NewsHour: Paula Jones – May 27, 1997

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JIM LEHRER: Today’s two major Supreme Court cases are first tonight. One was a decision, the other a hearing. The decision was the unanimous ruling that Paula Corbin Jones can proceed with her sexual harassment suit against President Clinton while he is in office. NewsHour regular Stuart Taylor of the American Lawyer and Legal Times is here. He wrote an extensive piece in the American Lawyer last November on the Paul Jones case.

Stuart, welcome. First, what was the legal issue before the court today?

STUART TAYLOR, The American Lawyer: The sole issue is whether the President’s status as President would warrant a constitutional decision by the court barring Paula Jones from proceeding with her lawsuit which seeks damages against him for his personal conduct before he was President, or, in fact, barring any private civil damage lawsuit from proceeding against the President until after he leaves office. President Clinton said that the Constitution so required and that the court should so require it even as matter of prudence, even if not as a matter of constitutional law. The court unanimously and emphatically said, no, and rejected the President’s position on both those questions.

JIM LEHRER: On what grounds?

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