The text message scandal involving Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick has led some to demand for his resignation. But what criteria does an elected official use to decide if it’s time to resign? Wayne State Historian Mel Small is an expert on the Watergate scandal and the author of The Presidency of Richard Nixon. Michigan Radio’s Jack Lessenberry spoke with him.
In this interview, Mr. Lessenberry and Mr. Small mentioned, but glossed over, former U.S. District Court Judge Alcee Hastings. Just to be clear, Hastings never 'resigned' his lifetime appointment (by Jimmy Carter) to the federal bench. Hastings was indicted and tried on criminal charges of bribery. He was acquitted in his criminal trial, but in subsequent judicial proceedings, including an impeachment by the Senate, Hastings was removed from office.
At the time the Senate voted to remove him, it could have barred Hastings from holding any future federal office. But it did not do so, and now Alcee Hastings is a Democrat Congressman from Florida.
There is an odd parallel with Kwame Kilpatrick in this regard. The next logical progression in the political career of Kwame Kilpatrick is, or was, a move into the House of Representatives, to occupy the seat that is now being kept warm for him by his mother, Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick.
A prosecution of Kilpatrick for criminal perjury now carries with it some very high stakes, not only with regard to the governance of Detroit, but also with regard to the Kilpatrick family's fiefdom over a Congressional seat.
Kilpatrick's personal reputation may also be tested in the event that the population of Detroit continues to stagnate and Southeast Michigan loses a Congressional seat following the 2010 census, which would have been about the time that a Kilpatrick seat-handoff might have occurred.
Posted by: Anonymous | February 12, 2008 at 09:51 PM
The notion that a Kilpatrick handoff of her congressional seat to her son is pure speculation and assumes the electorate does not have the capacity to elect someone other than Kilpatrick's son is sad.
There is nothing logical about the projection of personalities like Kwame Kilpatrick predicting his future is a waste of time.
With regard to family fiefdom's over political offices our state tragically has a number of those situations at every level of goverment. I am an advocate of knocking them all down from including the likes of Dingell, Levin's and Conyers...
Posted by: Thrasher | February 13, 2008 at 10:53 AM