Editorials
Tuesday, January 5, 1999

Clinton shouldn’t
deliver State of Union

THE prospect of President Clinton giving the State of the Union address to Congress in the midst of his impeachment trial is grotesque. At a minimum, the address, scheduled for Jan. 19, should be postponed until the Senate renders its judgment. It would be preferable, however, if the printed message was simply delivered to Congress. No speech is required by the Constitution.

Until the age of television, presidents did not appear in person before Congress to report on the State of the Union. Under the current extraordinary circumstances, the old practice of delivering a printed report would be the less painful option.

Senators from both parties have said Clinton should postpone the address if the trial is still in progress on Jan. 19. Sen. Slade Gorton, R-Wash., said, "I think it would be unseemly and distracting for the president to be giving a State of the Union address to Congress while he was under trial in the Senate."

Sen. Robert Torricelli, D-N.J., appearing with Gorton on NBC's "Meet the Press," agreed. "It's inappropriate to report on the State of the Union as long as the president is under impeachment, because the State of the Union from the perspective of his administration is unclear," he said.

However, the situation in the wake of the impeachment trial is likely to be no less embarrassing. The consensus is that Congress will work out a censure of the president rather than remove him from office. The Democrats support censure and appear to have the votes in the Senate to defeat the attempt to oust Clinton.

But censure is a very serious matter, although less drastic than convicting the president of "high crimes and misdemeanors." It would be a great humiliation. Clinton should not attempt to give the State of the Union address to a Congress that had just voted to censure him.

Pugilistic dementia

NO sport takes a heavier toll on its participants than professional boxing. The damage done to former heavyweight contender Jerry Quarry alone should be enough to trigger stronger safety measures. Quarry died at age 53 of pneumonia and cardiac arrest, but the condition that precipitated his death is called dementia pugilistica -- severe brain damage caused by repeated blows to the head.

Quarry's sad deterioration is far from an exception in the sport. Former heavyweight champion Floyd Patterson, whom Quarry twice defeated in the ring, now has significant memory loss. Boxing great Muhammad Ali, who pummeled Quarry twice, suffers from boxing-induced Parkinson's disease.

Quarry's condition is the rule even in his own family. Brother Mike once fought for the light heavyweight championship but, like Jerry, fell prey to debilitating assaults after dulling his reflexes with alcohol and cocaine. A second brother, Robert, acquired Parkinson's disease from blows he took during a mediocre, drug-filled heavyweight career.

Jerry Quarry earned $2.1 million as a prize fighter in the 1960s and 1970s but continued fighting long after his ability to defend himself had been spent. In a 1974 fight against Joe Frazier, an aged Joe Louis as referee ordered the fight to continue after both Frazier and Quarry had stepped back from the carnage and the crowd shouted that it should be stopped.

Neurological tests revealed Quarry's brain damage in 1983, but he kept on boxing. In 1992, he climbed into a ring in Colorado against a club fighter and crawled out with broken teeth, cuts over both eyes, a scrambled brain and $1,050 in gate money. Three years later, his only income was $614 a month in Social Security.

A fourth brother, James Quarry, started the Jerry Quarry Foundation to help raise money for Jerry and to help other boxers with dementia. A wiser course would be adoption of safety standards for boxing so strict that there eventually will be no need for post-career treatment of brain damage.

Northern Marianas

Despite repeated complaints of labor, immigration and human rights abuses in the Northern Marianas, which lie just north of Guam, little has changed in recent years. That is the finding of a report issued by the federal Office of Insular Affairs, which oversees the U.S. commonwealth.

The problems have prompted several attempts in Congress -- thus far unsuccessful -- to institute reforms. The islands have turned to imported foreign workers for their fast-growing garment industry. Workers have complained of low wages, poor working and living conditions and other abuses.

Hawaii's Senator Akaka has been in the forefront of those calling for reforms, including applying U.S. immigration and minimum-wage laws and allowing goods manufactured in the islands to bear the label "Made in the USA" only if 50 percent of the work was done by U.S. citizens. Reforms co-sponsored by Akaka were approved by a Senate committee last year but never emerged on the Senate floor.

The Insular Affairs Office said the new commonwealth government has made surprise raids and inspections of garment factories and construction projects and has deported some illegal aliens. But the report expressed skepticism about the effectiveness and duration of the efforts.

The report says the commonwealth's basic problems are "heavy and unhealthy dependence upon an indentured alien-worker program and on trade loopholes to expand its economy."

This was not anticipated when Washington approved commonwealth status. The flexibility that Congress gave the new government has been abused. Congress cannot ignore indefinitely its responsibility to correct the situation.

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Rupert E. Phillips, CEO

John M. Flanagan, Editor & Publisher

David Shapiro, Managing Editor

Diane Yukihiro Chang, Senior Editor & Editorial Page Editor

Frank Bridgewater & Michael Rovner, Assistant Managing Editors

A.A. Smyser, Contributing Editor