GOP Tars President With Broad Legal Brush

Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee brushed aside Democrats’ complaints of unfairness and voted Friday to impeach President Clinton on a general charge of lying under oath but without setting forth which of his statements they believe are lies.

Instead, the committee approved two broad allegations of perjury. Clinton lied under oath to the grand jury in August “concerning the nature and details of his relationship” with Monica S. Lewinsky, Article I says. Clinton “provided perjurious, false and misleading testimony” in his deposition in the Paula Corbin Jones sexual harassment lawsuit in January, according to Article II.

Chairman Henry J. Hyde (R-Ill.), citing Watergate as a precedent, insisted that the majority is not required to set forth specific allegations of lying.

“These articles were drafted exactly as they were in the [Richard M.] Nixon situation,” Hyde said. “They’re not a bill of particulars.”

Committee Report May Add Details

The chairman added that a committee report accompanying the articles may spell out the details before the vote next week by the full House.

But in spirited debate, Democrats said it is fundamentally wrong to accuse someone of perjury--and impossible to try him--without saying which of his statements were false.

“What is this, a shell game? Under which pea is the impeachment?” asked a mocking Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.).

The fight reflects the strategy on both sides.

The Republicans want to brand Clinton a liar, a broad charge that many Americans would believe. It is always easier to make a general charge than to prove a specific fact.

The Democrats want them to point to his specific lies under oath. They are “trivial and impossible to prove,” Frank said.

Despite being pressed Friday, the Republicans steadfastly refused to detail what were the lies Clinton told under oath in August.

“It is basic that we should be told before voting the specific words that are alleged to be perjurious,” said New York Rep. Jerrold Nadler, a Democrat.

White House lawyers have conceded that Clinton, caught off guard in the January deposition by sharp questions about Lewinsky, gave evasive and misleading answers. Some of his responses were “maddening,” one of his lawyers said. And White House Counsel Charles F.C. Ruff agreed it is “reasonable” for some to conclude that he lied in January in the civil deposition.

However, the president’s lawyers also said that Clinton told the truth during his grand jury testimony in August.

Republicans Say Details Unneeded

Having demanded earlier in the week that the debate focus on the facts, the Republicans said Friday that they saw no need to focus on details.

“We should not get bogged down in specifics,” said Rep. Steve Chabot (R-Ohio), paraphrasing comments from Democrats during the Watergate era. “I don’t think we need to get into the salacious details.”

The Watergate articles of impeachment were far more detailed than those approved Friday. However, they also refer at some points to “false or misleading statements” made by President Nixon without giving specifics.

In 1974, Article I charged Nixon with “obstruction of justice.” Nine allegations were included. The president was accused of misusing the Central Intelligence Agency, lying to FBI investigators, arranging to pay “substantial sums of money” to silence witnesses and promising favors to those who testified falsely.

On Friday, the Republican refusal to set forth specifics against Clinton seemed only to infuriate the Democrats.

“We are not dealing with beanbags. This is one of the serious things this committee has undertaken,” said Rep. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.). “I have read the article and I don’t know which specific statements it is alleged that the president made that are perjurious.”

In his September report, independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr alleged that Clinton told three lies in his grand jury testimony.

First, he said, Clinton’s sexual relationship with Lewinsky began in November 1995, as she said, rather than in February 1996, as he said.

Second, Starr said, Clinton lied when he denied touching Lewinsky in a sexual way. Democratic lawyer Abbe Lowell questioned whether the nation should undergo the “unseemly spectacle” of a Senate trial to resolve that dispute.

Third, Starr said that Clinton lied in August when he said he believed in January that oral sex was not covered by the definition of sexual relations used during the deposition.

On Thursday, Republican counsel David Schippers also said that Clinton lied in August when he said he was not paying much attention when his attorney, Robert S. Bennett, told the judge in the Jones deposition that the president did not have sex of any kind with Lewinsky.

Schippers played part of a videotape, which showed Clinton watching as Bennett spoke off-camera. “Do you think for one moment, after watching the tape, that the president was not paying attention?” Schippers asked, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley, who has advised the Republicans, said that it “borders on the ridiculous” to ask for specific allegations now. The House “can leave the specific findings of fact to the Senate,” he said.

“This is not a criminal trial,” added former U.S. Atty. Joseph E. DiGenova. ‘It is a question of fitness to hold office.”

Times staff writer Robert L. Jackson contributed to this story.