A British View of Watergate

We should not push too far in attempting to determine standards nor be too harsh in applying them. The Senate in these proceedings should keep in mind the words of a contemporary poet from Kansas: ‘And if we purify the pond, the lilies die.’ ”

This warning has haunted me throughout the prolonged unfolding of the Watergate affair. It fell six years ago, barely audible, from the wry lips of the then Senator Eugene McCarthy and left not a ripple in a crowded Senate on the moral rampage. Not “Clean for Gene” McCarthy, the monk manqué who was to stiffen the moral fiber of the Republic? The same. The pond to be purified on that occasion was the mess that Senator Thomas Dodd had made of his financial affairs. As readers now in their dotage may recall, the present writer reported the Dodd censure debate for national review; it is hard at this distance of time to recall exactly what Senator Dodd was supposed to have done wrong—spent campaign funds on a few personal air trips and hotel bills, used the proceeds of a testimonial dinner to pay off a mortgage, was it?

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Ferdinand Mount

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We should not push too far in attempting to determine standards nor be too harsh in applying them. The Senate in these proceedings should keep in mind the words of a contemporary poet from Kansas: ‘And if we purify the pond, the lilies die.’ ”

This warning has haunted me throughout the prolonged unfolding of the Watergate affair. It fell six years ago, barely audible, from the wry lips of the then Senator Eugene McCarthy and left not a ripple in a crowded Senate on the moral rampage. Not “Clean for Gene” McCarthy, the monk manqué who was to stiffen the moral fiber of the Republic? The same. The pond to be purified on that occasion was the mess that Senator Thomas Dodd had made of his financial affairs. As readers now in their dotage may recall, the present writer reported the Dodd censure debate for national review; it is hard at this distance of time to recall exactly what Senator Dodd was supposed to have done wrong—spent campaign funds on a few personal air trips and hotel bills, used the proceeds of a testimonial dinner to pay off a mortgage, was it?