Subpoena Led Packwood to Reject Resignation

Embattled Sen. Bob Packwood (R-Ore.) was on the verge of resigning from the Senate on Friday but changed his mind after he received a Justice Department subpoena for his personal diaries, the Senate’s top two Republicans said Sunday.

Packwood, accused of making unwanted sexual advances and already fighting a Senate subpoena for his private memoirs, decided to remain in the Senate to have a better forum to defend himself, according to Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.) and Minority Whip Alan K. Simpson (R-Wyo.).

“He’s going through a terrible personal turmoil,” Simpson said of Packwood on CBS’ “Face the Nation.” “He was ready to resign. He wanted out--the pain of it, the hounding of it.”

Simpson said he suspects that the staff of the Senate Ethics Committee alerted the Justice Department that Packwood intended to resign--and thus halt the Senate inquiry--and that Packwood was served with a Justice Department subpoena a short time later.

“Now, he (Packwood) is not going to resign, and that’s good,” Simpson added. “We need to buoy him up and sustain him and press him to our bosom.”

Dole gave a similar account on NBC’s “Meet the Press” of Packwood’s thinking last week after a long series of meetings with fellow Republicans.

In considering resignation, Packwood felt “there might be a window” for him to keep his diaries private if the ethics case were dismissed and federal prosecutors decided not to pursue charges that he had asked a lobbyist to help his former wife get a job.

“I think he was close to resignation, but about that time, the Justice Department came forth with a subpoena, and he decided then not to resign,” Dole said.

Dole said Packwood told him of his decision on the Senate floor on Friday afternoon, when rumors were swirling around the Capitol that the Oregon lawmaker was going to resign.

Dole said that he and former Senate Majority Leader Howard H. Baker (R-Tenn.) and former Sen. Warren Rudman (R-N.H.) met with Packwood frequently last week to discuss his options.

“My own hope was that he would not resign. But that, in my view, was a decision for him to make,” Dole said. “I think he’s entitled to defend himself. He’s entitled to the same rights as anyone in America. He’s only been charged with certain things--there’s been no proof, no evidence.”

Asked whether Packwood should resign, Senate Majority Leader George J. Mitchell (D-Me.) replied on the NBC program: “That’s his decision.”