Bob Barr: “having been a former prosecutor and practiced law in the private sector, I thought I was somewhat familiar with various…”

“having been a former prosecutor and practiced law in the private sector, I thought I was somewhat familiar with various defenses that were raised in criminal prosecution and in civil proceedings, but during the past year, listening to the Reagan administration and listening to the other side tonight, there is a whole new universe of defenses that defense attorneys are not even aware of. We hear them daily from the White House: That law does not apply to me. That is an old law. That law has not been used very much. I am not a person under that law. This building is not a building. We hear another one tonight. Despite the fact that the United States criminal and civil codes are replete with measures insuring that subpoenas, as duly and important court documents, can be enforced and are enforced, despite the fact that people can and are held daily in contempt for failure to respond to subpoenas, we have the preposterous statement on the other side just a short while ago that people in this country have an absolute civil liberties constitutional right to refuse to honor subpoenas. Mr. Speaker, we must stand for the rule of law. It begins now.”