As hank myers said, i am privileged to be the president and ceo of the National Constitution center in philadelphia which is the only institution in america chartered by congress to disseminate information about the u. S. Constitution on a nonpartisan basis. What an inspiring charter that is. I am thrilled to be here at the Gerald R Ford symposium for our symposium on gerald ford. This is the first of what we hope will be a series of collaborations with libraries across the country where we will join in partnership to explore not be political legacy of the president s, but their constitutional legacy. We forget in partisan politics , every person who serves as president makes a significant contribution to our understanding of the constitution, and the limits in places on governmental powers. I could not imagine a better panel than the one that we are going to talk about today. This panel is devoted to president fords domestic policy and features scholars of the Ford Administration as well as leaguer think will legal fingers. Michael gearhart is the distinguished professor of law at the university of North Carolina chapel hill. He is author of a new book, the forgotten president. The wall street journal called it one of the 10 best books of the year. Mike came to the National Constitution center last week. We have had a riveting discussion on how these president s often forgotten made a significant contribution to our constitutional understanding. And my other old friend martin , wolf. Im glad he is taken the time to join us. He was appointed to the District Court of massachusetts in 1985 and served as chief judge from 20062012. He previously served in the for department as attorney general of the United States. He also received a certificate of appreciation from the president for his work in the resettlement of indochinese. Michael, you have written this great book about the forgotten president s. One thing that emerges is that you can be forgotten and still make a significant contribution to constitutional understanding. You believe that president ford is neither a forgotten president nor a bad one. You think you made a significant contribution to our understanding of executive power. That is correct. Let me say i am honored to be , here. I appreciate the chance to be a part of this program and to talk about the president s legacy i know a great deal of. President ford is not in the book and the question becomes why. I think president ford had a tremendous constitutional legacy and is particularly striking when you consider he was president for 900 days. Over those 900 days what he did, it did have an impact. I will mention the ways in which it did. We have people here today. Four forgotten president , you could throw an event, and no one would come. The fact you have this library this museum, those help keep his memory alive. We keep talking about the things he did. The first is the fact that he became president , he is the first and only president who has come by way of the office for the 25th amendment. He was not elected. That in itself is remarkable. Even without that electoral mandate he was able to do a lot of things, many of which we will talk about today. They include the following. He took over at a time when the Justice Department will reeling from charges of corruption. He restored integrity to the department of justice. One of the most important was edward leavy. I think there is a symmetry there between ford and coolidge. Another president not long remembered. Coolidge took over the white house when there was a deal of corruption. He removed the attorney general, and they each tried to accomplish restoring integrity. Also treating the department of justice as an arms length from the white house was unusual and distinctive. There are number of other things we could. 2. We will talk about the pardon later. It is probably the most famous pardon in history. You all know when he made it his popularity dropped dramatically. We talk about it as if it were really important step towards healing the country. That in itself is an indication of how memorable it was. Thank you for that framing of our topic. Mark you were an assistant to , attorney general edward leavy. Mike talked about leavys as fords crowning achievement. Talk about his contribution. I would like to say how gratifying it is to be invited in be able to come. I am a United States district judge in my 30th year. I have just come from prague working with journalists and lawyers in russia. I was talking to them about the roles of lawyers in the media play in the United States. The meaningful part of my remarks focus on watergate, my experience working with president fords administration. This is an inspiring example of our country at its best to embattled people throughout the world. The opportunity that i had when i was 30 years old had a transforming effect on my interests, aspirations standards. It is very gratifying to be able to express my gratitude to president ford and attorney general leavy for that. Each of them i think has a vibrant living legacy. When attorney general leavy passed away in 2000, president ford came to the university of chicago and spoke at the memorial service. He said in part that when he recruited edward leavy from the president of the university of chicago, because he wanted someone with impeccable integrity and intellect at a time of corrosive cynicism throughout the country. Watergate, the coverup, severely damaged confidence in the Justice Department, as well as in the presidency, all kinds of abuses by the fbi and cia and the vietnam war has caused considerable controversy. The department of justice had been used for partisan purposes. John mitchell, president nixons Campaign Manager in 1972 went to prison for abusing his office as attorney general. President ford said to the gathering at the university of chicago when he recruited edward leavy, he told him i want you to protect the rights of american citizens and not the president who appointed you. All i knew is that he shared my reverence of the constitution. We were talking last night michael said wouldnt any president say that . It shows the remarkable success of president ford and edward leavy. That was not typical of the attorney general. They view the department of justice to protect his brothers personal reputation and partisan interest. That is what John Mitchell had done as well. Edward leavy was quite the opposite. He and president president ford delegated him substantial autonomy, but not complete independence, nor did the attorney general want independence. At that time, there were many proposed bills in washington to make the attorney general independent of the president. For example, the way the dei director is now. They have a 10year term that would survive the president who appointed him, to take away from the Justice Department the authority to investigate highlevel officials, special prosecutors. Edward leavys view was the attorney general is accountable to the president for policies, whether the priorities of the thats what are the priorities of the department of justice going to be, for example. And, for example, where the law was uncertain, guidance from the president that was appropriate. Interestingly, edward leavy and president ford had been graduate students at Yale Law School at the same time. The president , in a selfdeprecating way, explained he spent most of his time coaching the yale football team, and the attorney general and his reputation for tremendous intellect. Attorney general leavy did strongly believe that the department of justice should never be an instrument for partisan purposes. The law had to be administered impartially, and president ford wanted him to do that. In his two short years, the cynicism about the department of justice and the executive branch generally was essentially eliminated through the honest, Impartial Administration of justice, led by edward leavy but in very close collaboration with president ford. Great. Describe this incredible achievement two years, the most polarized time in history. President ford comes in. Theres concern about executive power and nixons abuses of wiretapping and also its of instruments of president ial power, and president ford transforms that all sorts of instruments of president ial power. Tell us what the result was of this transformation of executive power. Sure. As judge wolf well knows because he worked with most of these folks in the department adjust us, he pulled together a remarkable team of people, each of whom was exemplary and took that charge from the president quite seriously, which was to follow the law and not be partisan. That was particularly difficult at the time because you need to remember, there is tremendous spotlight placed on the department of justice at that time because up until then there had not been a spotlight placed on the department of justice. Everything that was happening was happening under a microscope. Among the people were carly hill, richard thornburgh, rex lee, someone i got to know very well fabulous lawyer. An incredible Public Servant as well. All of these appointments, both individually and together, i think restored faith in the department of justice. The fact that attorney general leavy was willing to sort of again, follow the law were ever it took him, but at the same time trying to protect executive power in a nonpartisan way. If we think about it, we might say that sounds really difficult because in these days, its hard to think of attorneys general or president s we all would have faith of actually doing that. Things have become so heavily partisan that a think the idea this could happen at all seems rather extraordinary, but it did. I just want to emphasize a couple of other things about it this was all being done by a president who was not elected. The challenge president ford had in doing all this was he had to be able to maintain his Political Support and political viability in the course of doing all this. He did not have elect oral mandate to do that, so somehow he had to maintain legitimacy for what he did, even though he was not technically elected. That in itself was a delicate act. It included doing things that were extraordinary. For example, again, he came and testified before congress. Imagine how unusual that was that a president of the United States would appear before congress to talk about his actions. It is both appointments, how he modeled himself as someone who was there to be transparent and somebody there to be responsible, accountable for what he was doing those things make him quite remarkable. He brought back one of the great Public Servants of the 20th century, who later became secretary of commerce. His nickname was mr. Clean, i think, but if you do not know anything about elliott richardson, you should read up on him. He brought the administration a lot of people who had reputations and records that really were quite distinctive. This gave it a character and cast that i think helped restore peoples faith in government. Tell us more about leavys specific reforms. He proposed guidelines for the fbi and talked about surveillance reforms. He had quite a record. Tell us about it. Attorney general leavy this was a time when executive power, the power of the president , was under great attack. The attorney general, edward leavy, believed that substantial executive power exists, but in contrast, as michael said, to the current climate where each branch perhaps even including the court seems to be asserting its maximum authority in either let the courts decide what the limits are, let political process decide what the limits are, president ford shared with edward leavy the idea of government by discussion. He did not believe that the executive branch should secretly, particularly, press its powers to the limits because this had led to abuses and secret abuses covered up under the rubric of National Security. The first generation, for example, of the current nsa controversy had occurred. The nsa had been intercepting the fbi and cia doing surveillance of americans. In a case coming out of the District Court in michigan, the Supreme Court in 1971 decided you cannot do that with regard to american citizens. It left open whether there was Inherent Authority in the president to do eavesdropping with regard to foreign powers and their agents for National Security purposes. Edward leavy believed that authority existed, and he set up with president ford a process where he would personally have to authorize each surveillance for National Security purposes but there was a question asked to whether that was legal. In this corrosive, cynical postwatergate era, there were risks he was taking. Even though he believed the president had the Inherent Authority to do things without approval from congress, edward leavy felt, and the president agreed with him on this, that things would be more clear coherent, accountable, and legitimate to the American People if he went to congress, they talked about what the architecture of this National Security surveillance should be, and to give a role, but a defined and limited role, to the courts. Essentially, edward leavy began the discussion that led to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court two years after president ford left office in a statute enacted during the carter administration. It works very well, at least until 9 11. This was a manifestation of the view that although we have a separation of powers powers, these are three powers that form one government. In a constant colloquy with each other, they share a duty the president , the congress, and the courts, in edward leavys view shared a duty to faithfully execute the constitution to the best of their ability and to try to reach a consensus and a accommodation. As i said, for about a generation, it led to what reasonably was regarded as a satisfactory resolution of the international National Security wiretapping issue. Edward leavy wanted a role for the congress and the court, but he also wanted it limited. I dont want this to sound too technical, but essentially, to get a National Security wiretap, you need a warrant. It is not a typical wanted based on probable cause that you will get evidence of a crime, but it is not a typical warrant based on probable cause that you will get evidence of a crime but it was a warrant based on the assumption that this was a foreign power or agent of a foreign power, and important National Security information would be obtained if this intrusion on privacy was permitted. There were efforts to get the courts and congress involved in deciding whether this was really a foreign power or foreign agent, and edward leavy strongly and successfully argued that the other branches of government did not have the responsibility to make that decision, nor would they have the information necessary to make the decision. While he was advocating the voluntary diminution of executive power, he was not allowing it to be hijacked. This is just fascinating. Mark has described a tremendous vision of balance where all three branches are supposed to cooperate. How did that happen . Did the fact that president ford came from congress influences effort to involve congress in checking the executive . I think the answer is yes. Sometimes people refer to president fords presidency as a congressional presidency, and i think that is partly because he was the only person that could get confirmed to be able to occupy the position of Vice President , and the reason hes the only person they thought they could get confirmed is because he was basically so popular in congress. He came into the position of Vice President and later became president with people in congress at least respecting him as an individual not always agreeing with him, but thinking he was a very decent man, a very thoughtful person. He is basically being a good steward. I say that knowing that we should not overstate the good relations he had with congress. He actually had a remarkable number of his vetoes overridden by congress. More vetoes overridden by congress in his short presidency than were even overridden by nixon in the last couple years of his administration. That goodwill did not always extend to doing everything he wanted, but i think his willingness to share, to be open, was something everybody appreciated, even more in retrospect and perhaps they did at the time. Another thing we cannot overestimate is the extent to which as an individual people really like him. That can go a long way. Contrast that with richard nixon, whom i would go so far as to say not many people like him as an individual, even though he was elected president twice i think with president ford, one reason why we are here today is because he really exuded and embodied a tremendous sense of decency, which i think everybody in government understood and appreciated. That helped the relationship with the other branches. The conception of executive power he had, which he shared with attorney general leavy, was a remarkable one because its not one that would be shared by subsequent president s and attorneys general. That in itself tells you something. Maybe it was driven to some extent by expediency, but i think it was driven to some extent by principal. The president was willing to do something on a principlebasis which people see even to this day as a principled act and achievement. That is a remarkable part of a legacy, and not many president s can look back and have the department of justice at least at the top and the relationship with the president always thought of as being perfectly principled, perfectly balanced. We have two visions of the attorney general what is the traditional one,