The Wright Stuff

The House ethics committee, after a closed-door meeting, has put off for a week a decision on whether to undertake a formal investigation of the financial dealings of Speaker Jim Wright (D-Tex.), but it can’t procrastinate forever on this hot potato. The sooner it votes to proceed with a full-fledged probe of the very serious questions raised about Wright, the better its chances for restoring the committee’s credibility in public eyes. Cynics say, with some justification, that Congress can’t be trusted to police its membership; here’s an opportunity to prove them wrong.

Wright, complaining that the allegations have left “a cloud hanging over the House of Representatives,” has pledged to cooperate with any investigation. But he and his defenders also dismiss the charges as purely partisan, an attempt to discredit him and the entire Democratic Party just as he is about to chair the Democratic National Convention in Atlanta next month. The claim of partisanship might have been believable when it was only Rep. Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) demanding an inquiry. But Gingrich’s formal complaint has been backed by 71 other House Republicans and Common Cause, the nonpartisan citizens’ lobby.

No one is suggesting that Wright has violated the law--Congress exempted its members from the 1978 Ethics in Government Act--but he may have broken the House’s own rules against the personal use of campaign funds and he certainly demonstrated an underdeveloped sense of the proprieties.

At the center of the controversy is $55,600 in royalties that Wright received from the publication of his book, “Reflections of a Public Man,” during the 1985-86 campaign cycle. It was the only book ever published by Madison Publishing Co. of Fort Worth, a company owned by William Carlos Moore, a long-time associate of the Speaker. Moore and his other companies received at least $250,000 and perhaps as much as $650,000 in fees from Wright’s campaign committee, then turned around and paid the Speaker a 55% royalty on book sales. That’s a royalty rate that other authors only dream of, raising the question of whether campaign funds were laundered through the publishing house;if the answer is yes, it would appear that Wright unethically pocketed campaign funds.

The Speaker also has been accused of intervening for Texas constituents who had problems with federal bank regulators, of contacting the late Egyptian President Anwar Sadat on behalf of a Texas oilman and of trying to influence the Interior Department’s award of gas leases to a company in which he held stock.

All of this may be completely innocent; congressmen are expected to look out for their constituents’ interests, after all. But the only way to determine whether Wright transgressed any ethical guidelines is to launch an investigation that can establish the facts. We urge the ethics committee, chaired by Rep. Julian C. Dixon (D-Los Angeles), to overcome its usual timidity, to waive its usual rules of confidentiality and to conduct a public inquiry. The committee also has the authority to hire as temporary counsel someone from outside its own payroll--a step that we think would go far to enhance its credibility.