Not since Watergate has Washington faced the questions that Barr has provoked with his refusal to appear before the House judiciary committee and to provide unredacted copies of the report special counsel Robert Mueller prepared examining ties between Russia and both the Trump campaign and the Trump administration
In personal style as in haberdashery, U.S. Attorney-General William Barr is conservative in an old-school way: quiet, dutiful, not given to showy demonstrations of emotion except the occasional flash of anger at Democrats and reporters he considers insolent for their probing questions. He walks with the air of a schoolmaster, which his father was, and with the discipline of that often-cheerless trade.
At issue – and likely flaring as soon as Monday – are vital issues involving the separation of powers between the legislative and executive branches of the American government that are the hinge of the political system that the country’s founding fathers sculpted in the glow of the late-18th century Enlightenment. These issues, to be sure, have emerged from time to time in the history of the United States, but ordinarily they are settled by reverting to custom or by striking a compromise.
“In a strictly pragmatic sense, his calculation might prove sound,” Laurence Tribe, the renowned Harvard legal scholar, said. “But the price he will pay in the court of America’s moral accounting will be immense. Sadly, Barr seems indifferent to history’s all-but-certain verdict that he has compromised his integrity, his oath and his sacred honour for no noble purpose.
While the struggle between Mr. Barr and his House inquisitors is not without precedent, Mr. Trump’s broader refusal to co-operate is a reflection of the contempt for political norms that has been the hallmark of his presidency.
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