By October 1973 special prosecutor Archibald Cox was tracing the Watergate cover-up to the Oval Office. President Nixon demanded that he stop. In the Saturday Night Massacre” two heads of the Justice Department quit before Nixon found a subordinate (Robert Bork) willing to fire Cox. Immediately public opinion swung against the president and turned Cox into a heroseemingly Washington's last honest man.Cox's life was distinguished well before that Saturday night. He had been a clerk for the legendary judge Learned Hand, a distinguished professor at Harvard Law School, and the Solicitor General, arguing many Supreme Court cases. He exemplified what we want lawyers to be. At its coreArchibald Coxis the story of a Yankee who went to Washington but refused to leave his principles behind.
Ken Gormleyis a professor of law at Duquesne University School of Law in Pittsburgh, and is also mayor of Forest Hills, Pennsylvania, a suburb of Pittsburgh.