Senate Panel Decides to Hold Packwood Hearings in Secret

WASHINGTON —  An irrevocably divided Senate Ethics Committee, voting along party lines late Monday, decided not to conduct hearings in public on the sexual misconduct charges against Sen. Bob Packwood (R-Ore.), setting up what may be a volatile debate on the Senate floor, possibly as early as today.

The committee split between three Republicans opposed and three Democrats in favor, failing to reach a majority vote for public hearings. The committee did agree, 6 to 0, to disclose virtually all information that it has gathered in the case over the last 30 months.

Committee members described the materials as thousands of pages of documents, including all depositions, affidavits, witness statements and even relevant excerpts from Packwood’s own diaries, as well as the Oregon Republican’s private testimony before the committee a month ago.

But the committee’s most vocal critic, Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), said Monday night that she is not satisfied with the promised release of documents and that, as she has threatened, she intends to take the issue to the full Senate by offering a resolution on the floor calling for public hearings.

Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.), in a statement Monday night, praised the pending release of the documents but said it is “no substitute for full and open hearings on this matter.”

Among the charges against Packwood, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, are that he made unwanted sexual advances toward at least 17 women from 1969 to 1990, then sought to destroy evidence by altering his private diaries before they were subpoenaed by the Ethics Committee.

As matters now stand, the committee has effectively ended the fact-finding phase of its inquiry and will begin to focus on the question of what sanctions, if any, to recommend to the full Senate. Potential punishments range from a simple reprimand to expulsion from the Senate.

Committee Chairman Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said after the panel’s closed-door session that the documents will be released as soon as they are assembled.

The panel’s vice chairman, Richard H. Bryan (D-Nev.), said he believes open hearings are “still the preferred course of action.”