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A Challenge for the LN side

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Gil Jesus

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Nov 24, 2009, 10:06:33 AM11/24/09

1. What evidence do you have that the Oswald rifle was in the Paine
garage on November 21, 1963 ?

2. What evidence do you have that Oswald took a 35-38 inch package to
work with him that day ?

3. What evidence do you have that Oswald brought a 35-38 inch package
into the building ?

4. What evidence do you have that Oswald loaded the clip into the
rifle ?

5. What evidence do you have that Oswald operated the bolt of the
rifle ?

6. What evidence do you have that CE 399 was fired in Dealey Plaza ?

I'M NOT INTERESTED IN BS OPINIONS, I'M INTERESTED IN EVIDENCE.

LET'S SEE IT.

cdddraftsman

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Nov 24, 2009, 10:08:12 AM11/24/09

The Warren Commission from the Procedural Standpoint

Arthur L. Goodheart
New York University Law Review, Vol. 40, May 1965, pp. 404–423

(Arthur L. Goodheart, K.B.E., Q.C., is the Editor of The Law Quarterly
Review in Britain.)

On November 29, 1963, President Lyndon B. Johnson appointed by
Executive Order[1] a Commission, generally known as the Warren
Commission “to ascertain, evaluate and report upon the facts relating
to the assassination of the late President John F. Kennedy and the
subsequent violent death of the man charged with the assassination.”
The Commission submitted its final report to the President on
September 24, 1964, ten months after its appointment.
There can be few persons, having a modicum of education, who did
not at the time read a summary of the findings made by the Commission,
and the conclusions and recommendations based on them. These were
discussed at length by all the various news media so that it is
probably true to say that no other legal report has ever had such a
wide coverage both in this country and throughout the world.
On the other hand there have been few, if any, important
commissions that have been so anonymous in character. Apart from the
fact that it had been appointed by the President, and that its
chairman was Chief Justice of the United States, little was known
concerning the powers that had been given to it or the nature of the
machinery by which it functioned. How was the evidence collected? Who
was responsible for presenting it to the Commission? What was the
legal relationship between the Commission and the witnesses? Could
they claim any privileges when under examination? Were they entitled
to be represented by counsel? Were the hearings of the Commission held
in public, in private, or in secret? Was evidence, such as hearsay,
which is not admissible in a court of law, to be considered by the
Commission? These, and other procedural problems arose out of, and in
relation to the work of the Commission, but comparatively little
attention has been paid to them even by the legal profession itself.
This will undoubtedly be remedied in the future, but at the present
time there seems to be little interest in the subject. This may be due
to a number of different reasons.
The first is that it has not been generally realized that the
Warren Commission was novel in character and in purpose. The Journal
of the American Judicature Society stated this succinctly when it
said, “Thus, although it was never a court, the Warren Commission had
added an interesting and commendable chapter to the judicial history
of the country.”[2] This may, indeed, prove to be a most important
chapter, but little attention has been directed to the possibility
that a new and more satisfactory system of investigation has been
found than ever existed in the past. Perhaps this has escaped notice
owing to the magnitude and horror of the subject-matter being
considered by the Commission—the assassination of the President—
because this obscured the fact that a similar procedure might be
applied successfully to lesser investigations in the future. It is
natural that there should be a general desire to regard the Commission
as unique, in the belief that no similar tragedy will ever again fall
to be investigated, but it may help to an understanding of the
Commission’s work if it is considered in relation to other methods of
investigation applied in Great Britain and in the United States.
The second reason why so little attention has been paid to
procedure is that, with one minor exception, all the hearings were
conducted in private.[3] There were sound reasons for this. As Chief
Justice Warren emphasized on a large number of occasions, the
Commission was not conducting the trial of an accused person; its
function was to collect the relevant evidence and to draw conclusions
from it. Now whatever may be said for our open trial system it is not
one to encourage people to give evidence voluntarily or freely; many
witnesses are terrified of speaking in public. A study of the fifteen
volumes in which the evidence collected by the commission has been
published shows that those witnesses, who at first seemed to be
hesitant and nervous, seemed to gain confidence in the quiet
atmosphere of a private hearing.
There was also the danger that a public hearing might be
peculiarly unfair to third persons because witnesses were allowed, and
even encouraged, to give evidence concerning any rumors they had heard
because this might lead to a useful trail in pursuing any possible
conspiracy. Such freedom to give hearsay evidence might, however, have
encouraged a malicious witness to throw suspicion on innocent persons
which might do them permanent harm.
The great number of the investigations carried on by the members
of the Commission and the members of its legal staff also militated
against public hearings; the testimony of 552 witnesses was taken, 94
of whom appeared before the Commission itself. If all of these
witnesses had been heard in public the hearings would have been
prolonged for an inordinate length of time; on the other hand, if only
a few of them had appeared in public this might have given rise to the
suspicion that other relevant evidence was being suppressed.
The Commission was also in the delicate position that while some
of the hearing were being held, the trial of Jack Ruby for the murder
of Oswald was progressing. There was, therefore, a certain danger that
some of the evidence it was hearing might, if published, interfere
with Ruby’s fair trial which was not concluded until March 14, 1964.
Against these conclusions Lord Devlin in his extremely
interesting article Death of a President: The Established Facts[4] has
advanced the suggestion that the Commission paid too little attention
to the value of publicity. “By its decision,” he said, “to sit in
private, whether right or wrong, the Commission necessarily gave
hostages to its potential critics.”[5] Fortunately, the fact that the
Chief Justice of the United States presided, that all the evidence has
been published, and that nothing was found which could support even
the possibilities of a conspiracy, provided a complete answer to any
suspicions. On balance, therefore, the decision to hold private
hearings, unless a witness asked for a public one, proved to be the
correct one on practical grounds. It did, however, have the result, as
has been suggested above, that little attention was called to the
procedure followed by the Commission in providing that all witnesses
could, if they wished, have counsel to assist them, and to the various
steps taken by it to obtain all evidence that might be even remotely
relevant to its investigation. The public has never become aware of
the full extent and the thoroughness of the work done by the
Commission.
The Report issued by the Commission, admirable though it was as
a narrative, tended to screen from the reader the extreme care with
which each witness was examined. The question and answer system of an
ordinary legal trial has been found to be an essential part of the
common law process, for it concentrates attention on the particular
point that is being considered; it may be said to pin-point each
separate fact. It is also the most dramatic way in which a story can
be told because each witness comes alive when his own words are given.
The narrative method of the Report, however, hid this. The story to be
told by the Commission was a tremendous one but it was only reported
at second-hand. The public never saw or heard the actors, and even in
the Report itself they are dim figures rather than real persons. It is
not until the reader turns to the fifteen volumes containing a
verbatim report of all that was said by the witnesses that he is able
to form for himself an independent judgment concerning the evidence
given by them. Perhaps the best illustrations of this can be found in
the evidence given by Marina Oswald,[6] the widow of Lee Harvey
Oswald, and by Mark Lane,[7] a New York lawyer.
As a result the importance of Mrs. Oswald’s evidence has not
been sufficiently realized. In an article entitled A Lawyer’s Notes on
the Warren Commission Report,[8] Mrs. Alfreda Scobey, who was a member
of the Commission’s staff, wrote: “[T]he fact is inescapable that the
report, although crammed with facts that would not be admissible on
the trial of a criminal case, sets out the whole picture in a
perspective a criminal trial could never achieve.”[9] It has sometimes
been suggested that if Oswald had lived and could have been tried, a
truer picture of the facts would have been established than was
achieved by the Commission.[10] Mrs. Scobey has, however, pointed out
that the opposite is probably the truth, because if Oswald had lived
his wife could not have given evidence at his trial. She would not
have been able to testify concerning ownership of the rifle from which
the shots were fired, she could not have identified the blue jacket
and the white jacket which were material in regard to the murder of
Patrolman J. D. Tippit, she could not have given evidence concerning
the abortive plan to kill General Walker, and she could not have
identified various material photographs. Above all, she could not have
given evidence concerning possible motives that might have induced
Oswald to assassinate the President. The most important and the most
dramatic moments during all the Commission’s hearings can be found in
this brief extract from her interrogation by Mr. Rankin, General
Counsel to the Commission:

Mr. Rankin: Do you have any idea of the motive which induced your
husband to kill the President?
Mrs. Oswald: From everything that I know about my husband, and of the
events that transpired, I can conclude that he wanted in any way,
whether good or bad, to do something that would make him outstanding,
that he would be known in history.
Mr. Rankin: And is it then your belief that he assassinated the
President for this purpose?
Mrs. Oswald: That is my opinion. I don’t know how true that is.[11]

An interesting incident occurred during the interrogation. Mrs. Oswald
was asked to identify a document showing that she was a fullfledged
pharmacist:

Mrs. Oswald: This is my diploma. My goodness, what did they do with my
diploma? I can’t work [without] it. The government seal is missing.
Who will give me a new diploma?[12]

After it had been explained to her that the seal had been removed for
examination, she said: “I am sorry—it is a pity for my diploma.”
During her examination Mrs. Oswald consulted her counsel. She
explained that she had done so because she wanted to refer to a letter
which she had written to “the prosecuting attorney” in the Ruby trial,
opposing capital punishment. She said:

I do not want another human life to be taken. And I don’t want it to
be believed because of this letter that I had been acquainted with
Ruby, and that I wanted to protect him.[13]

The importance of these extracts is that they throw such a clear light
on the character of the witness. It is difficult to feel any doubt
concerning the truthfulness of her evidence.
Mr. Mark Lane’s evidence is of importance, not because of any
relevant facts that it contained, but because on it most of the
criticisms directed against the Commission Report, both in this
country and abroad, have been based. When Oswald’s mother, Mrs.
Marguerite Oswald, appeared before the Commission she asked that her
son “who is accused of assassinating the President,” should be
represented by Mr. Lane as his counsel. The chairman (Chief Justice
Warren) replied:

[T]he Commission is not here to prosecute your dead son…. You may be
sure that if Mr. Lane has any evidence of his own knowledge, or has
any accumulation of affidavits…that he will have an opportunity to
come here, just as you are here, in order to present those to the
Commission.
But so far as his being here at all times before the Commission
to cross-examine or to be present when all witnesses are testifying—
that is not in accordance with the procedures of the Commission.[14]

Thereafter Mr. Lane appeared before the Commission to give
evidence “of his own knowledge” but the word evidence must be
interpreted in a very wide sense if it is to cover the testimony he
gave. Mr. Lane was the only witness who asked that his evidence should
be given in public, so that it is not surprising to find that it was
directed rather to the press than to the Commission itself. The only
new evidence was Mr. Lane’s statement that an undisclosed informant
had told him that Jack Ruby and Patrolman Tippit had met on November
14th at Ruby’s Carousel Club with a right-wing anti-Kennedy man.[15]
This might have suggested that there was some right-wing conspiracy
which induced Ruby to murder Oswald, but the connection is not a clear
one. Mr. Lane said that he had promised his informant not to reveal
his name, but he agreed that he would try to obtain his permission to
do so.
Shortly before the Commission concluded its hearings Mr. Lane
again appeared before it, this time at its request. He was asked to
disclose his informant’s name as importance had been placed on the
alleged meeting at the Carousel Club, especially by Mr. Lane himself
during a radio appearance, but he refused to give the name as he had
not obtained the necessary permission from his informant.[16] Mr.
Lane’s attention was also called to a statement by Mrs. Markham, who
had been present when Patrolman Tippit had been killed, that Mr.
Lane’s report of an interview with her had been inaccurate; he replied
that he had a tape-record of the interview, but he refused to produce
it on the ground that to do so would be a violation of the “sanctity
of working documents of a attorney.”[17] Neither the Commission nor
its General Counsel had ever heard of this privilege, but they took no
further steps in the matter. (Reference to this will be made
hereafter.)
The third evidence of special importance given to the Commission
was a prepared statement by Captain King, administrative assistant to
Chief Curry of the Dallas police. It said:

At that time we felt a necessity for permitting the newsmen as much
latitude as possible. We realized the magnitude of the incident the
newsmen were there to cover….We believed that we had an obligation to
make as widely known as possible everything we could regarding the
investigation of the assassination and the manner in which we
undertook that investigation.[18]

That the police were mistaken in the interpretation they placed on
their obligation is now generally accepted. What is less generally
realized is that this is strong evidence that there was no police
association with any suspected conspiracy, because newsmen are not
usually invited to be present on such an occasion. If there had been
any conspiracy they would have been carefully excluded.
This introduction will have suggested how novel and difficult
were the problems which faced the Commission, which had to decide, in
a very brief time, what machinery to adopt in investigating the
assassination of the President. Were there any guides that they could
follow? To determine this it may be of interest to discuss briefly the
inquiries and investigations that have been a part of the common law
system of government for more than eight hundred hears. Part of this
history is only of antiquarian interest, but the part relating to the
recent English practice is of direct relevance to the Warren
Commission itself.
The story of English inquiries begins with Domesday Book, the
great survey of the kingdom which was made in the last years of
William the Conqueror’s reign. Of this Maitland has said: “If English
history is to be understood, the law of Domesday Book must be
mastered.”[19] Professor Plucknett has described in detail how this
record was compiled and the accuracy with which the information it
contained was extracted. It exemplified “the Norman spirit of clever
administration and orderly government…. Upon this basis was the common
law to be built in later days.”[20] This development of the law can be
traced through the gradual establishment of a system by which the
necessary facts could be investigated. During the reign of Henry II
the justices in Eyre were sent throughout the country to inquire into
the enforcement of order and justice: “every crime, every invasion of
royal rights, every neglect of police duties must be presented.”[21]
It is at this time that an institution was established that
still plays a major role in the administration of criminal justice in
the United States. “[I]n the Assize of Clarendon (1166) we find the
establishment of a definite system of inquisitions as part of the
machinery of criminal justice which have come down to our own day as
‘grand juries.’”[22] The historical unity of the common law can be
found in the fact that if the Warren Commission had not been
appointed, the investigation of the assassination of President Kennedy
and the murder of Oswald might have been carried on by the Texas grand
jury in Dallas. It was not until 1933 that the grand jury was
abolished in England by the Administration of Justice (Miscellaneous
Provisions) Act, 1933,[23] in large part for reasons of economy.
Another link with the past can be found in the office of the
coroner which still exists today. Lord Devlin begins his article with
these words:

The Lord Chief Justice of England is ex officio the chief
coroner of the realm, an office he has held since time immemorial.
There is therefore to an English mind something fitting in the idea
that the inquiry into the death of President Kennedy, in its scope and
importance the greatest inquest that has ever been held, should have
been presided over by the Chief Justice of the United States.[24]

Here again, it was suggested by some persons that it was the function
of the Dallas coroner to hold an inquest, but no steps were taken in
this regard. As it was, two local officials tried to forbid the
removal of President Kennedy’s body without the autopsy which Texas
law required, but President Johnson’s first official act was to
overrule them.
From the past, we can turn to the present to see how
investigations can now be held under English law. This list is not
complete because it does not include investigations that may be
conducted by local bodies, such as counties or boroughs, or by
magistrates when committing a defendant for trial by a higher court.

The Royal Commission

The Royal Commission is the most dignified body concerned with
the investigation of some subject assigned to it for report. It is
constituted by the Sovereign, on the recommendation of the Prime
Minister, by a Royal Warrant submitted and countersigned by the Home
Secretary. The document begins with the Sovereign’s name, and is
directed to the various members of the Commission who are addressed
either as “Our Right Trusty and Well-beloved” if the member is a Privy
Counsellor, or as “Our Trusty and Well-beloved” if he is not.[25] The
Warrant then states, usually in fairly wide terms, the subject-matter
that the Commission is to consider. This is of great practical
importance because the Commission will be acting ultra viers if it
deals with any matters that fall outside of the prescribed scope,
although it is not clear what would happen if it exceeded its limits.
The Warrant then gives the Commission the full power to call before it
any persons having any information on the assigned subject-matter, to
examine all relevant books, documents, etc., and to inspect and visit
all places deemed to be expedient. It is an extraordinary fact that
the law is not clear concerning the steps that a Royal Commission can
take if it is hindered in the exercise of these powers, but it is
probable that some means could be found to enforce them. The Warrant
concludes with the words: “And Our further will and pleasure is that
you do, with as little delay as possible, report to Us your opinion
upon the matters herein submitted for your consideration.” These are
important because they make it clear that the Commission is not
sitting as a court, delivering judgment on specific questions of fact,
but is reporting its opinion on problems submitted for its
consideration.[26]
Nothing is said in the Warrant concerning the nature of the
hearing to be held by the Commission, the methods by which the
evidence will be collected, or the machinery by which it will
function. Concerning the first point it may be said that it has been
the practice of recent Commissions to hold most of their hearings in
public. This is of importance both in obtaining the confidence of the
public, and in enabling the public to understand for itself what are
the matters that are being considered. It has been said that the
primary purpose of a Commission is to instruct the public so that it
can be guided along the proper lines. The method of collecting
evidence will vary from Commission to Commission. The one on Capital
Punishment visited a number of foreign countries, but this is unusual.
As the Commission is not a court it does not have a legal counsel
attached to it; its chief administrative officer is a civil servant,
seconded from the Ministry that is directly concerned with the subject
that is being considered. He usually has assistants and secretarial
help. To be appointed secretary to an important Commission is a mark
of special distinction.
Some recent well-known Commissions, to mention only a few, have
been those on Capital Punishment (1949–53) which led to a revision of
the law of murder in 1957, the Press (1947) which led to the
establishment of the Press Council, the British Broadcasting
Corporation (1949) which led to commercial television, Equal Pay for
Men and Women (1946), Betting and Lotteries (1951), Marriage and
Divorce (1951), Mental Health (1957), and the Problems of Greater
London and Middlesex Government (1957) which led to an entire
reconstruction of the Metropolitan system of government. The primary
purpose of all these Commissions was to provide the necessary material
for future legislation. They have never been used as fact-finding
bodies investigating a particular case.

Ministerial Committees

The second type of committee, appointed by the executive, is the
ministerial committee. All ministers of the crown have such a power of
appointment because they could not fulfil their functions without such
help. The committees are of all different kinds and are concerned with
an infinite variety of subjects. They may have as many as fifteen or
twenty members or they may have only a single one. The famous 1943
Beveridge report, on which much of the modern British welfare state
has been founded, began with a committee of three, but ended with Sir
William Beveridge (later Lord Beveridge) as the sole signatory. They
may be able to complete their task in less than a month if they are
reporting on a single specific topic, or they may be semi-permanent if
they are assigned a general subject. Thus the original Law Revision
Committee, and the present Law Reform Committee, were designed to
consider possible reforms in regard to those legal matters which were
referred to them by the Lord Chancellor. Their reports are made to
him, and it is thereafter for him to decide what further steps, if
any, will be taken to implement them.[27]
Ministerial committees have no powers by which they can compel
persons to give evidence or to disclose documents. There is, however,
always the latent threat that Parliament may be asked to provide
further powers. Thus when last year the Prime Minister asked Lord
Denning, the Master of the Rolls, to make a report on the various
rumors that circulated after the Stephen Ward trial, with which the
names of Miss Christine Keeler and Mr. John Profumo, a former
Minister, were also associated, it was realized by some critics that
no one could be compelled to give evidence, but it was made clear that
Parliament, if necessary, would be moved to grant Lord Denning the
required powers.
Various statutes provide for the appointment of committees or of
individuals with powers to hear evidence on oath and to subpoena
witnesses, in particular fields. Various Acts relating to Local
Government, Education and the Fire Services are illustrations of this.
The most recent example is Section 32 of the Police Act, 1964,[28]
which enables the Home Secretary to set up a local inquiry into any
matter connected with the policing of an area.
The machinery of these committees may be of various kinds, but
in almost all of them, it is centered on a secretary who is a
permanent civil servant. It is not always realized how great is the
role played by these highly trained officials in the British system of
government.

Parliamentary Inquiry Committees and Tribunals

In the case of Royal Commissions and of Ministerial Committees
the appointment of the members is vested either in the Crown or in a
Minister, and the report is made to them. In the case of a
Parliamentary Inquiry the appointment of members is vested in either
the House of Commons or the House of Lords, and the report is made to
them. There is a direct analogy here with the committees of the Senate
and the House of Representatives.
Parliament may set up a committee which includes persons who are
not members of Parliament. In 1887 The Times began publishing a series
of articles entitled Parnellism and Crime which included certain
treasonable letters said to have been written by Charles Parnell, an
Irish member of Parliament. He declared that they were forgeries, and
asked the House of Commons to refer this issue to a Select Committee
of the House. This was refused, but finally by Act of Parliament a
special commission, composed of three judges of the High Court, was
appointed to inquire into all the charges. One of the most dramatic
trials of history followed. On cross-examination, Pigott, who had sold
the letters to The Times, broke down completely. He fled to Madrid
where he committed suicide.
The more usual form of Parliamentary inquiry is by a Select
Committee composed of members of the House of Commons. Such committees
of the House of Lords have been less frequent. Their history goes back
to 1689 when this method was first used to investigate the conduct of
the war in Ireland. The main function of the Select Committee is to do
the work for which the House is not adequately fitted, to find out the
facts of a case, to examine witnesses, and to draw up reasoned
conclusions.[29] The members are nominated, having expressed their
willingness to serve, on the motion of a Government Whip. In the House
of Commons not more than fifteen members may be appointed except by
special leave of the House. These committees were used on various
occasions during the 19th century, but the chief objection to them was
that in those cases in which the fate of the Government might be at
stake, political considerations were likely to influence the votes of
the members. This became obvious in the notorious Marconi Inquiry in
1913. It had been alleged that three members of the Liberal cabinet
had improperly invested in the shares of the English Marconi Company
when it was negotiating a contract with the Crown. When it was shown
that the shares they had bought were those of the entirely independent
American Marconi Company the Committee divided on strictly party lines
concerning the propriety of this transaction. Lloyd George’s political
career might have been ended if the vote had gone against him. In
retrospect it was felt that this would have been a disastrous result
both for him and for the country, and the faith in the impartiality of
Select Committees was in large part destroyed.

Tribunals of Inquiry (Evidence) Act 1921[30]

After the First World War ended in 1918 a committee was set up
to settle the accounts of various Government contractors. A Member of
Parliament, who had become suspicious regarding the actions of a
senior official in the Ministry of Munitions, pressed for an inquiry
by a Select Committee, but the memories regarding the Marconi Inquiry
were too vivid. It was recognized that some more efficient method of
investigation ought to be established, so Parliament enacted the 1921
act after a very short debate. Rarely has such a useful act been
passed in such a brief time.
The act provides that if both Houses of Parliament resolve that
it is expedient that a tribunal be established for inquiring into a
definite matter described in the resolution as of urgent public
importance, then a Tribunal shall be appointed either by the Crown or
by a Secretary of State. Such a Tribunal shall have all the powers,
rights, and privileges that are vested in the High Court. It can
enforce the attendance of witnesses whom it may examine under oath,
and it may compel the production of documents. If a witness refuses to
answer any question to which the tribunal may legally require an
answer or does anything which would constitute contempt of court in a
court of law, then the chairman may certify the offence to the High
Court which may inquire into the facts and hear witnesses, including
any statements that may be offered in defence, and if the witness is
found guilty may then punish him. A witness before the Tribunal shall
have the same privileges and immunities as in a court of law. The
Tribunal may authorize any person appearing before it who appears to
it to be interested to be represented by counsel or solicitor. The
final provision is that the public are to be admitted to all hearings
unless the Tribunal finds that this is against the public interest. It
will be noted that the act contains no provisions concerning the
procedure to be followed by the Tribunal or in regard to its
machinery.
During the first twenty-five years after the act came into force
a number of Tribunals were set up to deal with such matters as
complaints against the police, charges of bribery and corruption in
provincial cities, and the investigation of charges of negligence in
the loss of the submarine Thetis. In 1936 what was called the Budget
Leak Tribunal was held; Mr. J. H. Thomas, the Colonial Secretary in
the National Government, was found guilty of having negligently
disclosed to some of his friends a provision in the forthcoming Budget
of which they took advantage. He was forced to resign his office and
his Membership in Parliament. In all these inquiries it was the
practice for the chairman of the Tribunal to take the leading part in
questioning the witnesses. This was not very satisfactory as it gave
the impression that the Tribunal was inquisitorial in character. Most
of the evidence was collected by various government agencies.
In 1948 a more clear-cut procedure was adopted by the Tribunal
at which Mr. Justice Lynskey presided. Charges had been brought
against various persons holding public office that they had shown
favors to one Sydney Stanley in return for favors that he had given
them. They were so small that they could hardly be described as
bribes. The whole matter proved to be of little importance, but a
Parliamentary Under-Secretary to the Board of Trade and a Director of
the Bank of England were found guilty and forced to resign. The
importance of the Lynskey Tribunal, as it was called, lay, however, in
the fact that the Attorney-General, Sir Hartley Shawcross, examined
the various witnesses that were called before the Tribunal. This
proved to be a great improvement in the practice previously followed
as it gave more form to the procedure. It was not suggested, however,
that the strict rules of a court of law should be applied, and no
clear line was always drawn between examination and cross-examination.
Nor was hearsay evidence always excluded, as the Tribunal was an
investigating body and not a court of law.
Perhaps a clearer understanding of the procedure under the
Tribunals of Inquiry Act, 1921, can be obtained by a detailed
description of what has been called The Vassall Affair in 1963.[31] In
1962 William John Vassall, an Admiralty clerk, was found guilty of
offences against the Official Secrets Act, and was sentenced to
eighteen years’ imprisonment by the Lord Chief Justice. He had first
become a spy for the Russians when he was sent in 1954 to Moscow as a
clerk in the Naval Attaché’s office. In 1956 he returned to London,
working in the Naval Intelligence Division, and in 1959 he was posted
to the Fleet Section of Military Branch II where he had access to
secret material. He was arrested in September, 1962, and made a full
confession. After his conviction there were vigorous criticisms both
in the press and in Parliament concerning the security arrangements in
the Admiralty and in the Foreign office, culminating in the suggestion
put forward by some members of the Opposition (the Labour Party) that
Lord Carrington, the First Lord of the Admiralty, should resign on the
ground that the Minister in charge of a Department must be held
responsible for any error committed by his subordinates. Mr.
Macmillan, the Prime Minister, thereupon appointed a committee of
three distinguished civil servants—the Permanent Under-Secretary at
the Treasury, the Treasury Solicitor, and the Second Secretary at the
Treasury—to determine what, if any, faults there had been in the
security arrangements. Before they could do so, the situation changed
because Vassall, after his arrest, had sold his life story and his
personal papers to the Sunday Pictorial. Among his letters were found
twenty-three from Mr. T. D. Galbraith who had been Civil Lord of the
Admiralty in 1957. They were in themselves completely innocuous, but
it seemed strange to the newspaper that a Minister of the Crown should
have corresponded with a clerk in his Department. The newspaper
thereupon sent copies of the letters to the Government, and to one of
the leaders of the Labour Party in Parliament. As rumors began to
spread the Opposition pressed for a further inquiry. The committee of
three civil servants was asked to make an interim report in which they
found that the correspondence had been innocent but unwise. This did
not satisfy the newspapers; they published various stories implying
that there was important material that had not been disclosed. In
particular it was suggested that Vassall, who was a self-confessed
homosexual, had been favored by some persons in the Admiralty for this
reason. Finally the Prime Minister moved the House that a Tribunal of
Inquiry should be set up with wide terms of reference. These included
the circumstances in which Vassall’s offences had been committed, and
also “Any other allegations…reflecting on the honour and integrity of
person who, as Ministers, naval officers, and Civil servants, were
concerned in the case.”[32] This provision was of great importance for
it enabled the Tribunal which consisted of Lord Radcliffe, Lord of
Appeal, Mr. Justice Barry, and Sir Edward Milner Holland, Q.C., to
inquire into the source and the truth of the various rumors that had
been circulated.
It is not necessary to consider here the evidence that was heard
by the Tribunal or the conclusions that it reached that no favoritism
had been shown to Vassall, but certain points are of special interest
when considered in relation to the Warren Commission. The first was
that the right to be represented by counsel was granted to those
persons who were involved in the allegations, such as the newspapers
who had carried various stories, Lord Carrington, Mr. Galbraith, and
Vassall who gave evidence that no one at the Admiralty had even helped
him. For that matter, he attributed his spying in part to the fact
that he had felt that he was being ignored. The second point was that
Mr. Gerald Gardiner, Q.C., (now the Lord Chancellor) applied that
representation be accorded to Mr. High Gaitskell, as Leader of the
Opposition, to take part in all sessions, including the secret
sessions. This was refused by the Tribunal. It held that if Mr.
Gaitskell had any relevant evidence to give he could, of course, do
so, and be represented by counsel at that time, but he could not ask
to play a part in the work assigned to the Tribunal.
The third, and most dramatic, point concerned the refusal by two
newspaper reporters to disclose the sources from which they had
obtained certain information which they had published. Mr. Mulholland
was asked to give the name of the person who had told him that Vassall
had had two sponsors in the Admiralty who had made arrangements for
him to avoid the strictest part of the security vetting, and Mr.
Foster was asked for the source of the statement “Why did the spy
catchers fail to notice Vassall who sometimes wore women’s clothes on
West End trips?” Both the reporters claimed that they could not be
required to answer as they had promised their informants not to
disclose their names. The Tribunal held that there was no such
privilege as was claimed for the press, and remitted the cases to the
High Court where Mr. Mulholland was sentenced to six months’ and Mr.
Foster to three months’ imprisonment for contempt of court. At first
sight these sentences may seem to be harsh, but on further
consideration it is clear that the alleged information which had been
published would, if true, have shown that those in authority at the
Admiralty had been grossly derelict in the performance of their duty.
It was therefore essential in the public interest that these
statements should be traced to their sources so that they could be
properly tested; to stop the inquiry at the reporters on the ground
that their information had been “confidential” would have left a
miasma of doubt and suspicion. Perhaps the most important result of
the Vassall Affair was to make it clear that harmful gossip may prove
to be as dangerous for the person who publishes it, even if he is a
member of the press, as it is to the person against whom it was
directed.

The Warren Commission

When President McKinley and President Garfield were assassinated
there never was any question concerning the identity of the men who
had killed them, and there was no suspicion that others could have
been involved in a conspiracy. There was therefore no demand in either
case for an inquiry.[33] On the other hand when President Kennedy was
killed, and especially after Ruby had shot Oswald, no one ever doubted
that some public inquiry would have to be held. The only question was,
by whom should it be conducted? The two legal possibilities were the
grand jury or the coroner in Dallas, but in the circumstances these
were obviously unsuitable. The death of a president of the United
States should not be inquired into in such a way. It was essential
that some national forum, to use a neutral word, should be found, but
the only one that seemed to be readily available was a congressional
committee.[34] There were, however, objections to this, the most
obvious being that such a body might be regarded as having a political
tinge. Moreover the character of such an investigation would depend in
large part on the qualities of the chairman, and these had not always
proved satisfactory in the past.[35] Perhaps President Johnson, a
former Senator, was especially aware of these difficulties when he
took a step which was novel and imaginative. Before there was any risk
that the Senate or the House of Representatives might act, he
appointed by Executive Order a Commission with Chief Justice Warren as
its chairman. To placate Congress, two senior Senators, and two
Congressmen who were leaders of the Democratic and Republican parties
in the House, were appointed. Fortunately, they were also
distinguished lawyers so that their legal qualifications were of more
importance than their political ones on a Commission that was semi-
judicial in character. To complete the Commission there were two
outstanding members of the Bar: Mr. John J. McCloy[36] and Mr. Allen
W. Dulles.[37]
When the Commission first met on December 5, it concluded that
it could not act solely on the reports made by the various federal and
state agencies; it decided that it must conduct its own independent
examination into the facts. There was, however, no existing statutory
provision for doing this, so on December 13, Congress enacted Senate
Joint Resolution 137[38] giving the Commission the necessary powers to
subpoena witnesses and inspect documents. It was also given the power
to order a witness to answer the questions put to him, and on his
refusal to do so the Commission could remit the matter to the federal
court for action. The latter could then punish any contumacy as a
contempt. This resembles in so striking a manner the similar provision
in the Tribunals of Inquiry (Evidence) Act, 1921,[39] that it seems
probable that the British act served as a model on this point.
Strange to say, both the President’s Executive Order appointing
the Commission and the Joint Resolution of Congress were silent
concerning the procedure it was to follow in conducting its hearings
and obtaining the necessary evidence. The Commission therefore set up
its own machinery, and in doing this it was outstandingly successful.
A reader of the Report might, however, fail to notice how successfully
this was done unless he also turned to the fifteen volumes containing
the evidence.[40]
The Commission could not call on the Attorney General for his
personal assistance in presenting the evidence and in examining the
witnesses as does a British Tribunal of Inquiry, for the American
Attorney General is fully occupied as head of the Department of
Justice. Moreover it would not have been fitting in the present case
to do so as the Attorney General, Mr. Robert Kennedy, was the brother
of the late President.[41] The Commission therefore invited Mr. J. Lee
Rankin to become its General Counsel. He had been appointed assistant
Attorney General in 1953 by President Eisenhower, and in 1956 he
became Solicitor General. In 1961 he resigned to enter private
practice in New York City. Much, if not most, of the credit for the
success of the Commission must be ascribed to him because the skill
and courtesy with which he examined the witnesses left little
uncertainty concerning the facts to which they were testifying.
The Commission also appointed fourteen assistant counsel,
recruited from widely separated parts of the country. They constituted
a remarkable group of young lawyers, representing both the practical
and the academic sides of the law. They were assisted by twelve staff
members who helped in the various investigations carried on by the
Commission.[42]
It may seem strange that such formidable machinery had to be
used, as no other inquiry in the whole of legal history ever
approached the Warren Commission in the extent and detail of its
researches. The reason for this is that, as matters turned out, the
Commission was faced with the task of ascertaining a negative, which
requires far more proof than does a positive conclusion. It was
necessary, therefore, to explore every circumstance related in any way
with the assassination in case this might furnish a clue to come
concealed facts. It was also necessary to examine everything that
might explain the strange mental processes both of Oswald and of Ruby.
In the end the simple explanation given by Mrs. Oswald was probably
the correct one in regard to both men—the passionate desire to attract
attention to oneself—but the Commission could not assume that this was
true.
Perhaps it was the negative character of much of this evidence
which led in part to the Commission’s decision, which has been
discussed above, to hold the hearings in private unless a witness
asked for a public one. If it had seemed probable that the evidence
would lead to a positive conclusion in regard to a conspiracy, or that
someone besides Oswald had independently taken part in killing the
President, there would have been stronger reasons for calling
attention to the evidence at a public hearing as this would have
enabled the public to judge how much weight should be given to it. But
no such immediate publicity need be given to negative evidence that
leads nowhere. This point is of practical importance in regard to the
future as it does not follow that because the Commission was right in
the present case to hold private hearings at the inquiry it was
conducting, the same procedure should be followed in all future cases.
Thus, to take one illustration, the Vassall inquiry would have lost
much of its force if it had been held behind closed doors.
A final point concerning Mr. Lane’s evidence is of importance
because it had some effect on foreign opinion. It has been used as an
argument that as the Commission took no steps to require him to answer
its questions concerning the alleged Carousel Club meeting or
concerning Mrs. Markham’s evidence, his allegations ought to be
accepted as having been true. The Vassall Tribunal, on the other hand,
took a stronger line in regard to the reporters’ refusal to give the
names of their anonymous informants as it felt that this was necessary
so as to make it clear that there was no evidence to support their
allegations. It is possible that the Warren Commission would have
taken similar steps if it could have foreseen the effect of its
forbearance.
In conclusion Lord Devlin’s tribute to the Report may be set
out:

It is a monumental work. Even after taking into account the
quality and quantity of the staff which assisted the Commission and
the resources which it had at its command, its production within ten
months is an outstanding achievement. The mass of material is superbly
organized. The structure is clear. Each fact is to be found in its
proper place to sustain each conclusion. The minor conclusions support
the major, and on the major the verdict rests.[43]

The verdict was that Oswald had murdered the President, not for any
political motive but because of a desire for self-glorification or to
obtain revenge against a society into which he did not fit; that
Ruby’s murder of Oswald had no rational explanation except for his
craving to be recognized and to be the center of attention; and that
there was no trace of any evidence that anyone else was connected with
these crimes or that there was any conspiracy.
Lord Devlin has delivered many outstanding judgments in his
years in the High Court of Justice and in the House of Lords but none
has been more persuasive than the one in the present case:

It is no doubt distressing to the logical mind when after an immense
investigation, two extraordinary murders occurring in the course of
the same story are explained only as disconnected and senseless
actions. But life is often more distressing than logic. And what is
the alternative? Perhaps one day the critics will produce one. If they
can suggest one that is even faintly credible, they will deserve more
public attention than they are likely to get by making charges of
suppression that are more than faintly ridiculous.[44]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] No. 11130, 28 Fed. Reg. 12789 (1963).
[2] Editorial, Canon 35 Is Not Enough, 48 J. Am. Jud. Soc. 83, 84
(1964).
[3] There is a distinction between a private and a secret hearing. At
a private hearing the public, including the press, are excluded, but
the witness can repeat what he has said. In the case of a secret
hearing nothing can be published concerning what was said at it.
[4] The Atlantic Monthly, March 1965, pp. 112–18. Lord Devlin was a
Justice of the High Court, Queen’s Bench Division, from 1948 to 1960,
when he was made a Lord of Appeal. He resigned in 1964. At present he
is Chairman of the Press Council.
[5] Id. at 118.
[6] Hearings Before the President’s Commission on the Assassination of
President Kennedy 1–126 (1964) [hereinafter Hearings].
[7] 2 Hearings 32–61; 5 Hearings 546–61.
[8] 51 A.B.A.J. 39 (1965).
[9] Id. at 40.
[10] “After Lee Harvey Oswald was shot by Jack Ruby, it was no longer
possible to arrive at the complete story of the assassination through
normal juridical procedures during a trial of the alleged assassin.”
Foreword to Report of the President’s Commission on the Assassination
of President Kennedy at x (1964) [hereinafter Report].
[11] 1 Hearings 76.
[12] Id. at 86.
[13] Id. at 83.
[14] Id. at 128. It is not entirely clear why the Commission, having
taken this stand, then requested Mr. Walter E. Craig, the President of
the American Bar Association, in fairness to Oswald and his family, to
participate in the investigation. Oswald’s widow agreed to this. All
the evidence and all the other data that have now been published were
made available to him, and he was given an opportunity to cross-
examine any witness that he wished. It must be remembered that Mr.
Craig was not acting as a defense counsel at an ordinary murder trial
who seeks to get his client acquitted by every possible means; his
duty was to study the evidence, and if he thought that any evidence
had been misinterpreted against Oswald or that any evidence favorable
to him had been omitted or ignored, then to take the necessary steps
to call this to the attention of the Commission. This is more than a
British Tribunal would have done in the circumstances, but the
Commission probably felt that the appointment of Mr. Craig was an
additional guaranty that every possible step had been taken to
ascertain the truth. See Foreword to Report at xiv.
[15] 2 Hearings 58, 60.
[16] 5 Hearings 552.
[17] Id. at 547.
[18] Report 239.
[19] Domesday Book and Beyond 3 (1897).
[20] Plucknett, A Concise History of the Common Law 13 (5th ed. 1956).
[21] 1 Pollock & Maitland, The History of English Law 201 (2d ed.
1898).
[22] Plucknett, supra note 20, at 112.
[23] 24 Geo. 5, c. 36.
[24] The Atlantic Monthly, supra note 4, at 112.
[25] If the member is not a British subject then these expressions of
regard are omitted. See the Royal Warrant for the Royal Commission on
the Police, 1962.
[26] While the Royal Commission on the Police was sitting, an anti-
bomb meeting was held in Trafalgar Square, It led to a disturbance
which required police intervention. Charges were brought against the
police claiming that undue force had been used. The Commission held
that it was not the proper body to consider the disputed facts in the
case.
[27] In an article entitled Current Judicial Reform in England, 27
N.Y.U.L. Rev. 395 (1952), I discussed at length the work of the
Committee on Practice and Procedure in the Supreme Court appointed in
1947 by the then Lord Chancellor, Viscount Jowitt. The chairman was
Lord Evershed, Master of the Rolls. The Committee, which held more
than 300 meetings, sat for three years. Mr. Justice Felix Frankfurter
and the Hon. John W. Davis gave evidence concerning the use of written
briefs in the United States Supreme Court. Many of the Committee’s
recommendations have been put into force.
[28] 13 Eliz. 2, c. 48.
[29] Hood Phillips, Constitutional and Administrative Law 100–01, 205–
06 (3d ed. 1962); Wilding & Laundy, An Encyclopaedia of Parliament
(1958).
[30] 11 Geo. 5, c. 7.
[31] A brilliant analysis of the Vassall case can be found in a short
book entitled The Vassall Affair by Dame Rebecca West (1963). Some of
the conclusions reached by the author may, however, have been affected
by her sympathy for the newspaper reporters.
[32] West, supra note 31, at 50.
[33] When President Lincoln was assassinated, a Congressional
committee conducted an extensive investigation into all the
surrounding circumstances, but the report that it issued was subjected
to severe criticism.
[34] “As speculation about the existence of a foreign or domestic
conspiracy became widespread, committees in both Houses of Congress
weighed the desirability of congressional hearings to discover all the
facts relating to the assassination.” Foreword to Report at x.
[35] The Senatorial inquiry into the Titanic disaster in 1912 is still
remembered. Senator Smith, who presided, asked the famous question:
“Did the boat go down by the bow or the front?”
[36] Mr. McCloy had been President of the World Bank from 1947 to 1949
and the United States High Commissioner for Germany from 1949 to 1952.
[37] Mr. Dulles, a partner in a leading New York law firm, had been
the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency from 1953 to 1961.
[38] 77 Stat. 362 (1963).
[39] 11 Geo. 5, c. 7.
[40] There were an additional eleven volumes in which facsimiles of
the various exhibits were published.
[41] As Attorney General, Mr. Robert Kennedy was closely in touch with
the Commission as he was the titular head of the Federal Bureau of
Investigation. Moreover, one of the assistant counsel and two staff
members had been seconded to the Commission from the U.S. Department
of Justice. It is inconceivable that if Mr. Kennedy, who was the most
devoted of brothers, had felt that there had been the least evidence,
or even any rational suspicion, of a conspiracy to assassinate the
President, or that anyone other than Oswald had murdered him, he would
not have insisted that further steps should be taken to see that
justice was done. If he has not questioned the conclusions reached in
the Report, it seems extraordinary that others should do so.
[42] It is interesting to note that two members of the staff were
professional historians.
[43] The Atlantic Monthly, supra note 4, at 112.
[44] Id. at 118.

Nobody

unread,

Nov 24, 2009, 10:11:28 AM11/24/09

> Mr. ...
>
> read more »

more fart chasing and rhetoric

Bud

unread,

Nov 24, 2009, 10:56:46 AM11/24/09

On Nov 24, 10:06 am, Gil Jesus <gjjm...@aol.com> wrote:

Looks like Gil is going to look to others to do his research for him
again.

You seem only interested in everyone knowing how retarded you are.

> LET'S SEE IT.

Seems Gil has determined that since we have no evidence of anyone
loading a rifle, Kennedy can`t have been shot by anyone. This is what
happens when you leave investigations to retards.

Sam McClung

unread,

Nov 24, 2009, 12:40:20 PM11/24/09

what evidence exists that the evidence carcano was fired 11-22-63?

"Gil Jesus" <gjj...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:ac9d1980-4289-46ba...@r31g2000vbi.googlegroups.com...

mucher1

unread,

Nov 24, 2009, 1:21:19 PM11/24/09

I wouldn't be surprised if Gilly's career in law enforcement went
something like this:

Rookie cop: The scumbag may be guilty, Captain, but we can't prove
that he loaded the gun, so we gotta cut him lose. I have a degree in
Criminal Justice, remember, so I know what I'm talking about.

Captain: What's your major malfunction??? Get out of my sight, Gilly--
you're fired!

timstter

unread,

Nov 24, 2009, 3:35:57 PM11/24/09

Who cares what you're interested in, Gilly. You want your answers, go
read the WCR and HSCA volumes. No one is going to do your homework for
you, you bald, snooping idiot.

BTW, your evidence handling is SO hopeless that your stupid TSBD rifle
video only uses ONE of the extant THREE backyard photos to make your
case, if we could charitably call it that.

Where do you get off? You are an absolute DISGRACE to honest JFK
research, Gil.

Disgusted Regards,

Tim Brennan
Sydney, Australia
*Newsgroup(s) Commentator*

JLeyd...@aol.com

unread,

Nov 24, 2009, 10:00:12 PM11/24/09

On Nov 24, 10:06�am, Gil Jesus <gjjm...@aol.com> wrote:

You might try reading the Warren Commission report, Gilly, but no
you'd much rather play games. BTW, when you finish your research,
just what are you going to do with it? Now, there's a quest6ion you
can't answer.

JGL

Steve

unread,

Nov 25, 2009, 12:50:16 AM11/25/09

> > LET'S SEE IT.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

All right stupid here we go.

Gilly's silliness is obvious to anyone with even a minor level of
logical thought or formal education. According to Gilly if a cake is
sitting on the table, already baked and frosted, yet the husband of
the woman that baked it only observed her sifting the flour, and
cracking the eggs, then there is no logical reason to believe (to
Gilly) that THAT woman baked the cake or, for that matter, that the
cake was baked at all. This is what happens when idiots enter a logic-
centered discussion.

1. Oswald was witnessed by Wesley Frazier carrying a long package
into work with him on the morning of the assassination. Time and
again Frazier admitted he didn't pay much attention to it, but that
Oswald carried it next to his side, with the bottom cuppin in his hand
and the other beneath his armpit. Frazier was obviously in error on
this point, since he wasn't paying much attention to Oswald and since
the nervous Oswald was walking far ahead of Frazier to get into work
as quickly as possible.

2. There is no forensic evidence the rifle was in the Paine's garage
on the 21st of November. But since Marina knew it was there before,
and there is no evidence it was removed by anyone then a logical
thinker would be left to conclude it was still there on the 21st.
What evidence do YOU have that it had been removed and was somewhere
else, Giltard?

3. Evidence of Oswald loading the clip into the rifle? None. I also
don't have any evidence that Oswald wiped his ass the last time he
took a dump prior to the assassination but that doesn't lead me to
believe he didn't do that either. The rifle belonged to Oswald (this
is beyond logical debate.) The bullets and fragments recovered came
from the c2766 MC rifle that belonged to Oswald. Oswald's and ONLY
Oswald's prints were found on the rifle. Therefore the fact that no
one videotaped Oswald loading the clip into the rifle means nothing at
all.

4. The fact that the rifle was fired and ONLY Oswald's prints were
found on it and that Howard Brennan saw Oswald fire the third shot and
Harold Norman heard the shots fired above him from the 5th floor
provides enough evidence for me that Oswald worked the bolt. The fact
that a newscrew didn't video tape him working the bolt doesn't trouble
me a great deal. No one saw John Wilkes Booth load his murder weapon
but that doesn't cause me ( or any logical thinker) to doubt he shot
Lincoln.

5. Since all bullets and all fragments mated Oswald's rifle to the
exclusion of all other weapons on the planet, and since those bullets
and fragments were recovered in Dealey Plaza, and since everyone that
witnessed the assassination testified that Kennedy was shot at in
Dealey Plaza, and since no other rifle has ever been produced in 46
years, I have been able to connect the dots and reach the conclusion
that Oswald's rifle was fired in Dealey Plaza.

Gilly, just I think you have reached new levels of stupidity, you out
do yourself. Congratulations. You give conspiracy lunatics something
to be richly proud of. Keep up the groundbreaking research.

Chuck Schuyler

unread,

Nov 25, 2009, 8:52:45 AM11/25/09

On Nov 24, 9:06 am, Gil Jesus <gjjm...@aol.com> wrote:

> 1. What evidence do you have that the Oswald rifle was in the Paine
> garage on November 21, 1963 ?