Living History by Unknown (best non fiction books of all time .txt) 📕

Chelsea was worried for me, too. She followed closely the developments in the investigation, more so than I sometimes wished. Just as I wanted to shield her, she wanted to protect and comfort me. At first I tried to avoid burdening her with what I was experiencing, but eventually I realized that, as she grew older, she felt better when she knew what I was feeling.

Bill had outmaneuvered the Republicans over the government shutdowns, but his political success could not protect either of us from the misuse of the criminal process. He felt powerless in the face of Starr and his allies. Anger is not the best state of mind in which to prepare for a grand jury appearance. Being a lawyer helped me somewhat because I understood the process. But I couldn’t eat or sleep for a week before my appearance, and I lost ten pounds―not a diet I would recommend. Although I worked on my testimony, which was simple and straightforward, I was more focused on how to control my anger at the whole process. The grand jurors were performing their duty as citizens.

They deserved my respect, even if the lawyers working for Starr did not.

David argued strongly to the Starr prosecutors that calling me before the grand jury was unjustified and a misuse of the process. I could be questioned privately under oath as I had been before, even on video tape. But Starr insisted on summoning me to the courthouse.

One of his goals may have been to humiliate me publicly, but I was determined not to let him break my spirit. I might be the first wife of a President to testify before a grand jury, but I’d do it on my own terms. David told me we could avoid the photographers and TV crews outside the courthouse by driving the Secret Service limousine into the basement parking lot and taking an elevator to the third floor. I rejected the suggestion.

Sneaking into the building would make me look as though I had something to hide.

When my car pulled up in front of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia at 1:45 on that brisk afternoon, January 26, 1996, I got out, smiled and waved at the crowd, and walked into the federal courthouse. I knew I had to conceal my true feelings about Starr and his absurd proceeding. All week I had prepared myself mentally and spiritually for this moment. Breathe deeply, I kept telling myself, and pray for God’s help.

As I prepared to enter the grand jury room, I waved at my hardworking lawyers and said, “Cheerio! Off to the firing squad!”

The grand jury met in the large courtroom on the third floor. Under the federal procedures governing grand juries, witnesses cannot take a lawyer into the grand jury room. I was on my own. All but two of the twenty-three grand jurors were in attendance―ten were women, and most were African American. They seemed entirely representative of the district where they served. Each of Ken Starr’s eight male deputies looked just like him.

Starr left the questions to one of his deputies while he sat at the prosecutor’s table and stared at me. I answered all of the questions, many of them over and over again. I was out in the hallway during one of three breaks when a juror walked over and asked if I would sign his copy of It Takes a Village. I looked at David, who was grinning, and then I signed the book. I later learned that after an investigation into this “incident,” the juror was dismissed from the panel.

After four hours, it was over. In a side room, I quickly debriefed my lawyers, David and Nicole Seligman and Jack Quinn, the new White House counsel, and Jane Sherburne.

We talked about what I would tell the reporters who were anxiously awaiting me. As I walked to the exit, I passed by offices and noticed that no one seemed to have gone home. Many people were hanging around so they could wave to me or say something supportive.

It was already dark when I stepped outside and agreed to take a few brief questions from the media. They wanted to know how I was feeling.

“It’s been a long day,” I said.

“Would you rather have been somewhere else today?”

“Oh, about a million other places.”

When I was asked about the missing billing records, I told them, “I, like everyone else, would like to know the answer about how those documents showed up after all these years. I tried to be as helpful as I could in their investigation efforts.”

I waved as I climbed into the limousine for the ride back to the White House. When I walked into the Diplomatic Receiving Room, Bill and Chelsea were waiting for me with big hugs and eager questions about how it went. I told them I was just glad it was over.

In the ensuing press coverage, much was made of the flowing, embroidered black wool coat I wore that day. One reporter noted that the garment was “emblazoned on the back with a gold dragon,” which prompted the Beltway commentators to ponder its symbolic meaning: Was it a totem? Was I the dragon lady? The White House was obliged to issue a statement that the appliqued swirls on the coat made by Connie Fails, my designer friend in Little Rock, meant nothing: it was just an abstract pattern that one fashion columnist wrote looked like an “art deco rendering of seashells.” My press office reminded reporters that I had worn the coat during the 1993 inaugural events―when no one had commented on the design―but this did not end the chatter. The coat had “turned into a Washington political Rorschach test,” one reporter observed. True enough.

The following night, I forced myself to show up at yet another of Washington’s rituals, the Alfalfa Club Dinner. This is a club with only one purpose: to hold a mock