Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-98-03060/USCOURTS-caDC-98-03060-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Bruce R. Lindsey

Document Text:

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United States Court of Appeals

for the district of columbia circuit

Argued June 29, 1998 Decided July 27, 1998

No. 98-3060

In re: Bruce R. Lindsey (Grand Jury Testimony)

Consolidated with

Nos. 98-3062 and 98-3072

Appeals from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 98ms00095)

W. Neil Eggleston argued the cause for appellant the Office of the 

President, with whom

Timothy K. Armstrong, Julie K. Brof and Charles F.C. Ruff, Counsel to the 

President, were on

the briefs.

David E. Kendall argued the cause for appellant William J. Clinton, with 

whom Nicole K.

Seligman, Max Stier, Robert S. Bennett, Carl S. Rauh, Amy Sabrin and 

Katharine S. Sexton were

on the briefs.

Douglas N. Letter, Attorney, U.S. Department of Justice, argued the 

cause for amicus

curiae the Attorney General, with whom Janet Reno, Attorney General, Frank W. 

Hunger,

Assistant Attorney General, Stephen W. Preston, Deputy Assistant Attorney 

General, and

Stephanie R. Marcus, Attorney, were on the brief.

Kenneth W. Starr, Independent Counsel and Brett M. Kavanaugh, Associate 

Independent

Counsel, argued the causes for appellee the United States, with whom Joseph 

M. Ditkoff,

Associate Independent Counsel, was on the brief.

Before: Randolph, Rogers and Tatel, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed Per Curiam.

Opinion dissenting from Part II and concurring in part and dissenting in 

part from Part III

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filed by Circuit Judge Tatel.

Per Curiam: In these expedited appeals, the principal question is 

whether an attorney in

the Office of the President, having been called before a federal grand jury, 

may refuse, on the

basis of a government attorney-client privilege, to answer questions about 

possible criminal

conduct by government officials and others. To state the question is to 

suggest the answer, for

the Office of the President is a part of the federal government, consisting 

of government

employees doing government business, and neither legal authority nor policy 

nor experience

suggests that a federal government entity can maintain the ordinary common 

law attorney-client

privilege to withhold information relating to a federal criminal offense. 

The Supreme Court and

this court have held that even the constitutionally based executive privilege 

for presidential

communications fundamental to the operation of the government can be overcome 

upon a proper

showing of need for the evidence in criminal trials and in grand jury 

proceedings. See United

States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683, 707-12 (1974); In re Sealed Case (Espy), 121 

F.3d 729, 736-38

(D.C. Cir. 1997). In the context of federal criminal investigations and 

trials, there is no basis for

treating legal advice differently from any other advice the Office of the 

President receives in

performing its constitutional functions. The public interest in honest 

government and in

exposing wrongdoing by government officials, as well as the tradition and 

practice,

acknowledged by the Office of the President and by former White House 

Counsel, of government

lawyers reporting evidence of federal criminal offenses whenever such 

evidence comes to them,

lead to the conclusion that a government attorney may not invoke the 

attorney-client privilege in

response to grand jury questions seeking information relating to the possible 

commission of a

federal crime. The extent to which the communications of White House Counsel 

are privileged

against disclosure to a federal grand jury depends, therefore, on whether the 

communications

contain information of possible criminal offenses. Additional protection may 

flow from

executive privilege [[

]].

I.

On January 16, 1998, at the request of the Attorney General, the 

Division for the Purpose

of Appointing Independent Counsels issued an order expanding the 

prosecutorial jurisdiction of

Independent Counsel Kenneth W. Starr. Previously, the main focus of 

Independent Counsel

Starr's inquiry had been on financial transactions involving President 

Clinton when he was

Governor of Arkansas, known popularly as the Whitewater inquiry. The order 

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now authorized

Starr to investigate "whether Monica Lewinsky or others suborned perjury, 

obstructed justice,

intimidated witnesses, or otherwise violated federal law" in connection with 

the civil lawsuit

against the President of the United States filed by Paula Jones. In re 

Motions of Dow Jones &

Co., 142 F.3d 496, 497-98 (D.C. Cir.), petition for cert. filed, 66 U.S.L.W. 

3790 (U.S. June 3,

1998) (No. 97-1959) (quoting order). "Thereafter, a grand jury here began 

receiving evidence

about Monica Lewinsky and President Clinton, and others . . . . " Id. at 498.

On January 30, 1998, the grand jury issued a subpoena to Bruce R. 

Lindsey, an attorney

admitted to practice in Arkansas. Lindsey currently holds two positions: 

Deputy White House

Counsel and Assistant to the President. On February 18, February 19, and 

March 12, 1998,

Lindsey appeared before the grand jury and declined to answer certain 

questions on the ground

that the questions represented information protected from disclosure by a 

government attorneyclient privilege applicable to Lindsey's communications with the President as 

Deputy White

House Counsel, as well as by executive privilege, and [[ 

]].

Lindsey also claimed work product protections related to the attorney-client 

privilege[[ ]].

On March 6, 1998, the Independent Counsel moved to compel Lindsey's 

testimony. The

district court granted that motion on May 4, 1998. The court concluded that 

the President's

executive privilege claim failed in light of the Independent Counsel's 

showing of need and

unavailability. See In re Sealed Case (Espy), 121 F.3d at 754. It rejected 

Lindsey's government

attorney-client privilege claim on similar grounds, ruling that the President 

possesses an attorneyclient privilege when consulting in his official capacity with White House 

Counsel, but that the

privilege is qualified in the grand jury context and may be overcome upon a 

sufficient showing of

need for the subpoenaed communications and unavailability from other sources. 

[[

]].

[[ ]] the Office of the President [[ 

]] appealed the order

granting the motion to compel Lindsey's testimony, challenging the district 

court's construction

of both the government attorney-client privilege and [[ 

]]. The

Independent Counsel then petitioned the Supreme Court to review the district 

court's decision on

those issues, among others, before judgment by this court. On June 4, 1998, 

the Supreme Court

denied certiorari, while indicating its expectation that "the Court of 

Appeals will proceed

expeditiously to decide this case." United States v. Clinton, 118 S. Ct. 

2079 (1998). Following

an expedited briefing schedule, on June 29, 1998, this court heard argument 

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on the attorneyclient issues. Neither the Office of the President nor the President in his 

personal capacity has

appealed the district court's ruling on executive privilege. In Part II we 

address the availability

of the government attorney-client privilege; [[ 

]].

II.

The attorney-client privilege protects confidential communications made 

between clients

and their attorneys when the communications are for the purpose of securing 

legal advice or

services. See In re Sealed Case, 737 F.2d 94, 98-99 (D.C. Cir. 1984). It 

"is one of the oldest

recognized privileges for confidential communications." Swidler & Berlin v. 

United States, No.

97-1192, 1998 WL 333019, at *3 (U.S. June 25, 1998).

The Office of the President contends that Lindsey's communications with 

the President

and others in the White House should fall within this privilege both because 

the President, like

any private person, needs to communicate fully and frankly with his legal 

advisors, and because

the current grand jury investigation may lead to impeachment proceedings, 

which would require

a defense of the President's official position as head of the executive 

branch of government,

presumably with the assistance of White House Counsel. The Independent 

Counsel contends

that an absolute government attorney-client privilege would be inconsistent 

with the proper role

of the government lawyer and that the President should rely only on his 

private lawyers for fully

confidential counsel.

Federal courts are given the authority to recognize privilege claims by 

Rule 501 of the

Federal Rules of Evidence, which provides that

[e]xcept as otherwise required by the Constitution of the United States 

or

provided by Act of Congress or in rules prescribed by the Supreme Court 

pursuant

to statutory authority, the privilege of a witness, person, government, 

State, or

political subdivision thereof shall be governed by the principles of the 

common

law as they may be interpreted by the courts of the United States in the 

light of

reason and experience.

Fed. R. Evid. 501. Although Rule 501 manifests a congressional desire to 

provide the courts

with the flexibility to develop rules of privilege on a case-by-case basis, 

see Trammel v. United

States, 445 U.S. 40, 47 (1980), the Supreme Court has been "disinclined to 

exercise this authority

expansively," University of Pa. v. EEOC, 493 U.S. 182, 189 (1990). "[T]hese 

exceptions to the

demand for every man's evidence are not lightly created nor expansively 

construed, for they are

in derogation of the search for truth." Nixon, 418 U.S. at 710; see also 

Trammel, 445 U.S. at 50.

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Consequently, federal courts do not recognize evidentiary privileges unless 

doing so "promotes

sufficiently important interests to outweigh the need for probative 

evidence." Id. at 51.

The Supreme Court has not articulated a precise test to apply to the 

recognition of a

privilege, but it has "placed considerable weight upon federal and state 

precedent," In re Sealed

Case (Secret Service), No. 98-3069, 1998 WL 370584, at *3 (D.C. Cir. July 7, 

1998), and on the

existence of "a 'public good transcending the normally predominant principle 

of utilizing all

rational means for ascertaining the truth.'" Jaffee v. Redmond, 518 U.S. 1, 

9 (1996) (quoting

Trammel, 445 U.S. at 50 (quoting Elkins v. United States, 364 U.S. 206, 234 

(1960) (Frankfurter,

J., dissenting))). That public good should be shown "with a high degree of 

clarity and certainty."

In re Sealed Case (Secret Service), 1998 WL 370584, at *4.

A.

Courts, commentators, and government lawyers have long recognized a 

government

attorney-client privilege in several contexts. Much of the law on this 

subject has developed in

litigation about exemption five of the Freedom of Information Act ("FOIA"). 

See 5 U.S.C.

• 552(b)(5) (1994). Under that exemption, "intra-agency memorandums or 

letters which would

not be available by law to a party other than an agency in litigation with 

the agency" are excused

from mandatory disclosure to the public. Id.; see also S. Rep. No. 89-813, 

at 2 (1965) (including

within exemption five "documents which would come within the attorney-client 

privilege if

applied to private parties"). We have recognized that "Exemption 5 protects, 

as a general rule,

materials which would be protected under the attorney-client privilege." 

Coastal States Gas

Corp. v. Department of Energy, 617 F.2d 854, 862 (D.C. Cir. 1980). "In the 

governmental

context, the 'client' may be the agency and the attorney may be an agency 

lawyer." Tax Analysts

v. IRS, 117 F.3d 607, 618 (D.C. Cir. 1997); see also Brinton v. Department of 

State, 636 F.2d

600, 603-04 (D.C. Cir. 1980). In Lindsey's case, his client -- to the extent 

he provided legal

services -- would be the Office of the President.

Exemption five does not itself create a government attorney-client 

privilege. Rather,

"Congress intended that agencies should not lose the protection traditionally 

afforded through the

evidentiary privileges simply because of the passage of the FOIA." Coastal 

States, 617 F.2d at

862. In discussing the government attorney-client privilege applicable to 

exemption five, we

have mentioned the usual advantages:

the attorney-client privilege has a proper role to play in exemption 

five cases. . . .

In order to ensure that a client receives the best possible legal 

advice, based on a

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full and frank discussion with his attorney, the attorney-client 

privilege assures

him that confidential communications to his attorney will not be 

disclosed without

his consent. We see no reason why this same protection should not be 

extended to

an agency's communications with its attorneys under exemption five.

Mead Data Cent., Inc. v. United States Dep't of Air Force, 566 F.2d 242, 252 

(D.C. Cir. 1977).

Thus, when "the Government is dealing with its attorneys as would any private 

party seeking

advice to protect personal interests, and needs the same assurance of 

confidentiality so it will not

be deterred from full and frank communications with its counselors," 

exemption five applies.

Coastal States, 617 F.2d at 863.

Furthermore, the proposed (but never enacted) Federal Rules of Evidence 

concerning

privileges, to which courts have turned as evidence of common law practices, 

see, e.g., United

States v. Gillock, 445 U.S. 360, 367-68 (1980); In re Bieter Co., 16 F.3d 

929, 935 (8th Cir.

1994); Linde Thomson Langworthy Kohn & Van Dyke v. Resolution Trust Corp., 5 

F.3d 1508,

1514 (D.C. Cir. 1993); United States v. (Under Seal), 748 F.2d 871, 874 n.5 

(4th Cir. 1984);

United States v. Mackey, 405 F. Supp. 854, 858 (E.D.N.Y. 1975), recognized a 

place for a

government attorney-client privilege. Proposed Rule 503 defined "client" for 

the purposes of the

attorney-client privilege to include "a person, public officer, or 

corporation, association, or other

organization or entity, either public or private." Proposed Fed. R. Evid. 

503(a)(1), reprinted in56 F.R.D. 183, 235 (1972). The commentary to the 

proposed rule explained that "[t]he definition

of 'client' includes governmental bodies." Id. advisory committee's note. 

The Restatement also

extends attorney-client privilege to government entities. See Restatement 

(Third) of the Law

Governing Lawyers • 124 (Proposed Final Draft No. 1, 1996) [hereinafter 

Restatement].

The practice of attorneys in the executive branch reflects the common 

understanding that

a government attorney-client privilege functions in at least some contexts. 

The Office of Legal

Counsel in the Department of Justice concluded in 1982 that

[a]lthough the attorney-client privilege traditionally has been 

recognized in the

context of private attorney-client relationships, the privilege also 

functions to

protect communications between government attorneys and client agencies 

or

departments, as evidenced by its inclusion in the FOIA, much as it 

operates to

protect attorney-client communications in the private sector.

Theodore B. Olsen, Assistant Attorney General, Office of Legal Counsel, 

Confidentiality of the

Attorney General's Communications in Counseling the President, 6 Op. Off. 

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Legal Counsel 481,

495 (1982). The Office of Legal Counsel also concluded that when government 

attorneys stand

in the shoes of private counsel, representing federal employees sued in their 

individual capacities,

confidential communications between attorney and client are privileged. See 

Antonin Scalia,

Assistant Attorney General, Office of Legal Counsel, Disclosure of 

Confidential Information

Received by U.S. Attorney in the Course of Representing a Federal Employee 

(Nov. 30, 1976);

Ralph W. Tarr, Acting Assistant Attorney General, Office of Legal Counsel, 

Duty of Government

Lawyer Upon Receipt of Incriminating Information in the Course of an 

Attorney-Client

Relationship with Another Government Employee (Mar. 29, 1985); see also 28 

C.F.R.

• 50.15(a)(3) (1998).

B.

Recognizing that a government attorney-client privilege exists is one 

thing. Finding that

the Office of the President is entitled to assert it here is quite another.

It is settled law that the party claiming the privilege bears the burden 

of proving that the

communications are protected. As oft-cited definitions of the privilege make 

clear, only

communications that seek "legal advice" from "a professional legal adviser in 

his capacity as

such" are protected. See 8 John Henry Wigmore, Evidence in Trials at Common 

Law• 2292, at 554 (McNaughton rev. 1961). Or, in a formulation we have 

adopted, the privilege

applies only if the person to whom the communication was made is "a member of 

the bar of a

court" who "in connection with th[e] communication is acting as a lawyer" and 

the

communication was made "for the purpose of securing primarily either (i) an 

opinion on law or

(ii) legal services or (iii) assistance in some legal proceeding." In re 

Sealed Case, 737 F.2d at

98-99 (quoting United States v. United Shoe Machinery Corp., 89 F. Supp. 357, 

358-59 (D.

Mass. 1950)).

On the record before us, it seems likely that at least some of the 

conversations for which

Lindsey asserted government attorney-client privilege did not come within the 

formulation just

quoted. [[

]]. Both of these subjects arose from the expanded 

jurisdiction of the Independent

Counsel, which did not become public until January 20, 1998. Before then, 

any legal advice

Lindsey rendered in connection with Jones v. Clinton, a lawsuit involving 

President Clinton in

his personal capacity, likely could not have been covered by government 

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attorney-client

privilege. [[

]]. According to the Restatement, "consultation with one admitted to 

the bar but not in that

other person's role as lawyer is not protected." Restatement • 122 cmt. c. 

"[W]here one

consults an attorney not as a lawyer but as a friend or as a business adviser 

or banker, or

negotiator . . . the consultation is not professional nor the statement 

privileged." 1 McCormick

on Evidence • 88, at 322-24 (4th ed. 1992) (footnotes omitted). Thus 

Lindsey's advice on

political, strategic, or policy issues, valuable as it may have been, would 

not be shielded from

disclosure by the attorney-client privilege.

As for conversations after January 20th, the Office of the President 

must "present the

underlying facts demonstrating the existence of the privilege" in order to 

carry its burden. See

FTC v. Shaffner, 626 F.2d 32, 37 (7th Cir. 1980). A blanket assertion of the 

privilege will not

suffice. Rather, "[t]he proponent must conclusively prove each element of 

the privilege." SEC v.

Gulf & Western Indus., 518 F. Supp. 675, 682 (D.D.C. 1981). In response to 

the Independent

Counsel's questions, Lindsey invariably asserted executive privilege and 

attorney-client

privilege. On this record, it is impossible to determine whether Lindsey 

believed that both

privileges applied or whether he meant to invoke them on an "either/or" 

basis. As we have said,

the district court's rejection of the executive privilege claim has not been 

appealed. With this

privilege out of the picture, the Office of the President had to show that 

Lindsey's conversations

"concerned the seeking of legal advice" and were between President Clinton 

and Lindsey or

between others in the White House and Lindsey while Lindsey was "acting in 

his professional

capacity" as an attorney. Shaffner, 626 F.2d at 37.

With regard to most of the communications that were the subject of 

questions before the

grand jury, it does not appear to us that any such showing was made in the 

grand jury by Lindsey

or in the district court by the Office of the President in the proceedings 

leading to the order to

compel his testimony. This may be attributable to the parties' focus in the 

district court. The

arguments on both sides centered on whether any attorney-client privilege 

protected the

conversations about which Lindsey was asked, not on whether -- if the 

privilege could be

invoked -- the conversations were covered by it. In light of this, and in 

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view of the

Administration's abandonment of its executive privilege claim, Lindsey would 

have to return to

the grand jury no matter how we ruled on the government attorney-client 

privilege claim.

There is, however, no good reason for withholding decision on the issues 

now before us.

We have little doubt that at least one of Lindsey's conversations subject to 

grand jury questioning

"concerned the seeking of legal advice" and was between President Clinton and 

Lindsey or

between others in the White House and Lindsey while Lindsey was "acting in 

his professional

capacity" as an attorney. See id. [[

]]. The issue whether 

the government attorney-client privilege

could be invoked in these circumstances is therefore ripe for decision.

Moreover, the case has been fully briefed and argued. The Supreme Court 

has asked us

to expedite our disposition of these appeals. Sending this case back for 

still another round of

grand jury testimony, assertions of privileges and immunities, a district 

court judgment, and then

another appeal would be inconsistent with the Supreme Court's request and 

would do nothing but

prolong the grand jury's investigation. The parties, we believe, are 

entitled now to a ruling to

govern Lindsey's future grand jury appearance.

We therefore turn to the question whether an attorney-client privilege 

permits a

government lawyer to withhold from a grand jury information relating to the 

commission of

possible crimes by government officials and others. Although the cases 

decided under FOIA

recognize a government attorney-client privilege that is rather absolute in 

civil litigation, those

cases do not necessarily control the application of the privilege here. The 

grand jury, a

constitutional body established in the Bill of Rights, "belongs to no branch 

of the institutional

Government, serving as a kind of buffer or referee between the Government and 

the people,"

United States v. Williams, 504 U.S. 36, 47 (1992), while the Independent 

Counsel is by statute an

officer of the executive branch representing the United States. For matters 

within his

jurisdiction, the Independent Counsel acts in the role of the Attorney 

General as the country's

chief law enforcement officer. See 28 U.S.C. • 594(a) (1994). Thus, 

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although the traditional

privilege between attorneys and clients shields private relationships from 

inquiry in either civil

litigation or criminal prosecution, competing values arise when the Office of 

the President resists

demands for information from a federal grand jury and the nation's chief law 

enforcement

officer. As the drafters of the Restatement recognized, "More particularized 

rules may be

necessary where one agency of government claims the privilege in resisting a 

demand for

information by another. Such rules should take account of the complex 

considerations of

governmental structure, tradition, and regulation that are involved." 

Restatement • 124 cmt. b.

For these reasons, others have agreed that such "considerations" counsel 

against "expansion of

the privilege to all governmental entities" in all cases. 24 Charles Alan 

Wright & Kenneth

W. Graham, Jr., Federal Practice and Procedure • 5475, at 125 (1986).

The question whether a government attorney-client privilege applies in 

the federal grand

jury context is one of first impression in this circuit, and the parties 

dispute the import of the lack

of binding authority. The Office of the President contends that, upon 

recognizing a government

attorney-client privilege, the court should find an exception in the grand 

jury context only if

practice and policy require. To the contrary, the Independent Counsel 

contends, in essence, that

the justification for any extension of a government attorney-client privilege 

to this context needs

to be clear. These differences in approach are not simply semantical: they 

represent different

versions of what is the status quo. To argue about an "exception" 

presupposes that the privilege

otherwise applies in the federal grand jury context; to argue about an 

"extension" presupposes the

opposite. In Swidler & Berlin, the Supreme Court considered whether, as the 

Independent

Counsel contended, it should create an exception to the personal 

attorney-client privilege

allowing disclosure of confidences after the client's death. See Swidler & 

Berlin, 1998 WL

333019, at *2. After finding that the Independent Counsel was asking the 

Court "not simply to

'construe' the privilege, but to narrow it, contrary to the weight of the 

existing body of caselaw,"

the Court concluded that the Independent Counsel had not made a sufficient 

showing to warrant

the creation of such an exception to the settled rule. Id. at *7.

In the instant case, by contrast, there is no such existing body of 

caselaw upon which to

rely and no clear principle that the government attorney-client privilege has 

as broad a scope as

its personal counterpart. Because the "attorney-client privilege must be 

'strictly confined within

the narrowest possible limits consistent with the logic of its principle,'" 

In re Sealed Case, 676

F.2d 793, 807 n.44 (D.C. Cir. 1982) (quoting In re Grand Jury Investigation, 

599 F.2d 1224,

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1235 (3d Cir. 1979)); accord Trammel, 445 U.S. at 50, and because the 

government attorneyclient privilege is not recognized in the same way as the personal 

attorney-client privilege

addressed in Swidler & Berlin, we believe this case poses the question 

whether, in the first

instance, the privilege extends as far as the Office of the President would 

like. In other words,

pursuant to our authority and duty under Rule 501 of the Federal Rules of 

Evidence to interpret

privileges "in light of reason and experience," Fed. R. Evid. 501, we view 

our exercise as one in

defining the particular contours of the government attorney-client privilege.

When an executive branch attorney is called before a federal grand jury 

to give evidence

about alleged crimes within the executive branch, reason and experience, 

duty, and tradition

dictate that the attorney shall provide that evidence. With respect to 

investigations of federal

criminal offenses, and especially offenses committed by those in government, 

government

attorneys stand in a far different position from members of the private bar. 

Their duty is not to

defend clients against criminal charges and it is not to protect wrongdoers 

from public exposure.

The constitutional responsibility of the President, and all members of the 

Executive Branch, is to

"take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed." U.S. Const. art. II, • 3. 

Investigation and

prosecution of federal crimes is one of the most important and essential 

functions within that

constitutional responsibility. Each of our Presidents has, in the words of 

the Constitution, sworn

that he "will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United 

States, and will to the best of

[his] Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United 

States." Id. art. II, • 1,

cl. 8. And for more than two hundred years each officer of the Executive 

Branch has been bound

by oath or affirmation to do the same. See id. art. VI, cl. 3; see also 28 

U.S.C. • 544 (1994).

This is a solemn undertaking, a binding of the person to the cause of 

constitutional government,

an expression of the individual's allegiance to the principles embodied in 

that document. Unlike

a private practitioner, the loyalties of a government lawyer therefore cannot 

and must not lie

solely with his or her client agency.

The oath's significance is underscored by other evocations of the 

ethical duties of

government lawyers. The Professional Ethics Committee of the Federal Bar 

Association has

described the public trust of the federally employed lawyer as follows:

[T]he government, over-all and in each of its parts, is responsible to 

the people in

our democracy with its representative form of government. Each part of 

the

government has the obligation of carrying out, in the public interest, 

its assigned

responsibility in a manner consistent with the Constitution, and the 

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applicable

laws and regulations. In contrast, the private practitioner represents 

the client's

personal or private interest. . . . [W]e do not suggest, however, that 

the public is

the client as the client concept is usually understood. It is to say 

that the lawyer's

employment requires him to observe in the performance of his professional

responsibility the public interest sought to be served by the 

governmental

organization of which he is a part.

Federal Bar Association Ethics Committee, The Government Client and 

Confidentiality: Opinion

73-1, 32 Fed. B.J. 71, 72 (1973). Indeed, before an attorney in the Justice 

Department can step

into the shoes of private counsel to represent a federal employee sued in his 

or her individual

capacity, the Attorney General must determine whether the representation 

would be in the

interest of the United States. See 28 C.F.R. • 50.15(a). The obligation of 

a government lawyer

to uphold the public trust reposed in him or her strongly militates against 

allowing the client

agency to invoke a privilege to prevent the lawyer from providing evidence of 

the possible

commission of criminal offenses within the government. As Judge Weinstein 

put it, "[i]f there is

wrongdoing in government, it must be exposed. . . . [The government 

lawyer's] duty to the

people, the law, and his own conscience requires disclosure . . . . " Jack 

B. Weinstein, Some

Ethical and Political Problems of a Government Attorney, 18 Maine L. Rev. 

155, 160 (1966).

This view of the proper allegiance of the government lawyer is 

complemented by the

public's interest in uncovering illegality among its elected and appointed 

officials. While the

President's constitutionally established role as superintendent of law 

enforcement provides one

protection against wrongdoing by federal government officials, see United 

States v. ValenzuelaBernal, 458 U.S. 858, 863 (1982), another protection of the public interest 

is through having

transparent and accountable government. As James Madison observed,

[a] popular Government, without popular information, or the means of 

acquiring

it, is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy; or, perhaps both. 

Knowledge will

forever govern ignorance: And a people who mean to be their own 

Governors,

must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.

Letter from James Madison to W.T. Barry (Aug. 4, 1822), in 9 The Writings of 

James

Madison 103 (Gaillard Hunt ed., 1910). This court has accordingly recognized 

that "openness

in government has always been thought crucial to ensuring that the people 

remain in control of

their government." In re Sealed Case (Espy), 121 F.3d at 749. Privileges 

work against these

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interests because their recognition "creates the risk that a broad array of 

materials in many areas

of the executive branch will become 'sequester[ed]' from public view." Id. 

(quoting Wolfe v.

Department of Health & Human Servs., 815 F.2d 1527, 1533 (D.C. Cir. 1987)). 

Furthermore,

"to allow any part of the federal government to use its in-house attorneys as 

a shield against the

production of information relevant to a federal criminal investigation would 

represent a gross

misuse of public assets." In re Grand Jury Subpoena Duces Tecum, 112 F.3d 

910, 921 (8th

Cir.), cert. denied, 117 S. Ct. 2482 (1997).

Examination of the practice of government attorneys further supports 

the conclusion that

a government attorney, even one holding the title Deputy White House Counsel, 

may not assert

an attorney-client privilege before a federal grand jury if communications 

with the client contain

information pertinent to possible criminal violations. The Office of the 

President has

traditionally adhered to the precepts of 28 U.S.C. • 535(b), which provides 

that

[a]ny information . . . received in a department or agency of the 

executive branch

of the Government relating to violations of title 18 involving 

Government officers

and employees shall be expeditiously reported to the Attorney General.

28 U.S.C. • 535(b) (1994). We need not decide whether section 535(b) alone 

requires White

House Counsel to testify before a grand jury. The statute does not clearly 

apply to the Office of

the President. The Office is neither a "department," as that term is defined 

by the statute, see 5

U.S.C. • 101 (1994); 28 U.S.C. • 451 (1994); Haddon v. Walters, 43 F.3d 1488, 

1490 (D.C. Cir.

1995) (per curiam), nor an "agency," see Kissinger v. Reporters Comm. for 

Freedom of the

Press, 445 U.S. 136, 156 (1980) (FOIA case); see also Armstrong v. Executive 

Office of the

President, 1 F.3d 1274, 1295 (D.C. Cir. 1993) (per curiam); National Sec. 

Archive v. Archivist of

the United States, 909 F.2d 541, 545 (D.C. Cir. 1990) (per curiam). However, 

at the very least

"[section] 535(b) evinces a strong congressional policy that executive branch 

employees must

report information" relating to violations of Title 18, the federal criminal 

code. In re Sealed

Case (Secret Service), 1998 WL 370584, at *7. As the House Committee Report 

accompanying

section 535 explains, "[t]he purpose" of the provision is to "require the 

reporting by the

departments and agencies of the executive branch to the Attorney General of 

information coming

to their attention concerning any alleged irregularities on the part of 

officers and employees of

the Government." H.R. Rep. No. 83-2622, at 1 (1954). Section 535(b) 

suggests that all

government employees, including lawyers, are duty-bound not to withhold 

evidence of federal

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crimes.

Furthermore, government officials holding top legal positions have 

concluded, in light of

section 535(b), that White House lawyers cannot keep evidence of crimes 

committed by

government officials to themselves. In a speech delivered after the 

Kissinger FOIA case was

handed down, Lloyd Cutler, who served as White House Counsel in the Carter 

and Clinton

Administrations, discussed the "rule of making it your duty, if you're a 

Government official as

we as lawyers are, a statutory duty to report to the Attorney General any 

evidence you run into of

a possible violation of a criminal statute." Lloyd N. Cutler, The Role of 

the Counsel to the

President of the United States, 35 Record of the Ass'n of the Bar of the City 

of New YorkNo. 8, at 470, 472 (1980). Accordingly, "[w]hen you hear of a 

charge and you talk to someone in

the White House . . . about some allegation of misconduct, almost the first 

thing you have to say

is, 'I really want to know about this, but anything you tell me I'll have to 

report to the Attorney

General.'" Id. Similarly, during the Nixon administration, Solicitor 

General Robert H. Bork told

an administration official who invited him to join the President's legal 

defense team: "A

government attorney is sworn to uphold the Constitution. If I come across 

evidence that is bad

for the President, I'll have to turn it over. I won't be able to sit on it 

like a private defense

attorney." A Conversation with Robert Bork, D.C. Bar Rep., Dec. 1997-Jan. 

1998, at 9.

The Clinton Administration itself endorsed this view as recently as a 

year ago. In the

proceedings leading to the Supreme Court's denial of certiorari with regard 

to the Eighth

Circuit's decision in In re Grand Jury Subpoena Duces Tecum, the Office of 

the President

assured the Supreme Court that it "embraces the principles embodied in 

Section 535(b)" and

acknowledged that "the Office of the President has a duty, recognized in 

official policy and

practice, to turn over evidence of the crime." Reply Brief for Office of the 

President at 7, Office

of the President v. Office of Independent Counsel, 117 S. Ct. 2482 (1997) 

(No. 96-1783). The

Office of the President further represented that "on various occasions" it 

had "referred

information to the Attorney General reflecting the possible commission of a 

criminal offense --

including information otherwise protected by attorney-client privilege." Id. 

At oral argument,

counsel for the Office of the President reiterated this position. In 

addition, the White House

report on possible misdeeds relating to the White House Travel Office stated 

that "[i]f there is a

reasonable suspicion of a crime . . . about which White House personnel may 

have knowledge,

the initial communication of this information should be made to the Attorney 

General, the

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Deputy Attorney General, or the Associate Attorney General." White House 

Travel Office

Management Review 23 (1993).

We are not aware of any previous deviation from this understanding of 

the role of

government counsel. We know that Nixon White House Counsel Fred Buzhardt 

testified before

the Watergate grand jury without invoking attorney-client privilege, although 

not much may be

made of this. See Anthony Ripley, Milk Producers' Group Fined $5,000 for 

Nixon Gifts, N.Y.

Times, May 7, 1974, at 38. On the other hand, the Office of the President 

points out that C.

Boyden Gray, White House Counsel during the Bush Administration, and his 

deputy, John

Schmitz, refused to be interviewed by the Independent Counsel investigating 

the Iran-Contra

affair and only produced documents subject to an agreement that "any 

privilege against

disclosure . . . including the attorney-client privilege" was not waived. 1 

Lawrence E. Walsh,

Final Report of the Independent Counsel for Iran/Contra Matters 478-79 & n.52

(1993). However, the Independent Counsel in that investigation had not 

subpoenaed Gray or

Schmitz to testify before a grand jury, and there is no indication that the 

information sought from

them constituted evidence of any criminal offense. Independent Counsel Walsh 

apparently

sought to question these individuals merely to complete his final report. 

See id. In any event,

even outside the grand jury context, the general practice of government 

counsel has been to

cooperate with the investigations of independent counsels. For example, 

Peter Wallison, White

House Counsel under President Reagan, produced his diary for the Iran-Contra 

investigation and

cooperated in other ways. See id. at 44, 470 n.137, 517, 520. Other 

government attorneys both

produced documents and agreed to be interviewed for that investigation. See 

id. at 346-48, 366-

68, 536 & nn.116-17, 537.

The Office of the President asserts two principal contributions to the 

public good that

would come from a government attorney's withholding evidence from a grand 

jury on the basis

of an attorney-client privilege. First, it maintains that the values of 

candor and frank

communications that the privilege embodies in every context would apply to 

Lindsey's

communications with the President and others in the White House. Government 

officials, the

Office of the President claims, need accurate advice from government 

attorneys as much as

private individuals do, but they will be inclined to discuss their legal 

problems honestly with

their attorneys only if they know that their communications will be 

confidential.

We may assume that if the government attorney-client privilege does not 

apply in certain

contexts this may chill some communications between government officials and 

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government

lawyers. Even so, government officials will still enjoy the benefit of fully 

confidential

communications with their attorneys unless the communications reveal 

information relating to

possible criminal wrongdoing. And although the privacy of these 

communications may not be

absolute before the grand jury, the Supreme Court has not been troubled by 

the potential chill on

executive communications due to the qualified nature of executive privilege. 

Compare Nixon,

418 U.S. at 712-13 (discounting the chilling effects of the qualification of 

the presidential

communications privilege on the candor of conversations), with Swidler & 

Berlin, 1998 WL

333019, at *6 (stating, in the personal attorney-client privilege context, 

that an uncertain

privilege is often no better than no privilege at all). Because both the 

Deputy White House

Counsel and the Independent Counsel occupy positions within the federal 

government, their

situation is somewhat comparable to that of corporate officers who seek to 

keep their

communications with company attorneys confidential from each other and from 

the shareholders.

Under the widely followed doctrine announced in Garner v. Wolfinbarger, 430 

F.2d 1093 (5th

Cir. 1970), corporate officers are not always entitled to assert such 

privileges against interests

within the corporation, and accordingly must consult with company attorneys 

aware that their

communications may not be kept confidential from shareholders in litigation. 

See id. at 1101.

Any chill on candid communications with government counsel flowing from our 

decision not to

extend an absolute attorney-client privilege to the grand jury context is 

both comparable and

similarly acceptable.

Moreover, nothing prevents government officials who seek completely 

confidential

communications with attorneys from consulting personal counsel. The 

President has retained

several private lawyers, and he is entitled to engage in the completely 

confidential

communications with those lawyers befitting an attorney and a client in a 

private relationship. [[

]]

The Office of the President contends that White House Counsel's role in 

preparing for

any future impeachment proceedings alters the policy analysis. The Ethics in 

Government Act

requires the Independent Counsel to "advise the House of Representatives of 

any substantial and

credible information . . . that may constitute grounds for an impeachment." 

28 U.S.C. • 595(c)

(1994). In November 1997, a Congressman introduced a resolution in the House 

of

Representatives calling for an inquiry into possible grounds for impeachment 

of the President.

See H.R. Res. 304, 105th Cong. (1997). Thus, to the extent that impeachment 

proceedings may

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be on the horizon, the Office of the President contends that White House 

Counsel must be given

maximum protection against grand jury inquiries regarding their efforts to 

protect the Office of

the President, and the President in his personal capacity, against 

impeachment. Additionally, the

Office of the President notes that the Independent Counsel serves as a 

conduit to Congress for

information concerning grounds for impeachment obtained by the grand jury, 

and, consequently,

an exception to the attorney-client privilege before the grand jury will 

effectively abrogate any

absolute privilege those communications might otherwise enjoy in future 

congressional

investigations and impeachment hearings.

Although the Independent Counsel and the Office of the President agree 

that White

House Counsel can represent the President in the impeachment process, the 

precise contours of

Counsel's role are far from settled. In any event, no matter what the role 

should be,

impeachment is fundamentally a political exercise. See The Federalist No. 65 

(Alexander

Hamilton); Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution • 764, at 559 (5th 

ed. 1905).

Impeachment proceedings in the House of Representatives cannot be analogized 

to traditional

legal processes and even the procedures used by the Senate in "trying" an 

impeachment may not

be like those in a judicial trial. See (Walter) Nixon v. United States, 506 

U.S. 224, 228-31

(1993); Story, Commentaries on the Constitution • 765, at 559-60. How the 

policy and

practice supporting the common law attorney-client privilege would apply in 

such a political

context thus is uncertain. In preparing for the eventuality of impeachment 

proceedings, a White

House Counsel in effect serves the President as a political advisor, albeit 

one with legal

expertise: to wit, Lindsey occupies a dual position as an Assistant to the 

President and a Deputy

White House Counsel. Thus, information gathered in preparation for 

impeachment proceedings

and conversations regarding strategy are presumably covered by executive, not 

attorney-client,

privilege. While the need for secrecy might arguably be greater under these 

circumstances, the

district court's ruling on executive privilege is not before us. In 

addition, in responding to the

grand jury investigation and gathering information in preparation for future 

developments in

accordance with his official duties, White House Counsel may need to interact 

with the

President's private attorneys, and to that extent other privileges may be 

implicated. [[ ]]

Nor is our conclusion altered by the Office of the President's concern 

over the possibility

that Independent Counsel will convey otherwise privileged grand jury 

testimony of White House

Counsel to Congress. Cf. Fed. R. Crim. P. 6(e). First, no one can say with 

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certainty the extent

to which a privilege would generally protect a White House Counsel from 

testifying at a

congressional hearing. The issue is not presently before the court. See 

Nixon, 418 U.S. at 712

n.19; In re Sealed Case (Espy), 121 F.3d at 739 nn.9-10, 753. Second, the 

particular procedures

and evidentiary rules to be employed by the House and Senate in any future 

impeachment

proceedings remain entirely speculative. Finally, whether Congress can 

abrogate otherwise

recognized privileges in the course of impeachment proceedings may well 

constitute a

nonjusticiable political question. See (Walter) Nixon, 506 U.S. at 236.

The Supreme Court's recognition in United States v. Nixon of a qualified 

privilege for

executive communications severely undercuts the argument of the Office of the 

President

regarding the scope of the government attorney-client privilege. A President 

often has private

conversations with his Vice President or his Cabinet Secretaries or other 

members of the

Administration who are not lawyers or who are lawyers, but are not providing 

legal services.

The advice these officials give the President is of vital importance to the 

security and prosperity

of the nation, and to the President's discharge of his constitutional duties. 

Yet upon a proper

showing, such conversations must be revealed in federal criminal proceedings. 

See Nixon, 418

U.S. at 713; In re Sealed Case (Espy), 121 F.3d at 745. Only a certain 

conceit among those

admitted to the bar could explain why legal advice should be on a higher 

plane than advice about

policy, or politics, or why a President's conversation with the most junior 

lawyer in the White

House Counsel's Office is deserving of more protection from disclosure in a 

grand jury

investigation than a President's discussions with his Vice President or a 

Cabinet Secretary. In

short, we do not believe that lawyers are more important to the operations of 

government than all

other officials, or that the advice lawyers render is more crucial to the 

functioning of the

Presidency than the advice coming from all other quarters.

The district court held that a government attorney-client privilege 

existed and was

applicable to grand jury proceedings, but could be overcome, as could an 

applicable executive

privilege, upon a showing of need and unavailability elsewhere by the 

Independent Counsel.

While we conclude that an attorney-client privilege may not be asserted by 

Lindsey to avoid

responding to the grand jury if he possesses information relating to possible 

criminal violations,

he continues to be covered by the executive privilege to the same extent as 

the President's other

advisers. Our analysis, in addition to having the advantages mentioned 

above, avoids the

application of balancing tests to the attorney-client privilege -- a practice 

recently criticized by

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the Supreme Court. See Swidler & Berlin, 1998 WL 333019, at *6.

In sum, it would be contrary to tradition, common understanding, and our 

governmental

system for the attorney-client privilege to attach to White House Counsel in 

the same manner as

private counsel. When government attorneys learn, through communications 

with their clients,

of information related to criminal misconduct, they may not rely on the 

government attorneyclient privilege to shield such information from disclosure to a grand jury.

III. [[

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]].

IV.

Accordingly, for the reasons stated in this opinion, we affirm [[ 

]].

In accordance with the Supreme Court's expectation that "the Court of 

Appeals will

proceed expeditiously to decide this case," Clinton, 118 S. Ct. at 2079, any 

petition for rehearing

or suggestion for rehearing in banc shall be filed within seven days after 

the date of this decision.

It is so ordered.

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Tatel, Circuit Judge, dissenting from Part II and concurring in part and 

dissenting in part

from Part III. The attorney-client privilege protects confidential 

communication between clients

and their lawyers, whether those lawyers work for the private sector or for 

government. Although I

have no doubt that government lawyers working in executive departments and 

agencies enjoy a

reduced privilege in the face of grand jury subpoenas, I remain unconvinced 

that either "reason" or

"experience" (the tools of Rule 501) justifies this court's abrogation of the 

attorney-client privilege

for lawyers serving the Presidency. This court's far-reaching ruling, 

moreover, may have been

unnecessary to give this grand jury access to Bruce Lindsey's communications 

with the President,

for on this record it is not clear whether those communications involved 

official legal advice that

would be protected by the attorney-client privilege. Before limiting the 

attorney-client privilege

not just for this President, but for all Presidents to come, the court should 

have first remanded this

case to the district court to recall Lindsey to the grand jury to determine 

the precise nature of his

communications with the President.

I

My colleagues and I have no disagreement concerning personal legal 

advice Lindsey may

have given the President. We agree, and the White House concedes, that the 

official

attorney-client privilege does not protect such communications, for as a 

White House employee

Lindsey had no authority to provide such advice. Nor do we disagree about 

political advice given

to the President by advisers who happen to be lawyers. Such advice is 

protected, if at all, by the

executive privilege alone. Our disagreement centers solely on whether a 

grand jury can pierce the

attorney-client privilege with respect to official legal advice that the 

Office of White House

Counsel gives a sitting President.

One of the oldest privileges at common law and "'rooted in the 

imperative need for

confidence and trust,'" Jaffee v. Redmond, 518 U.S. 1, 10 (1996) (quoting 

Trammel v. United

States, 445 U.S. 40, 51 (1980)), the attorney-client privilege "encourage[s] 

'full and frank

communication between attorneys and their clients, and thereby promote[s] 

broader public interests

in the observance of law and the administration of justice.'" Swidler & 

Berlin v. United States, No.

97-1192, 1998 WL 333019, at *3 (U.S. June 25, 1998) (quoting Upjohn Co. v. 

United States, 449

U.S. 383, 389 (1981)). The privilege protects client confidences even in the 

face of grand jury

subpoenas. See id. at *2, *7.

Government attorneys enjoy the attorney-client privilege in order to 

provide reliable legal

advice to their governmental clients. "Unless applicable law otherwise 

provides, the attorneyclient privilege extends to a communication of a governmental organization . 

. . and of an

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individual officer . . . of a governmental organization." Restatement 

(Third) of the Law

Governing Lawyers ("Restatement") • 124 (Proposed Final Draft No. 1, 1996); 

see alsoProposed Fed. R. Evid. 503(a)(1), reprinted in 56 F.R.D. 183, 235 

(1972). We have explained

that where "the Government is dealing with its attorneys as would any private 

party seeking advice

to protect personal interests, [it] needs the same assurance of 

confidentiality so it will not be

deterred from full and frank communications with its counselors." Coastal 

States Gas Corp. v.

Department of Energy, 617 F.2d 854, 863 (D.C. Cir. 1980); see also Tax 

Analysts v. IRS, 117 F.3d

607, 620 (D.C. Cir. 1997) ("Communications revealing . . . client confidences 

[between IRS field

personnel and IRS counsel regarding audit activity] . . . are clearly covered 

by the attorney-client

privilege . . . .").

This court now holds that for all government attorneys, including those 

advising a

President, the attorney-client privilege dissolves in the face of a grand 

jury subpoena. According to

the court, its new rule "avoids the application of balancing tests to the 

attorney-client privilege a

practice recently criticized by the Supreme Court." Maj. Op. at 26. But 

whether a court abrogates

the privilege by applying the balancing test rejected in Swidler, or by the 

rule the court adopts

today, the chilling effect is precisely the same. Clients, in this case 

Presidents of the United States,

will avoid confiding in their lawyers because they can never know whether the 

information they

share, no matter how innocent, might some day become "pertinent to possible 

criminal violations,"

id. at 18. Rarely will White House counsel possess cold, hard facts about 

presidential wrongdoing

that would create a strong public interest in disclosure, yet the very 

possibility that the confidence

will be breached will chill communications. See Swidler, 1998 WL 333019, at 

*5-6. As a result,

Presidents may well shift their trust on all but the most routine legal 

matters from White House

counsel, who undertake to serve the Presidency, to private counsel who 

represent its occupant.

Unlike Jaffee, 518 U.S. at 10-11 (recognizing a federal psychotherapy 

privilege), and In re

Sealed Case, No. 98-3069, 1998 WL 370584, at *4 (D.C. Cir. July 7, 1998) 

(declining to

recognize a protective function privilege for Secret Service agents), this 

case involves not the

creation of a new privilege, but as in Swidler, the carving out of an 

exception to an already wellestablished privilege. See Swidler, 1998 WL 333019, at *6. Denying that 

they are creating an

exception, my colleagues say that they are "defining the particular contours 

of the government

attorney-client privilege," Maj. Op. at 14, but no court has suggested that 

the attorney-client

privilege must be extended client by client to each new governmental entity, 

proceeding by

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proceeding. Rather, "[u]nless applicable law otherwise provides," 

Restatement • 124, the

privilege applies to all attorneys and all clients, regardless of their 

identities or the nature of the

proceeding, see Swidler, 1998 WL 333019, at *6 (finding no case authority for 

civil-criminal

distinction). The question before us, then, is whether either "reason" or 

"experience" (Fed. R.

Evid. 501), calls for exempting the Presidency from the traditional 

attorney-client relationship

that all clients enjoy with their lawyers. See, e.g., Trammel, 445 U.S. at 

48, 52 (curtailing spousal

privilege based on majority trend in state law, the disappearance of 

"ancient" notions of the

subordinate status of women, and the unpersuasiveness of arguments regarding 

privilege's effect

on marital stability).

As one of its reasons for abrogating the presidential attorney-client 

privilege, the court

says that legal advice is no different from the advice a President receives 

from other advisers,

advice protected only by executive privilege. Maj. Op. at 25-26. I think 

the court seriously

underestimates the independent role and value of the attorney-client 

privilege. Unlike the

executive privilege a broad, constitutionally derived privilege that protects 

frank debate between

President and advisers, see United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683, 708 (1974); 

In re Sealed Case,

121 F.3d 729, 742-46 (D.C. Cir. 1997) the narrower attorney-client privilege 

flows not from the

Constitution, but from the common law, see Swidler, 1998 WL 333019, at *7. 

The attorney-client

privilege does not protect general policy or political advice even when given 

by lawyers but

only communications with lawyers "for the purpose of obtaining legal 

assistance." Restatement• 122. Necessitated by the nature of the lawyer's 

function, the attorney-client privilege enables

the lawyer as an officer of the court properly to advise the client, 

including facilitating compliance

with the law. See Upjohn, 449 U.S. at 389. In other words, the unique 

protection the law affords

a President's communications with White House counsel rests not, as my 

colleagues put it, on

some "conceit" that "lawyers are more important to the operations of 

government than all other

officials," Maj. Op. at 26, but rather on the special nature of legal advice, 

and its special need for

confidentiality, as recognized by centuries of common law. It therefore 

makes sense that the

Presidency possesses both the attorney-client and executive privileges, and 

that courts treat them

differently.

The court also cites 28 U.S.C. • 535(b). Although that statute 

generally supports

qualifying though not abrogating the attorney-client privilege for government 

attorneys

working in executive departments and agencies, the court acknowledges, as the 

Attorney General

has told us in her amicus brief, that section 535(b) does not apply to the 

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Office of the President.

The court cites several statements, including former White House Counsel 

Lloyd Cutler's speech

to the New York Bar, the White House Travel Office Management Review, and the

Administration's certiorari petition in In re Grand Jury Subpoena Duces 

Tecum, 112 F.3d 910

(8th Cir.), cert. denied, 117 S. Ct. 2482 (1997), indicating that White House 

lawyers comply with

the spirit of section 535(b). Maj. Op. at 19-20. Nothing in those 

statements suggests, however,

that their authors were referring to conversations between White House 

counsel and the President

of the United States, i.e., that one presidential subordinate (White House 

counsel) would report a

confidential conversation with a President to another presidential 

subordinate (the Attorney

General). The court points to no other statutory basis for denying the 

President the benefit of the

official privilege. Although the Independent Counsel statute ensures 

independent, aggressive

prosecution of wrongdoing, nothing in that statute disables a President from 

defending himself or

otherwise indicates that Congress intended to deprive the Presidency of its 

official privileges.

The court refers to actions of a few previous White House counsel: Fred 

Buzhardt

testified voluntarily before the Watergate grand jury; Peter Wallison turned 

over his diaries to the

Iran-Contra investigation; and C. Boyden Gray and his deputy refused to be 

interviewed by that

same Iran-Contra Independent Counsel. See Maj. Op. at 20-21. In my view, 

these limited and

contradictory examples reveal nothing about the standard we should apply 

where, as here, a

President of the United States actually invokes the attorney-client privilege 

in the face of a grand

jury subpoena.

Acknowledging the facial inapplicability of section 535(b) to the Office 

of the President,

the court relies on the government lawyer's oath of office for the 

proposition that White House

counsel cannot have a traditional attorney-client relationship with the 

President. But all lawyers,

whether they work within the government or the private sector, take an oath 

to uphold the

Constitution of the United States. In order to practice before this court, 

for example, attorneys

must promise to "demean [themselves] . . . according to law . . . [and] 

support the Constitution of

the United States." Application for Admission to Practice (U.S. Court of 

Appeals for the D.C.

Circuit). No one would suggest that this oath abrogates a client's privilege 

in the face of a grand

jury subpoena.

This court's opinion, moreover, nowhere accounts for the unique nature 

of the Presidency,

its unique need for confidential legal advice, or the possible consequences 

of abrogating the

attorney-client privilege for a President's ability to obtain such advice. 

Elected, head of the

Executive Branch, Commander-in-Chief, head of State, and removable only by 

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impeachment, the

President is not just "a part of the federal government, consisting of 

government employees doing

government business." Maj. Op. at 2. As Justice Robert H. Jackson observed 

in the steel seizure

case, the Presidency concentrates executive authority "in a single head in 

whose choice the whole

Nation has a part, making him the focus of public hopes and expectations. In 

drama, magnitude

and finality his decisions so far overshadow any others that almost alone he 

fills the public eye

and ear." Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U.S. 579, 653 (1952) 

(Jackson, J.,

concurring). Echoing Justice Jackson three decades later, the Supreme Court 

emphasized in

Nixon v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 731 (1982), that the President "occupies a 

unique position in the

constitutional scheme," id. at 749, that we depend on the President for the 

"most sensitive and farreaching decisions entrusted to any official under our constitutional 

system," id. at 752, and that

the President's "unique status under the Constitution" distinguishes him from 

other executive

branch officials, id. at 750. The Attorney General, focusing on the 

President's "singular

responsibilities," describes the Presidency's critical need for legal advice 

as follows:

The Constitution vests the President with unique, and uniquely 

consequential,

powers and responsibilities. The Nation's "executive Power" is vested 

in him

alone. U.S. Const. Art. II, • 1. In addition to his significant and 

diverse domestic

and foreign affairs responsibilities, he is specifically required to 

adhere to and

follow the law, both in his oath of office (Art. II, • 1, Cl. 8) and in 

the requirement

that "he shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed." Art. 

II, • 3. To

fulfill his manifold duties and functions, the President must have 

access to legal

advice that is frank, fully informed, and confidential. Because of the 

magnitude of

the Nation's interest in facilitating the President's conduct of his 

office in

accordance with law, the President's pressing need for effective legal 

advice knows

no parallel in government.

Amicus Br. at 24. By lumping the President together with tax collectors, 

passport application

processors, and all other executive branch employees even cabinet officers 

the court bypasses

the reasoned "case-by-case" analysis demanded by Rule 501, Jaffee, 518 U.S. 

at 8 (quoting S.

Rep. No. 93-1277, at 13 (1974)).

A President's need for confidential legal advice may "know[] no parallel 

in government"

for another reason. Because the Presidency is tied so tightly to the persona 

of its occupant, and

because of what Fitzgerald referred to as the Presidency's increased 

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"vulnerability," stemming

from "the visibility of [the] office and the effect of [the President's] 

actions on countless people,"

Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. at 753, official matters proper subjects for White House 

counsel

consultation often have personal implications for a President. Since for any 

President the line

between official and personal can be both elusive and difficult to discern, I 

think Presidents need

their official attorney-client privilege to permit frank discussion not only 

of innocuous, routine

issues, but also sensitive, embarrassing, or even potentially criminal 

topics. The need for the

official presidential attorney-client privilege seems particularly strong 

after Watergate which,

while ushering in a new era of accountability and openness in the highest 

echelons of government,

also increased the Presidency's vulnerability. Aggressive press and 

congressional scrutiny, the

personalization of politics, and the enactment of the Independent Counsel 

statute, Pub. L. No. 95-

521, Tit. VI, 92 Stat. 1824, 1867 (1978) (codified as amended at 28 U.S.C. •• 

591-599

(1994)) which triggers appointment of an Independent Counsel based on no more 

than the

existence of "reasonable grounds to believe that further investigation is 

warranted," 28 U.S.C. •

592(c)(1)(A) have combined to make the Supreme Court's fear that Presidents 

have become

easy "target[s]," Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. at 753, truer than ever. No President 

can navigate the

treacherous waters of post-Watergate government, make controversial official 

legal decisions,

decide whether to invoke official privileges, or even know when he might need 

private counsel,

without confidential legal advice. Because of the Presidency's enormous 

responsibilities,

moreover, the nation has compelling reasons to ensure that Presidents are 

well defended against

false or frivolous accusations that could interfere with their duties. The 

nation has equally

compelling reasons for ensuring that Presidents are well advised on whether 

charges are serious

enough to warrant private counsel. I doubt that White House counsel can 

perform any of these

functions without the candor made possible by the attorney-client privilege. 

As I said at the

outset, weakening the privilege may well cause Presidents to shift their 

trust from White House

lawyers who have undertaken to serve the Presidency, to private lawyers who 

have not.

Preserving the official presidential attorney-client privilege would not 

place the President

above the law, as the Independent Counsel implies. To begin with, by 

enabling clients including

Presidents to be candid with their lawyers and lawyers to advise clients 

confidentially, the

attorney-client privilege promotes compliance with the law. See Upjohn, 449 

U.S. at 389.

Independent Counsels, moreover, have powerful weapons to combat abuses of the 

attorney-client

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privilege. If evidence suggested that a President used White House counsel 

to further a crime, the

crime-fraud exception would abrogate the privilege. See United States v. 

Zolin, 491 U.S. 554,

562-63 (1989). If an Independent Counsel had evidence that White House 

counsel's status as an

attorney was used to protect non-legal materials from disclosure, those 

materials would not be

protected. See State v. Philip Morris Inc., No. C1-94-8565, 1998 WL 257214, 

at *7 (Minn. Dist.

Ct. Mar. 7, 1998) (releasing documents as penalty for bad faith claim of 

privilege). "The privilege

takes flight," Justice Benjamin Cardozo said, "if the [attorney-client] 

relation is abused." Clark v.

United States, 289 U.S. 1, 15 (1933). Or if an Independent Counsel presented 

evidence that a

White House counsel committed a crime, a grand jury could indict that lawyer. 

See George

Lardner, Jr., Dean Guilty in Cover-Up: Nixon Ex-Aide Pleads to Count of 

Conspiracy, Wash.

Post, Oct. 20, 1973, at A1. This Independent Counsel has never alleged that 

any of these abuses

occurred.

To be sure, a properly exercised attorney-client privilege may deny a 

grand jury access to

information, see Swidler, 1998 WL 333019, at *6 (justifying the burden placed 

on the truthseeking function by the privilege), but Presidents remain accountable in 

other ways, see

Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. at 757 (checks on Presidential action include 

impeachment, press scrutiny,

congressional oversight, need to maintain prestige, and concern for 

historical stature). An

Independent Counsel, moreover, can always report to Congress that a President 

has denied critical

information to a grand jury. See 28 U.S.C. • 595(a)(2), (c). If the 

President continues to exercise

his attorney-client privilege in the face of a congressional subpoena, and if 

Congress believes that

the President has committed "high Crimes and Misdemeanors," U.S. Const. art. 

II, • 4, Congress

can always consider impeachment. See H. Rep. No. 93-1305, at 4, 187-213 

(1974)

(recommending impeachment of President Nixon based on his refusal to turn 

over information in

response to congressional subpoenas).

II

During Lindsey's several grand jury appearances he invoked both 

executive and attorneyclient privileges, often with respect to the same questions. Now that the 

White House has

dropped the executive privilege issue, much of that information may be 

available to the

Independent Counsel and we have no way of knowing which questions, if any, 

Lindsey would

continue to decline to answer. Even more fundamental, Lindsey's affidavit, 

[[ ]] and the

affidavit of White House Counsel Charles F.C. Ruff suggest that the 

communications between

Lindsey and the President regarding the Monica Lewinsky and Paula Jones 

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matters may have

involved political and policy discussions, not legal advice. To be sure, the 

affidavits [[

]] refer to advice about legal topics, such as invoking privileges and 

preparing for

impeachment. But nowhere do they demonstrate that Lindsey rendered that 

advice in his capacity

as a lawyer, i.e., that "the lawyer's professional skill and training would 

have value in the matter."

Restatement • 122 cmt. b. A conversation is not privileged merely because 

the President asked

Lindsey a question about a nominally legal matter or in his capacity as White 

House Counsel staff.

For example, if Lindsey advised the President about the political 

implications of invoking

executive privilege, that communication would not be privileged; if he 

discussed the availability

of the privilege as a legal matter, the conversation would be protected.

Distinguishing between Lindsey's legal and non-legal advice becomes even 

more difficult

because not only does Lindsey wear two hats, one legal (Deputy White House 

Counsel) and one

non-legal (Special Assistant to the President), but the Office of White House 

Counsel has

historically performed many non-legal functions, such as giving policy 

advice, writing speeches,

and performing various political tasks. See Stephen Hess, Organizing the 

Presidency 36, 43,

84 (1988); Lloyd N. Cutler, The Role of the Counsel to the President of the 

United States, 35

Record of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York 470, 472-76 

(1980);

Jeremy Rabkin, At the President's Side: The Role of the White House Counsel 

in Constitutional

Policy, Law & Contemp. Probs., Autumn 1993, at 63, 65-76. When an advisor 

serves dual

roles, the party invoking the privilege bears a particularly heavy burden of 

demonstrating that the

services provided were in fact legal. See, e.g., Texaco Puerto Rico, Inc. v. 

Department of

Consumer Affairs, 60 F.3d 867, 884 (1st Cir. 1995) (where agency "delegated 

policymaking

authority to its outside counsel to such an extent that counsel ceased to 

function as lawyers and

began to function as regulators," it could not invoke attorney-client 

privilege); Restatement •

122 cmt. c (whether privilege applies to lawyer acting in dual roles depends 

upon circumstances);

cf. In re Sealed Case, 121 F.3d at 752 (with respect to "'dual hat' 

presidential advisors, the

government bears the burden of proving that the communications" are covered 

by the executive

privilege).

Accordingly, before abrogating the official attorney-client privilege 

for all future

Presidents, this court should have remanded to the district court to allow 

the Independent Counsel

to recall Lindsey to the grand jury to determine whether, with respect to 

each question that he

declines to answer, he can demonstrate the elements of the attorney-client 

privilege, namely that

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each communication was made between privileged persons in confidence "for the 

purpose of

obtaining or providing legal assistance for the client," Restatement • 118. 

See United States v.

Kovel, 296 F.2d 918, 923 (2nd Cir. 1961) (remanding to permit accountant 

witness to offer factual

support for assertion that communications were made in pursuit of legal 

advice). If Lindsey failed

to meet this burden, that would end the matter, leaving for another day the 

difficult question of

presidential attorney-client privilege, with its consequences for the 

functioning of the Presidency,

as well as its potential implications for possible impeachment proceedings 

(implications we have

hardly begun to consider). See Maj. Op. at 23-25; Office of the President 

Br. at 26-29; Office of

the Independent Counsel Br. at 35; cf. Amicus Br. at 34-37. On the other 

hand, if Lindsey

demonstrated that his communications involved official legal advice, the 

district court could use

the remand to enrich the record by, for example, inviting former White House 

counsel to describe

the nature of the relationship between Presidents and White House counsel 

generally and the role

of the attorney-client privilege in particular. This would create an 

infinitely more useful record

for us, or eventually the Supreme Court, to determine whether reason or 

experience justifies any

change in the official presidential attorney-client privilege, and if so, 

whether the privilege can be

modified without threatening a President's ability to "take Care that the 

Laws be faithfully

executed." U.S. Const. art. II, • 3. See Swidler, 1998 WL 333019, at *6 n.4 

(noting lack of

empirical evidence in support of limiting the privilege); Jaffee, 518 U.S. at 

16 & n.16 (relying on

amicus briefs citing psychology and social work studies); Trammel, 445 U.S. 

at 48, 52 (relying on

historical developments regarding the role of women in marriage).

I do not consider the Supreme Court's expectation that we proceed 

expeditiously to be

inconsistent with our obligation to engage in fully reasoned and informed 

decision-making. The

importance to the Presidency of effective legal advice requires no less. 

Moreover, according to

the Independent Counsel, the grand jury is exploring whether obstruction of 

justice, perjury,

witness intimidation, and other crimes were committed in January 1998. See 

18 U.S.C. • 3282

(establishing five-year statute of limitations for non-capital federal 

crimes). We thus have time to

determine whether we need to resolve this important question and, if so, to 

ensure that we do so

on the basis of a fuller, more useful record. If the Independent Counsel 

needs to report to

Congress more expeditiously, he is free to do so.

III

[[

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]]

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