselves and from others around
us.
It's true that some people will never know the meaning
of truth or honesty, but I don't think we should lose
those two very important ideals.
So, before you think about cheating on the final or
before you even think about lying for a job, think about
the kind of precedent you're setting. And think about if
your actions are what you would expect of others. I think
we can all do ourselves a favor by being honest and ex
pecting it from others. It may be difficult to be honest,
but it will pay off in the long run.
It sounded more like a high school biology class than a
Senate hearing.
For two days, the Judiciary subcommittee room was
filled with all sorts of lessons about the facts of "life," the
birds and the bees, the sperm and the ovum .
od goodman
For two days, freshman Sen. John East (R-N.C?) con
ducted hearings on a piece of legislation known as the
Human Life Bill. This is the bill that could outlaw abor
tion, by definition, without even bothering with a consti
tutional amendment.
The scam is a pretty simple one. First the Congress pre
tends that the Supreme Court didn't know the medical
facts when it decided in 1973 to decriminalize abortion.
Then the Congress in its wisdom "helps" the Court by
defining "person" as a fertilized egg.
As East explained it when he opened the hearings on
the origin of life: "If life does commence at conception,
then the unborn person is protected under the Constitu
tion ... Roe v. Wade would be negated."
This Human life Bill, sponsored by Jesse Helms, (R
N.C.), framed the abortion question-and I use the word
"framed" advisedly-in terms of genetics rather than law
or politics. That accomplished, East ran the hearings like
a block meeting of the Friends of the Fetus.
On the first morning, five scientists, all apparently
instructed never to use the word abortion, limited their
testimony to the prescribed subject: "simply to define
the word person in biological terms." They talked
about chromosomes, zygotes, fetuses, Fallopian tubes
everything but pregnant women.
One of the witnesses, Dr. Jerome Lejeune of Paris,
highlighted the event with a lyric description of trans
continental cattle-breeding. What you do is transport
a fertilized cow ovum across the ocean in the Fallopian
tube of a rabbit and then transplant the ovum back into
a cow uterus. (What you get, by the way, is a calf and
not a cabbit.) y
By the end of the first morning, to no one's surprise,
the doctors had testified that biological life begins at
conception . Eureka ! Stop the presses !
Continued on Page 5
(skfityj nebraskan
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