Clinton obstruction was never even discussed . . . it seems some understood who was in charge of the executive branch of government back then.
“The facts are disturbing and compelling on the President's intent to obstruct justice,” he said, according to remarks in the congressional record.
Sessions isn’t alone. More than 40 current GOP members of Congress voted for the impeachment or removal of Clinton from office for obstruction of justice. They include Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell – who mounted his own passionate appeal to remove Clinton from office for obstruction of justice – Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley and Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr, who was a House member at the time.
In all, 17 sitting senators supported the obstruction of justice charge against Clinton in 1998 and 1999.
“The chief law officer of the land, whose oath of office calls on him to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution, crossed the line and failed to defend the law, and, in fact, attacked the law and the rights of a fellow citizen,” Sessions said during Clinton’s trial in the Senate, two months after he was impeached by the House. “Under our Constitution, equal justice requires that he forfeit his office.”
http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/stories/1999/01/20/impeachment.01/Mills dissects obstruction-of-justice allegations
White House Deputy Counsel Mills followed Craig, arguing against the House's obstruction-of-justice charges. Mills maintained that Clinton did not ask his secretary, Betty Currie, to retrieve presidential gifts from Lewinsky after they had been subpoenaed in December 1997 by lawyers for Jones.
Mills noted that Lewinsky has given 10 accounts of a December 28 meeting with the president where they discussed the gifts, but House prosecutors have quoted only the one least favorable to the president.
Even based on that account, no one claims that Clinton ordered, suggested or even hinted that anyone should obstruct justice, Mills said.
"Why haven't you heard these (other) versions?" Mills asked. "Because they weaken an already fragile circumstantial case."
House prosecutors have ignored Lewinsky's own motivations for having Currie take the gifts, Mills said. When Lewinsky got the Jones subpoena, she feared lawyers for Jones would break into her apartment or tap her phone and she wanted the gifts moved.
Why would Currie agree to hold the box of gifts?
"Because she's a friend, and that is not obstruction of justice," Mills said.
Mills also disputed the notion that Clinton tried to obstruct justice by asking Currie leading questions the day after his Jones deposition, trying to influence Currie's potential testimony.
"There was no effort to intimidate or pressure Ms. Currie," Mills said, citing Currie's own grand jury testimony.
Mills also took on the House prosecutors' assertion that failing to convict and remove Clinton would hurt the case of civil rights, since Jones' case alleged a violation of her civil rights.
Jones got her day in court and the Lewinsky matter was judged immaterial to her case, Mills noted. Acquitting Clinton will not "shake the house of civil rights," she said.
