Will Senators and their Lawyers Stand up to False Accusations of Anti-Semitism at the Hagel Confirmation Hearing?

Lawyers play the race and religion card all too frequently in litigation.   It is the responsibility of other lawyers to call them on it.

Politicians play the same game.

Now, the subject of bias -- here a false accusation of anti-Semitism -- is being deployed as a political strategy in the confirmation hearing of Chuck Hagel for Secretary of Defense.

The New York Daily News dispenses with these allegations handily in this editorial:

http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/old-smear-decent-man-article-1.1235051

Many Republicans recall that a similar smear was used by some of the same actors to attack senior officials in the Administration of President George H. W. Bush in 1991 and 1992.  Republicans and Democrats should now reject a political strategy that involves imagining in opponents a bias that is all too real in many parts of the world.

Regardless of the merits of the Hagel nomination, it is the responsibility of lawyers involved in the Senate confirmation process to keep the focus on the merits and to denounce false accusations against a man who has served his Country well in armed combat and in the Senate.

 

 

Comments

[Dan Abrams]

I could not disagree more. First, the "Daily News" did not clear Hagel from the charge of anti-semitism. The newspaper simply ran an opinion piece by Richard Cohen. I personally found the Bret Stephens article that Cohen was objecting to a lot more persuasive than Cohen's article. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324907204578185223495090066.html

More importantly for purposes of a legal ethics blog, this is not a legal ethics issue. Lawyers and non-lawyers alike have legitimate concerns over some of Hagel's prior comments. And yes, some of those comments sound an awful lot like anti-semitism. People may legitimately disagree, but lawyers have no "responsibility" to gloss over these comments just because Hagel served in the military or the Senate.

[Richard Painter]

There is zero evidence to support the charge. The same special interest groups said similar things about Secretary of State James Baker in 1992. It was false then and is false now. If there were a shred of evidence to support this charge, groups such as J Street would not support Hagel as they do.

It is our job as lawyers to make sure people focus on the issues including the real anti-Semites who are taking over key Middle Eastern countries. We also should repudiate slander. That is why this belongs on a legal ethics blog.

[Dan Abrams]

So you are the arbiter of what constitutes evidence of anti-semitism? Baker said "F the jews" — that is evidence to me. Hagel complains about the "Jewish lobby" intimidating lawmakers and said he is not the Senator from Israel, implying to these ears that some of his other colleagues have divided loyalties. This feeds into well-worn negative stereotypes about Jewish Americans and Jews in general. It is in the same ballpark as saying that the Jews exert undue control over the government.

I understand how many will see Hagel's comments and shrug. That is a legitimate viewpoint which I can respect. But that does not mean that those of us who see it differently should be silenced. Don't try to turn this into a legal ethics issue where everyone who disagrees with you is unethical. Hagel is a big boy who can and should answer questions about prior comments which are troubling to some people.

[Richard Painter]

Zero evidence. Lots of emotion and hype, including this last comment. The senators and their lawyers I trust will focus on the facts.

[Richard Painter]

Many commentators inaccurately refer to "evangelicals" and "conservative Christians" when referring to a few extremist groups whose views many Christians do not share. Such phrases are wrong, but not evidence of bias. Some people complain of bias against Christians in the media, but the more intelligent response is to focus on the underlying issues that cause disagreement.

[Patrick S. O'Donnell]

Perhaps if Israel was not defined, as it is in one of its Basic Laws, as a "Jewish State," then the locution "Jewish lobby" would appear less often, especially among those who, like Hagel, are by all accounts, possessed of otherwise perfectly reasonable intentions and sincere motivations. Alas, even the slightest critique of the nature or specific components of our foreign policy with regard to Israel reflexively brings charges of anti-Semitism (and if these critics be Jewish, 'self-hating' and the like). Whatever one thinks of the overall argument, the perfervid and hysterical response to John Walt and Stephen Mearsheimer's The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy (2007) well illustrates the hazards associated with any critical examination of the policy, academic or otherwise.