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February 13, 2008
Clemens Autograph Seekers May Have Broken Federal Law

By DUFF WILSON
WASHINGTON — Any members of the House oversight committee or their staff who asked Roger Clemens for an autograph during his tour of the Capitol over the past week might have violated a federal law against soliciting things of value from people with interests before the committee, several lawyers with expertise in Congressional ethics laws said.

In addition, if a staff member or a member of the committee had Clemens autograph a baseball, that would apparently violate a House ethics ban against taking a gift valued at more than $50, the lawyers said.

Clemens’s entourage here said he autographed scores of items Thursday and Friday while visiting 19 of the 40 members of the committee, which is set to take his testimony Wednesday. Clemens and his lawyers were back Tuesday, visiting more committee members in advance of the public hearing.

“They shouldn’t have been asking him to autograph things because no matter what it’s worth, there’s a prohibition against soliciting gifts of any value,” said Bernadette Sargeant, a lawyer in Washington who worked as counsel for the House Ethics Committee until late 2004.

“You’re definitely not supposed to do it if it’s linked to any action you’re taking or being asked to take,” she said in a telephone interview. “That’s a problem if he’s going around meeting with members of the House oversight committee.”

Another Congressional ethics expert, Jan Witold Baran, a partner in the law firm of Wiley Rein & Fielding in Washington, said, “It would be like O. J. Simpson giving an autographed football to Judge Ito.”

A lawyer for Clemens, Rusty Hardin, said Tuesday that he had “no idea” whether Clemens had signed baseballs in members’ offices. Joe Householder, director of Public Strategies Inc., a public relations firm in Houston working with Clemens’s lawyers here, said Clemens had autographed mostly paper and some balls and a baseball card in the hallways of the House office buildings.

No staffers were identified Tuesday. Staff people in five offices visited by Clemens said they had not asked for autographs. One staff member for Diane E. Watson, Democrat of California, said Clemens had signed some baseballs for another office, but that staff member then declined to provide details or his name.

Lawyers for Brian McNamee, whose account of injecting Clemens at least 16 times with performance-enhancing drugs is the main subject of the hearing on Wednesday, had objected to the private meetings Clemens and his lawyers had with committee members, saying it was inappropriate lobbying. They have not raised the issue of gifts.

Householder said staffers of some committee members’ offices asked Clemens for autographs and to have their photographs taken with him. He said he did not know if any of committee members did.

“Roger’s the kind of guy, I’ve never seen him say no to an autograph unless he was running late for something,” Householder said.

Although Clemens and his fans in Congress might not have realized they were violating the rules, they were, three ethics experts said in interviews this week.

Kathleen Clark, a law professor at Washington University of St. Louis, said a prohibited gift under House ethics rules can be any “item having monetary value.”

“So it looks like an autograph can be a gift,” Clark said in a telephone interview, noting that Clemens is one of the most decorated pitchers in baseball history.

An exception to that ban is gifts worth less than $50. But Clemens’s autographed baseballs appear to be worth more than that. They are for sale at prices of $99 and $149 on eBay.

Even more of a problem than receiving such a gift, Clark said, would be soliciting one. In that case, under federal law, there is no exception for smaller gifts.

Title 5 Section 7353 of the United States Code, defining government misconduct, prohibits federal employees from soliciting anything of value from a person “whose interests may be substantially affected by the performance or nonperformance of the individual’s official duties.”

That may be what separates Clemens from actors who have been known to sign autographs when visiting Capitol Hill.

Representative Mark E. Souder, Republican of Indiana, who refused to meet with Clemens, said it would be “logical” for some staff and even members to seek Clemens’s autograph because actors who come to the Capitol pose for and sign photographs. Asked about the House ethics rule, in an interview Tuesday, Souder said he thought there was an exception for autographs.

But Clark said there was no exception for soliciting things of value from someone whose interests may be affected by the office. “So if any of the members of the committee or the staffers involved in preparing questions for the hearing solicited Clemens’s autograph, that may have violated the prohibition on soliciting gifts,” Clark said.

Sargeant agreed. “They’re not supposed to solicit gifts,” she said. “Roger Clemens has a marketable value on his autograph right now, as he should know very well. I’m not trying to impugn him, but his signatures are worth money.”

Sargeant added: “Staff members might say it’s a commemorative thing, but technically it isn’t a commemorative thing. And if they say it’s an innocent mistake, that doesn’t matter.”

The ethics experts said people who violated the rule could take care of it by returning the items to Clemens.

Alan Schwarz contributed reporting.


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