Latest / Plausibly Live - The Dave Bowman Show Podcast / DDH - Pardon Moi?
Transcript
- 0:00History is strange, it's alien, and it won't give us what we
- 0:04would like to have. Tuesdays, 8:00.
- 0:08Dave, does history on Bill Mick live.
- 0:10And with presidential pardons having become news in recent
- 0:16days, good time to take a look back and look at this pardon
- 0:20power through history. Dave, how are we going to look
- 0:22at this thing? In 1794, there was a simmering
- 0:27discontent in the Backcountry of Pennsylvania that boiled over
- 0:33into an outright insurrection. Farmers, a real 1 farmers and
- 0:40distillers, outraged by federal tax on whiskey, refused to pay
- 0:45it and they took up arms against tax collectors.
- 0:49This was not just an isolated act of defiance, it was a full
- 0:52blown insurrection that tested the very foundation of the very
- 0:55young United States government. President George Washington,
- 1:00faced with the most serious internal threats since the
- 1:03Revolution, made an unprecedented decision, one that
- 1:07has never been repeated. He personally LED a militia
- 1:11force of 13,000 troops to suppress the rebellion in
- 1:15Western Pennsylvania. But what happened after the guns
- 1:18were lowered is even more remarkable, and it introduces us
- 1:22to one of the most powerful and controversial tools of the
- 1:25presidency. In the aftermath of the
- 1:28rebellion, Washington faced a choice.
- 1:31He could press the full weight of federal law against the
- 1:34rebels, making examples of those who defied the government.
- 1:37Two men who had been convicted of treason in the in the
- 1:41rebellion had been sentenced to death, and they were the symbols
- 1:45of the resistance. Their execution would have sent
- 1:47a strong message about the power of the new federal government to
- 1:50enforce its laws. But Washington chose a different
- 1:53path. In an extraordinary act of
- 1:56mercy, he pardoned the two men, declaring that, quote, the
- 1:59people of the United States were capable of forgiving as well as
- 2:03correcting their errors. UN quote.
- 2:06This act of clemency wasn't just a moment of personal
- 2:09magnanimity. It was a deliberate use of a
- 2:12power granted to the president in the new Constitution.
- 2:16His pardon of the whiskey rebels highlighted the president's
- 2:18unique authority to temper the harshness of the law with the
- 2:22wisdom of mercy was a calculated act meant to unify a divided
- 2:27nation, showing that the government could be both firm
- 2:30and just. But it raised questions that
- 2:34would echo throughout American history.
- 2:35How far should the president's power to forgive extend?
- 2:39Should there be limits? And what happens when it's used
- 2:42in ways that appear to be politically or personally
- 2:45motivated? That power, enshrined in Article
- 2:492, Section 2 of the Constitution, has been wielded
- 2:51by every president since then. It's been used to heal divisions
- 2:55after wars, correct perceived injustices and, sometimes
- 3:00controversially, to reward political allies or serve
- 3:04personal agendas. From the Civil War to Watergate,
- 3:08from Prohibition to, well, last week, this power has shaped our
- 3:13nation's story in profound ways. And we dig into it more in 60
- 3:19seconds on WMMB. So, Dave, with this pardon
- 3:23coming into the play, are there really any of these acts by a
- 3:27president like this that are not political?
- 3:30It is a political power after all, right?
- 3:33It's certainly a political power.
- 3:35It's found in the Constitution, Article 2, Section 2, and it
- 3:38says, quote, the president shall have the power to grant
- 3:42reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United
- 3:45States comma except in cases of impeachment, UN quote.
- 3:51Now that seems like it's a pretty simple thing, but it's
- 3:57also one of those things that we inherited from our mother
- 4:01country, England. It was traditional for the for
- 4:04the British royalty to have the, the power of pardons and it was
- 4:10used politically. It was used professionally and
- 4:12personally. It maintains stability in a lot
- 4:16of ways, loyalty and stability. This this idea of pardons was
- 4:21one that could generate in, in in many ways, political
- 4:25protection for the monarch. In the in the aftermath of the
- 4:30English Civil Wars, it was used. It allowed the monarchs to
- 4:33correct perceived injustices or to show political favoritism.
- 4:39And by the time the colonies had been established, the power had
- 4:43evolved into a very nuanced tool of statecraft.
- 4:47It was both a symbol of sovereign authority and a
- 4:50mechanism to address judicial overreach or inflexibility,
- 4:54which is something we don't like to think about.
- 4:57We like to think of the jury as being the last bulwark against
- 5:00government abuse, but juries can be abusive and can overreach as
- 5:07well. And this pardon power enabled
- 5:10the monarch especially, or the governors in the colonies, to
- 5:14kind of push back against that. The political power of the royal
- 5:19governors, reflecting the British model, gave them that
- 5:23right. They frequently issued clemency
- 5:25for a wide range of offenses, petty theft right down to
- 5:28rebellion, in order to maintain order in a fractious and
- 5:33expanding society. The use of pardons foreshadowed
- 5:37executive clemency in the New Republic, where the challenge
- 5:41was enforcing federal authority across diverse populations, and
- 5:46it demanded a similar blend of firmness and forgiveness.
- 5:50Colonial governors often leveraged their pardons to
- 5:53address the unique challenges of frontier justice, which, you
- 5:57know, that's where rigid legal systems would clash a lot, often
- 6:02with practical realities. And that went on well into the
- 6:07early years of the twenty 20th century here in the United
- 6:10States. Think about places like
- 6:11Tombstone, Arizona or Dodge City where you had that political
- 6:17reality versus the, you know, the rigid legal system.
- 6:21It it was rather remarkable philosophically. the
- 6:26Enlightenment era, which is, you know, where we come from, deeply
- 6:32influenced the the creation of the pardon power in the US
- 6:35Constitution. People like John Locke and
- 6:39Montesquieu had championed the idea that justice must sometimes
- 6:44be tempered with mercy. Is there anybody that would
- 6:47disagree with that, particularly in cases where law alone could
- 6:51not achieve equity? Montesquieu had argued for a
- 6:55separation of powers, but also recognized that an executive
- 6:58must possess certain prerogatives, such as the
- 7:01ability to pardon, to counterbalance the judiciary's
- 7:04potential rigidity. Again, this is not something we
- 7:08like to think about. We like to think of the
- 7:10judiciary as being independent and a counterweight, a check and
- 7:16balance as it were, to the executive and the others.
- 7:18But even in that, they could become, and I think many of us
- 7:23would argue have become very rigid themselves and very
- 7:28inflexible themselves. John Locke saw clemency as a
- 7:32humane response to the imperfections of any legal
- 7:35system, a way to reconcile justice with compassion.
- 7:39In that spirit, when the framers sat down in Philadelphia, they
- 7:44included the pardon power in Article 2, Section 2.
- 7:47We talked about it. They entrusted the president
- 7:49with the authority to grant reprieves and pardons.
- 7:52Given how much they argued about the presidency.
- 7:55There was, as we're going to talk about in the next segment,
- 7:58some debate over this, but not as much as you might think.
- 8:03They saw it as a necessary executive check on the
- 8:06judiciary, ensuring that the president could act swiftly to
- 8:09correct miscarriages of justice, promote national unity, or
- 8:14provide mercy in extraordinary circumstances.
- 8:19And I would re emphasize, promote national unity.
- 8:24This blending of British tradition and Enlightenment
- 8:27ideas creates a uniquely American version of executive
- 8:32clemency, and one that of the course, has well sparked debates
- 8:38over its scope and usage ever since.
- 8:42Who's surprised when Washington pardoned the two men that had
- 8:46been sentenced to death? There were people who were mad
- 8:51about that. Hamilton not happy.
- 8:56How are we going to ever, you know, establish a firm,
- 9:01centralized government if you're going to go around pardoning
- 9:03everybody who stands up against it?
- 9:07But Washington didn't see it that way.
- 9:09He saw it as a chance to promote unity.
- 9:12And as he said, the nation can forgive and can learn from our
- 9:16mistakes. And that's certainly something
- 9:18that you would hope the pardon power would do.
- 9:22But I think we also know that it hasn't quite worked out that
- 9:27way, has it? Well no, and the one time that
- 9:31I'm familiar with a pardon in my lifetime is the pardon of
- 9:34Richard Nixon by Gerald Ford. And it was a pre emptive pardon
- 9:37as Nixon left office to also the idea of unity and healing the
- 9:42country was what it was at the foundation there.
- 9:44At least that was the excuse. Oh, that's what he said in his
- 9:46speech. Yeah.
- 9:48And it's one part. And I think that might have
- 9:51actually accomplished that in a way, But we'll see.
- 9:54Didn't get him elected next time out.
- 9:56And we're back with more on pardons on Bill Mcklive.
- 9:59Stay with us. It's a take on history you won't
- 10:02find anywhere else. Dave does history on Bill
- 10:06Mcklive. The McPherson Financial Group
- 10:09brings you the hour and we'll get to your calls on our next
- 10:12segment. Right now, Dave's going to get
- 10:14us back into taking a look at this pardon and, and how it came
- 10:18about in the US Constitution. And Dave, some arguments over
- 10:22how it's to be done. Yeah, at the convention there
- 10:26was, it wasn't a lot of sharp debate, certainly compared with
- 10:31the rest of the discussion about the presidency.
- 10:36But there was some debate and in concern about this.
- 10:40Hamilton and others who were more favoritist of a centralized
- 10:46government thought it was a good idea.
- 10:48They saw it as the a way to end a rebellion and to grant mercy
- 10:54where the law was overly harsh. One of their key points was that
- 10:59it was very utilitarian. In cases of national
- 11:02reconciliation. Hamilton foresaw situations
- 11:06where rebellions and insurrections might arise,
- 11:09threatening the national stability much like the Whiskey
- 11:11Rebellion did. And they argued that the ability
- 11:15to pardon would allow the executive to swiftly de escalate
- 11:19tensions and restore peace without prolonged trials or
- 11:23punitive measures that could deepen divisions.
- 11:27This kind of plays into what Gerald Ford said when he
- 11:31pardoned Nixon. It was we're we're trying to
- 11:34avoid this. We, we could, as, as I recall,
- 11:37and I don't remember these exact words in the speech, if this
- 11:40continued on, it would just be wall to wall trials, wall to
- 11:44wall hearings and punitive responses that could have
- 11:50deepened those divisions. The interesting thing to me is
- 11:55that Hamilton did object to the to the pardon of the two men who
- 11:59were condemned. But that's the story for another
- 12:02day, I guess. The proponents, like Hamilton,
- 12:06also believe that the legal system, that there's no legal
- 12:08system, no matter how well designed, that can perfectly
- 12:12account for every nuance of human behavior or circumstances.
- 12:17The law by its nature, is rigid. It's blind to extenuating
- 12:21factors that might render a punishment unjust.
- 12:24A president empowered to grant clemency, then could act as a
- 12:28final safeguard, tempering that, and that would be a good thing
- 12:33to have. That didn't mean that there
- 12:35weren't arguments against it. The concerns primarily from from
- 12:40George Mason, were they They didn't like this idea that it
- 12:47was so sweeping that it was just absolute for many delegates.
- 12:52That kind of echoed the British royal pardons, which had been
- 12:55yielded to shield, used to shield political allies and
- 12:59maintain power. They didn't like that idea, and
- 13:03they thought, well, what happens if a president that we're also
- 13:06afraid might become a king takes the same approach?
- 13:10They feared unchecked pardon power could lead to corruption,
- 13:15allowing the president to protect cronies, excuse
- 13:19political allies, or undermine the rule of law.
- 13:23These fears were, of course, particularly acute in light of
- 13:26the ongoing distrust of centralized powers that had led
- 13:30the colonies to rebel against England in the 1st place.
- 13:34But another concern was the potential for the pardon power
- 13:37to be misused in cases of treason or rebellion.
- 13:41There were delegates who worried that a president might pardon
- 13:43individuals listen to this not out of national interest, but to
- 13:49serve personal or political ends, effectively aiding
- 13:53insurrectionists or subverting the will of the people.
- 13:59This fear would dovetail with their broader apprehensions
- 14:02about creating an executive branch that was just too much
- 14:06like the monarchy that they had just tried and fought so hard to
- 14:11escape from. So they're concerned about too
- 14:16much power, but yet they want the power there for the good of
- 14:20the country, it seems. Well, the.
- 14:21Federalists do. The Federalists think this is a
- 14:23good idea and they see it as necessary.
- 14:26The anti federalists see a lot of concerns.
- 14:30They see a lot of potential for this to be abused, to be used by
- 14:33presidents, to subvert the will of the people, to reward
- 14:38political cronies, to serve their own interests rather than
- 14:42the interests of the nation. Now, like so many things, which
- 14:48of them turned out to be correct?
- 14:50I mean, that's that's one of the one of the more fascinating
- 14:55things to the about federalists versus anti federalists is
- 14:58federalists seem very pollyannish about American
- 15:00people and anti federalists seem more realistic about human
- 15:05nature. That doesn't mean that there
- 15:07isn't an ideal that we can't achieve here.
- 15:09But you got to give the anti federalists their deal.
- 15:12They clearly saw that not every president is going to be George
- 15:18Washington and some of these people, some of these people
- 15:22sitting around this very room, we're going to do things that
- 15:25are, you know, weird. The pardon power, of course, has
- 15:30been used throughout presidential history.
- 15:32It started with Washington with the the pardons for the Whiskey
- 15:34Rebellion, and he specifically said it was to promote unity, to
- 15:39reunite the country together. Thomas Jefferson, in an
- 15:44interesting approach, used the pardon power to forgive people
- 15:48who had been convicted under the Alien and Sedition Acts, which
- 15:52his predecessor John Adams had had passed to jail.
- 15:56People who criticized the government in violation of the
- 15:591st Amendment. Keep in mind that portions of
- 16:02those laws still on the books still being used today,
- 16:06particularly in the January 6th cases.
- 16:09Also keep in mind that Thomas Jefferson ran his campaign on
- 16:12repealing those but never did in the 19th century.
- 16:17Andrew Johnson is infamous in some ways for his mass pardons
- 16:23for Confederate soldiers in the aftermath of the post civil war.
- 16:27Also, his pardons of political leadership of the South, with a
- 16:32couple of major exceptions, but he was willing to to sign off on
- 16:36this. Now, many people in the North
- 16:39saw that as politically motivated because Johnson
- 16:41himself was a southerner and very much in in empathy with the
- 16:47Southern positions on things, with the exception of secession
- 16:52in the 20th century. Warren G Harding, who is, I
- 16:56think, one of the most fascinating presidents we've
- 16:58ever had, pardoned Eugene Debs, a socialist communist who would
- 17:04run for president from behind bars.
- 17:06He did so as a symbol of reconciliation.
- 17:10Well, Debs lost and lost pretty badly.
- 17:13But, you know, there's that First Amendment thing again.
- 17:17He should be able to say what he wants to say.
- 17:19And so Harding gave him that pardon.
- 17:23And Eugene Debs, for the most part, has gone in the the trash
- 17:26bin of history for the most part.
- 17:28Gerald Ford, of course, pardoned Richard Nixon, one of the most
- 17:32debated pardons in our history. And I've I'm of the opinion, and
- 17:37this is strictly my opinion, it shouldn't be.
- 17:40I mean, of all the pardons delivered, other than
- 17:43Washington's, it might have been the most honest one.
- 17:46Look, we can spend all of our time arguing about this or we
- 17:49can just move on. And we moved on.
- 17:53And was the country better off for that?
- 17:56I it was angering. It was frustrating, but yeah, I
- 18:01think we were. Of course, then you get into the
- 18:0321st century, you've got Bill Clinton partying, people like
- 18:09Marc Rich, the last minute, Donald Trump's pardons of his
- 18:13political allies, Steve Bannon, Roger Stone.
- 18:15You've got Calvin Coolidge and the Teapot Dome.
- 18:18You you've got a lot of these that that start to make you
- 18:21wonder, is this really what it was intended to be for?
- 18:27And of course, that has LED us to what has happened in the last
- 18:30week, which has a lot of people discussing whether or not we
- 18:34need to change this. Well, even if we do, how are we
- 18:39going to do that? That's the part that nobody
- 18:42really wants to talk about, but I suppose we should.
- 18:47And we will pick it up with Dave Bowman and Dave Does history.
- 18:50We also get to your thoughts in our final segment of the day
- 18:54right here on Bill Mick Live. We continue in moments on WMMB,
- 18:58the McPherson Financial Group, this hour's sponsor, as Dave
- 19:01does history of Bill Mick live. We take a look at presidential
- 19:04pardons since their inception here in this country.
- 19:07And Dave, where we at right now? So I guess where that leaves us
- 19:12is the debate and criticism that we have today over these
- 19:20pardons. It really came to, to A to a
- 19:24head last week when the pardon was issued for Hunter Biden.
- 19:30But by the way, you would literally have to be as dumb as
- 19:34cabbage not to know what's coming, despite the fact that
- 19:38they kept saying it wasn't. I mean, there's an old saying in
- 19:42the civil service, never believe anything until it's been
- 19:44officially denied. So you knew this this was coming
- 19:48and there's a lot of discussion about more of these coming, you
- 19:52know, pre emptive pardons for other people.
- 19:55Doctor. So this is of course launched
- 20:01more debate whether we should change this, whether we should
- 20:06this unchecked power it, it's got people a little concerned
- 20:12about some things. Should we require congressional
- 20:15or judicial oversight of that? Do we have concerns about
- 20:20perceived inequities in the use of the power?
- 20:23Clemency for your friends, but not, you know, for the pardons,
- 20:28for thee, but not for me. What about an emphasis on
- 20:33executive discretion as a balance to judicial rigidity?
- 20:38I mean, Hunter Biden, was he was he politically tried, as the
- 20:47president said, you could certainly make that argument
- 20:50that he wasn't, even though the president makes the argument
- 20:53that it was. It really depends on your point
- 20:55of view. And So what then does it, how
- 20:59then does that executive privilege, that discretion enter
- 21:04into all that? Then, of course, there's the
- 21:07arguments for the president's unique position to act as the
- 21:09final arbiter of justice at a mercy.
- 21:13Here's the problem with the whole thing, and whether you
- 21:17think that it needs to have as Bill and I were kicking around
- 21:20during the break, Can you imagine having a senatorial
- 21:22hearing over a pardon? Oh, it would be zoo.
- 21:27It would. It would be like the
- 21:29confirmation hearings for any appointment a president makes.
- 21:32It would be exactly what Gerald Ford was trying to avoid.
- 21:36I mean, it would be we'd we'd never get anything done.
- 21:39So I don't know that that's the solution.
- 21:41But even if we wanted to solve it that way, it requires, unlike
- 21:47Senator Manchin seems to think it requires an actual amendment
- 21:52to the Constitution. This cannot be changed by a law
- 21:55that Congress can't pass. A law saying the president
- 21:57doesn't have this power or it's going to be, would never stand.
- 22:01It's going to require an amendment, which means 2/3 of
- 22:04the House, 2/3 of the Senate have to approve it and 3/4 of
- 22:08the states have to ratify it. Please don't call me and say,
- 22:11Dave, we could have an article of five convention.
- 22:14No, you can't. You're not going to have an
- 22:16article of five convention to change pardon power.
- 22:20It's not going to happen, but you can pretend if you want.
- 22:24But in the meantime, do you think 35 states term?
- 22:27Limits. People pretending the term
- 22:29limits actually work and mean something because they don't.
- 22:32It's I don't know that you could get 35 states around.
- 22:36You couldn't get 2/3 of Congress to pass this anyway.
- 22:38I can tell you that too many of them want those pardons if they
- 22:41need them. So.
- 22:43And too many of them have, yeah, too many of them have their eyes
- 22:47on the White House anyway. So why would you give up a power
- 22:50that's there? So it's not going to change.
- 22:54The question that I have, Bill, is how come this has never been
- 22:56a question in a political, in a, in a presidential debate?
- 23:00No one has ever asked the presidential candidates, if you
- 23:03become the president, how will you use the pardon, the power of
- 23:06pardon? Because even though it's become
- 23:11an issue, it's one of those things that we'd you can't
- 23:14really put on a bumper sticker. And so maybe those are the
- 23:18questions we should start asking, you know, substantive
- 23:20policy questions as opposed to just nonsense.
- 23:26Maybe we should have the peanut gallery send a letter to the
- 23:29president and see if. You can answer.
- 23:32You could form your own nonprofit and do that though.
- 23:34Exactly. We're back in 60 seconds on
- 23:37WMMB, the executive and the pardon of the Power on this
- 23:41edition of Dave Does History on Bill Micklife, Randy's in
- 23:44Indialantic. OK, Randy, what are you thinking
- 23:45about all this? Hey, good morning.
- 23:48Yeah, I, you know, I think that the if you look at the history
- 23:52of the pardon and you lived before the Nixon era, the pardon
- 23:56was kind of implied to be something that would pardon a, a
- 24:02guilty person, not a person that might be found guilty.
- 24:05And I I think the way to say that is that the purpose of the
- 24:09pardon system seem to be to stop an injustice, not to stop
- 24:13justice. Oh, that's an interesting
- 24:17thought. So if you could tweak it, what
- 24:19would you do? Yeah, that's it.
- 24:21That's a tough one. I don't, I don't think you can
- 24:23change it because the power kind of needs to be absolute.
- 24:27But I do think that in history, and this is my opinion, I don't
- 24:32have historical facts to, to back it up, but it just kind of
- 24:35my impression watching everything in history is that
- 24:39people would probably be insulted if a president pardoned
- 24:42them before they were found guilty.
- 24:45Because the belief was that the federal government would be, you
- 24:49know, not as invasive and, and, and an attack dog like the like
- 24:54the prosecution is now. And you know, also just to point
- 24:57out, we, we have other forms of pardon system because we have
- 25:00people that, that we believe broke the law here that we can't
- 25:04get the, you know, the DA to act on.
- 25:06Yeah, that's true. You know, you mentioned the the
- 25:08preemptive pardon ID and Randy, thanks for your thoughts.
- 25:11I appreciate it. Dave, Adam Schiff said I don't
- 25:15want a preemptive pardon from Joe Biden that he could be
- 25:18saying don't throw me in the briar patch, but he doesn't want
- 25:21a pre emptive pardon because he thinks it makes him look guilty.
- 25:24And there is that perception out there too.
- 25:27And yet there are others who maybe do want that pre emptive
- 25:31pardon. I that to me is going to be one
- 25:34of the most fascinating things that happens in the if Biden
- 25:38does that. And of course, then we're back
- 25:41to is Biden even really the president?
- 25:43So who's really writing these? So there is that.
- 25:47But you know, again, it didn't always come with a conviction.
- 25:52I mean, I guess you could have dragged every soldier in the
- 25:55Civil War into a court and convicted them of sedition and
- 25:59treason, but they for the most part, they weren't.
- 26:03He just Andrew Johnson just granted those pardons.
- 26:06The, the convictions under the Alien and Sedition Act are, in
- 26:10my view, still questionable to this day.
- 26:13I don't think the Alien and Sedition Act is constitutional.
- 26:15And I'm appalled that Jefferson never repealed that.
- 26:23And I'm appalled that the courts, of course, packed with
- 26:25the Federalists upheld it. I mean, that's just, that's just
- 26:29insane. We we all go back to the, the,
- 26:33the Nixon pardon, but really outside of the Whiskey
- 26:36Rebellion, it may be the one part that actually accomplished
- 26:39the purpose, which was national reconciliation.
- 26:42And let's move on. On the healing and getting past
- 26:44Watergate and gave Dan Rather even more power than he had
- 26:49before. Line 2, you're up next on Bill
- 26:51Make live. Good morning.
- 26:53Morning, Bill. Good morning, Dan.
- 26:55Yeah, Nick, what do you think? Yeah.
- 26:58I think that that the way they're using it today, I don't
- 27:04think the communists should be pardoned.
- 27:06It's not a question of I, I don't want them running this
- 27:09country. Now if everybody votes for him,
- 27:12I still don't want them running the country.
- 27:14And, and as far as giving them pardon, no, there there has to
- 27:18be. If you label them a communist,
- 27:20if they're communist, you call them a communist, then they
- 27:23don't deserve pardon. They're not part of this
- 27:25country. They're they're.
- 27:26No, no pardon for Donald Trump then, because the left's been
- 27:29calling him a commie and a Nazi and everything else they can
- 27:31think of for the last eight years.
- 27:35Not just calling, not just calling, but actually being OK.
- 27:39These people in power today in Washington are communists and,
- 27:43and everything they do proves it.
- 27:46Trump is just the opposite. And and I, I don't want those
- 27:50guys. I don't want those communists,
- 27:52but. That is why we have elections
- 27:55and that's why we get folks in power and and we do it through
- 27:58the electoral process. Nick, I think, I think what
- 28:01you're saying at least becomes irrelevant with the voters
- 28:06having their say at that point. Dave, let me ask you this, does
- 28:11this pardon of Hunter Biden, not to mention any pre emptive
- 28:15pardons that Joe Biden may issue between now and leaving office
- 28:18on January 20th. Does that legitimize or open a
- 28:23door politically for Donald Trump to go back and, and
- 28:27they're already hearing calls. Time to pardon the folks from
- 28:29January 6th and and maybe some others along the way.
- 28:34From a strictly operational standpoint, since most of them
- 28:37were convicted quote UN quote under the remnants of the Alien
- 28:41and Sedition Act, I would be in favor of that anyway because I
- 28:44hate that law. Sure, again, I I think that it
- 28:49does, but. That was Biden's use for his
- 28:51son. Give political cover to Trump
- 28:55for any use he might determine is appropriate.
- 28:57I think he already had that to begin with.
- 28:58But now you're back to are you, are you serving the national
- 29:04will? Are you subverting the will of
- 29:06the people? And I don't.
- 29:06That's a question I can't answer.
- 29:09And if we have a person in there who is a a servant minded person
- 29:15with the job, it makes a difference in how those powers
- 29:18are wielded. I would agree with you there.
- 29:19Line one you're up on Bill make live.
- 29:21Good morning. Or a military of our Yeah, Eric.
- 29:25Yeah. So as far as this topic goes
- 29:27about, you know, pardoning or not, I, I think that it, it's
- 29:30necessary to have that kind of backstop for, you know, stopping
- 29:35injustice, right? It is a political, it does seem
- 29:39like a political power though, right?
- 29:41It's not a judicial power necessarily or or not in kind of
- 29:46in the, in the feel of it, right.
- 29:49Well, as Dave was talking, it's a check and a balance, right?
- 29:52Yeah. So, but I think I think that the
- 29:55strong take away here is, is that you have an October
- 30:00surprise in 2020 in the Hunter laptop that really pointed to
- 30:05some really ugly stuff that needed to be looked into before
- 30:12you would elect somebody like Biden the the presidency, right?
- 30:16And this, this is the consequence.
- 30:18And I think this is what people need to take away from it.
- 30:20And remember, moving forward with all presidential elections
- 30:24that that there is a real consequence if you don't do the
- 30:28vetting and thoroughly look into all of these things that are
- 30:33coming out that could point to some real corruption.
- 30:39And so this is just where we're at, you know?
- 30:43Well, it is. Are you suggesting any change at
- 30:45all in the in the power of the system?
- 30:48I, I don't think you can change the, the, the, the pardon
- 30:52system. I think it, I think it needs to
- 30:54be there. I, I think that it is political
- 30:56and I, and I do think that, that people just need to wake up and
- 31:01say, look, you, you know, America, you made a mistake in
- 31:032020. You, you, you gave this guy the
- 31:07power to to whitewash and completely pardon himself
- 31:12because that's. A lot of things there.
- 31:14Yeah. I got to leave it there, Eric.
- 31:15The show's almost done, Dave. I'll turn it to you for the
- 31:18final word, my friend. Well, I, you can look at the
- 31:21Hunter Biden thing, but that's just one example of 47
- 31:25presidents who have something in their backgrounds that you could
- 31:29object to. It's it's all about us doing our
- 31:33due diligence up front, Is there?
- 31:35Any father that would not have pardoned his son in that
- 31:38circumstance. I don't think so, but you know,
- 31:42there's always, there's always that one, I guess.
- 31:45Dave, thank you. Talk to you next week.
- 31:46See you then check out more stories from
- 31:52history@davedoeshistory.org.