Second Term - A Novel of America in the Last Days (The End of America Series Book 1) (10 page)

TWENTY
ONE

Tyler,
Texas

“John Madison, how
long have I known you?”

“What kind of a
question is that, Chuck?” Whenever the two sparred over any topic, they both
knew that John would bring up their standing grade school girlfriend joke.
“You’re my best friend, and you’ve been my best friend since I stole Patty
Pierson away from you in the 5
^th
Grade of Tyler Elementary. You’ve
never forgiven me, have you? This is all about Patty, again, isn’t it?”

“If you hadn’t
married Patty, later, I would have never forgiven you, but in light of the
circumstances, I about had to forgive you. No, goofy, this is about how you are
about to get yourself indicted, for various federal crimes and misdemeanors, if
you’re not
very careful.
You obviously have no clue how seriously the
President, and his Senate buddy, Jim Blevins, take the campaign speech you made
in Austin before the shootings.”

Chuck Webster was a
few years younger than John Madison, but they had developed a close
relationship, as Webster had helped his friend negotiate through the labyrinth
of insurance industry rules and regulations. His top of his Tyler high school
class standing, paved the way, along with his impressive LSAT results, to his
admission to an Ivy League law school. After graduation he turned down
lucrative New York and DC offers, returning instead to Texas. He wanted to
raise his family in a family environment, and near his parents. Chuck Webster
and his wife had decided early in their marriage that they wanted to bear all
of the children that God sent them, without any restrictions or impediments. As
a result, they had been blessed with ten children, ranging in age from twelve
years to eighteen months. Chuck liked to joke that he would be practicing law
until he was in a nursing home, just to get all of his kids through college.
John and Debbie Madison, whose grandchildren lived some distance from them,
loved to spend time with Chuck’s brood, whom they referred to as their Tyler
grandkids.

“Chuck, I understand
the concept. A pro-gun Texas conservative gives a speech suggesting that if the
President were to be re-elected he’ll try and outlaw gun ownership. That wasn’t
a revolutionary thought, after all. When the President ran four years earlier a
lot of people quietly suggested that’s what he would do. Otherwise, why did all
the gun dealers sell out of ammunition back then?”

“Quietly is the key
word. No major conservative leader went so public four years ago. Low profile
was the approach. But, not this time.
Right Wing Pro-Gun, Tea Party Leader John
Madison
uses his campaign megaphone and fires a salvo, if you’ll excuse the
expression, at the President just a few days, a couple, three weeks, before
he’s shot, or winged, or whatever actually happened in Dallas. Wonderful
timing, John.”

“So? What ever
happened to the First Amendment? I can’t speak my mind, in a civil way, without
the sky falling in on me? Plus, I would point out the obvious in all this – the
President
is trying to take away our guns,
just as I said he would.
Doesn’t that inconvenient fact give me some cover?”

“See, John, that’s
what I’m talking about. You’re in denial. The First Amendment? You really think
these guys give a fig for the Constitution? They’re re-defining the First
Amendment in Blevin’s anti-free speech, anti-gun ownership bill he introduced.
This is the same President who promised to fundamentally transform America. How
do you fundamentally transform a country without altering its founding
documents?”

“OK, I hear you, but
the Second Amendment’s right to keep and bear arms is written in our nation’s
DNA. I was just trying to warn the voters, using my First Amendment rights, I
might add, that his second term posed a distinct danger to gun rights. So, now
I should worry about getting indicted for just speaking out, in a campaign?”

Chuck Webster shifted
uncomfortably in his leather lawyers’ chair. It was obvious to him that his
friend was headed for deep legal problems, and in spite of all of his lawyerly
skills, he would not be able to head off the oncoming onslaught. He concluded
that the best approach to help his friend and client was to give him the scary
truth of what he was facing.

“John, buddy, here’s how
it’s going to go. You’re going to be served very soon with a U.S. Senate
subpoena from Blevin’s Committee on the Judiciary. You might have had more of a
shot at true justice, ironically, if Senator Reese had assigned the Bill to the
Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. The problem with the
Judiciary Committee is that it’s packed with the Senate’s most liberal,
doctrinaire haters of all conservative causes and people. You’ll only have a
handful of days to prepare. You’ll face the grilling of your life from Senator
Blevins and his Committee members and Staff. They’ll paint you as the
instigator, at the very least, of the shootings. You’ll try and defend
yourself, but you are very likely to say things that will expose you to
indictment. They’ll indict you, not only for what you say at the Committee
Hearing, but every word you uttered in the campaign will be scrutinized for
‘hate speech’. They’ll push the trial to a quick date. They’ll convict you.
You’ll be watching the world from a federal facility hundreds of mile from your
family. And that’s the best case scenario. Now, do I have your attention, John?

“That’s not going to
happen.”

“Why? Because you’re
going to listen to your lawyer, and best friend, and take the Fifth Amendment,
refusing to utter words that can be used against you, to indict you?”

“Chuck, I know you
mean well. I know you’re scary smart in the law. I know that you have my best
interests at heart and that you are probably giving me really good advice.
But…”

“But?”

“But, I’m not going
to refuse to answer questions by asserting my Fifth Amendment rights. That’s
like waving a red flag.
‘Hey, look at me – I’m guilty of the crimes you’re
asking about – which is why I’m taking the Fifth!’
No way, Chuck, I’m not
doing it.”

“You don’t get it.
The Fifth Amendment to the Constitution was written to protect you from the
ambush that Blevins and his Committee are arranging for you. It’s the only way
you can protect yourself from being indicted for your own words. I know it
looks bad to take the Fifth, because you look like you’re hiding something, but
it looks a lot worse to go to prison, when you might have been able to avoid
it.”

“Chuck, I would agree
with you and I would probably take the Fifth if the only danger to me was what
I might say in front of Blevins’ witch-hunting Committee. But, as you just
said, and we both know, I gave over 30 speeches in the campaign, to gun groups,
tea party and patriot meetings, even to a handful of Republican county
Lincoln-Reagan Dinners. Most were recorded, and several videotaped. I’m stuck
with what I said in those speeches. If they want to accuse me of violating the
federal Hate Crimes Act, they’ll figure out a way to do it, no matter what I
say before the Committee.”

“No doubt, John. I’m
just trying to minimize the charges. One of their historical tricks in DC is to
charge people they are pursuing with lying to Congress, based on a portion of
the criminal code that makes it a felony to give a materially false statement
or representation to the nation’s lawmakers. Who do you think decides what
constitutes a materially false statement? You guessed it, my friend.”

“Well, then, Chuck,
your job, as you sit next to me at the witness table, is to make sure that I
don’t lie to Congress.

“How do you propose,
exactly, that I accomplish that task? I can’t take back your words once they
exit your pie hole.”

“If I come even close
to an untruth, kick my ankle, elbow my ribs or just write
indictable
statement
on your legal pad. However you nudge me, I’ll get the message,
and try to undig my way out of the hole. But, I’m not….not…going to plead the
Fifth. Frankly, Chuck, I’d rather get indicted for federal crimes than to tell
the nation at the hearing that I refuse to answer questions about the
shootings, and make it look like I was involved, even though I knew absolutely
nothing about the shootings before the shots were fired.”

“Well stated, John,
but you may just get your wish. You won’t look guilty – but you may find
yourself guilty, anyway.”

TWENTY
TWO

Washington,
DC

With each day Hilde
was increasingly committed to removing the President from office in order to
begin the healing of America. She had reluctantly concluded that she would have
to take action. There was no other way, she now firmly believed, to spare the
nation from an armed insurrection in which its many still-armed citizens assaulted
the Executive Mansion and ripped the fabric of the Republic asunder. She knew
that her ascension to power would be accepted, gratefully, by the leaders of
her own political party, especially in Congress, men and women who had long ago
quietly withdrawn their support from their party’s standard bearer. They were
just as frightened as Hilde of what was happening to America.

But, how to
accomplish the historical deed? Wilbur, bless his soul, was no help, as he
continued to slumber in his blissful coma. Truth be told, she thought, I never
really needed Wilbur and his advice as much as he needed mine. All of her years
of education, and political experience, and work in the deep political trenches
of governing from the White House with Wilbur, and the Senate, and in the
Cabinet, convinced her that this President would only resign under intense
pressure. Pressure that convinced him that he had no real choice. That he would
have to go to avoid a greater harm. OK. So how should I apply the pressure, she
pondered,?
How
to make it happen?

Ultimately, Hilde, as
a lawyer, knew that she would have to use the Twenty-Fifth Amendment to the
Constitution. She had been a lower level federal employee in Washington when
the Amendment had been adopted. Hilde was well acquainted with the fourth
section of the Amendment which provided for the removal of a President from
office if the Vice President and a majority of the Cabinet agreed that the occupant
of the Oval Office was unable to perform the powers and duties of “his” office.
‘Sexist pigs’, she thought. It should have been written to say ‘powers and
duties of his or her’ office, but no matter, it would work for “his” removal,
she concluded.

Hilde knew that she
had more friends in the Cabinet than the President himself. She could only name
three members of the Cabinet who were appointed because of their close personal
relationship with the President. The rest were the usual suspects, Washington insiders
who had served under Wilbur’s administration, or even in one case, an appointee
of Jimmy Carter. Hilde knew how to schmooze with others, a talent that the
President seemed not to have learned. She spoke with most Cabinet members more
frequently than their boss, leading her to believe that the Cabinet was made up
of political animals with whom she could work to remove the President from
office. They had to be just as worried as she was about what was happening in
America’s streets. Martial law? What have we come to, she frequently asked
herself.

What she needed now,
Hilde mused after a particularly bloody report from Michigan came to her ears,
was a plan. It wouldn’t do to just start contacting Cabinet members recruiting
signators to remove the President. Word would leak within minutes of her first
few calls. This was DC, after all. The Cabinet, what the Twenty-Fifth Amendment
called the principal officers of the executive department, consisted of fifteen
members. So, besides her own signature, she would need a minimum of eight signatures
in order to remove the President from his power and duties.

It could only happen
in one way – at a Cabinet meeting, with almost no warning, except to a trusted
few. As she arrived at that decision, though, it occurred to her that she would
have to have at least two or three Cabinet members to support what she was
doing, to be vocal in demanding that it happen, to backstop her. To pull off
that critical component of her plan, she reluctantly concluded, she would have to
tell her two or three closest allies on the Cabinet what was about to happen,
but only hours, maybe just a few minutes before the actual meeting. Any more
time than that extended greatly the chance of a leak.

The next Cabinet
meeting was Tuesday morning the following week at 10 AM. This President didn’t
like Cabinet meetings very much. He wasn’t comfortable with management of large
organizations, as he had no prior management experience of any type. As a
consequence, he convened them only infrequently. The meeting of the Cabinet
could be the last time the Cabinet convened for several weeks, or months. Thus,
Hilde knew that the time to act was upon her. So, she wondered, who to call?
Who to call first? And just as important, when to make the calls?

TWENTY
THREE

Washington,
DC  –  Russell Senate Office Building

“Would the witness
please stand and be sworn?”

With these
time-honored words directed to John Madison, United States Senator James R.
Blevins commenced what Washington loved best, the blood sport of reputation
assassination via Congressional hearings. This Committee hearing, as Senator
Blevins had previously announced, was being held the next day after Congress
convened in January in the historic Senate Caucus Room on the third floor of
the Russell Senate Office Building, one of three buildings occupied by Senators
for their Senatorial offices. The United States Senate Committee on the
Judiciary, one of twenty standing Committees, consisted of ten Democrats and
eight Republicans.

None of the eighteen
Committee members were smiling. All knew that the mainstream media had decided
to extensively cover the hearing, most airing the testimony live. It was
political high drama show time. John Madison stood from behind the glass-topped
witness table, on which were a bevy of microphones all pointed towards him, and
raised his right hand. He swore to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing
but the truth, but added “so help me God” at the end, even though the oath as
given to him omitted those four words, and had not included the words for
several years.

Senator Blevins, in
his purposely emphasized low country South Carolinian accent, made it clear he
was not amused. “Fine, Mr. Madison, y’all want to add y’alls’ own words to our
o-fficial oath, that’s just fine. Ya may need all the help you can get from
your version of God before this proceedin’ has concluded. I see ya got ya
lawyer here today. Care to introduce ya man?”

“Certainly, Senator,
Members of the Committee, I’m joined today by my attorney and lifelong friend,
Chuck Webster. He’s a graduate of Har….”

“That’ll be enough,
Mr. Madison. He’s identified for the record, we are
not
in need of his
resume. Let’s move ahead, now. Mr. Madison, before we take y’all’s testimony,
the several Members of this U-nited States Senate Committee on the Judiciary
are granted the opportunity to make openin’ statements. Mine, suh, will be
brief and to the point…..

“I don’t believe that
individual citizens should ever have the right to own anythin’ that can be
used, suh, to kill folks. I believed this before some dang fool right winger
shot me in Dallas, but I’m even more of that belief and persuasion now, of
course. I know all about what y’all scream about when it comes to any
restrictions on ya precious guns, ya
fire
-arms.
The Second
Amendment.  The Second Amendment.
  It’s ya mantra, ya holy grail.

“In these here
hearings we all gonna’ look real close at your holy grail words, study ‘em real
close up like. America’s gonna’ see that the Second Amendment don’t even come
close to sayin’ what y’all been sayin’ what it says. We gonna’ have a number of
expert academic legal scholars to testify that the Second Amendment don’t mean
what it says….that is, it don’t mean what it seems to say…., uh, it don’t mean
what it seems like it means….oh, well, you get my idea here. The scholars are
gonna’ tell us, I understand, that this Congress can clear up the con-fusion in
the Amendment real well, by just passin’ the McAlister Hate Weapons Elimination
Bill. And, also, my bill will put some teeth in the Hate Crimes Act, to
prohibit hateful speech that leads to violence. No more need in this here
country for any more martial law declarations. Simple as that. I promised
this’d be short. Uh….Let’s see here. Uh, yes, I recognize the ranking member for
his openin’ statement, the distinguished gentleman from Idaho, Senator
Remington.”

Senator Sam Remington
had served in the U.S. Senate longer than all but two other Senators. In his
several years of service in the Senate he had become known as a man who did not
suffer fools gladly. He had long ago decided that Senator Blevins from South
Carolina was, as he had said privately, ‘all blow, and no go’. Senator
Remington had voted on nearly every bill of importance directly opposite the
votes cast by Senator Blevins. Since the senior Senator from Idaho was a
rancher and hunter, he was less than enthusiastic about Senator Blevins’ bill
to take away his right to own and possess the several firearms he maintained at
his ranch. It was widely known that for decades he had hosted in his office a
weekly Tuesday night poker game for his western Senate colleagues.

As ranking member of
the Committee on the Judiciary, Senator Remington was in a position to become
Chairman, should control of the Senate revert to the Republican Party.
Unfortunately for Senator Remington, control did not vest in the Republican
Party after the election. A bit salty, Senator Remington had said that being
the Committee’s ranking member was about like being Vice President, but without
all the fun funerals to attend. He knew that his brief opening statement
wouldn’t be long remembered, but that it could help set the tone for the
hearings on the McAlister Bill, though the outcome of which Senate hearings
there did not appear to be much doubt.

“Chairman Blevins,
distinguished members of the Committee on the Judiciary, my remarks will also
be limited. We all know why we are here. We all know that the McAlister Bill is
designed and crafted to be an end-run around the U.S. Constitution. The
majority may have the votes to pass this bill, but they don’t have the votes to
do it the right way, the legal way, the honest way. They don’t have enough
support in the country to amend the Constitution and take away the right to
keep and bear arms, nor enough votes to legally take away the right of free
speech, even if its controversial speech. If they didn’t have the occupant of
the White House and if they didn’t have what may well be a majority of the
Court that sets across the plaza from us, we wouldn’t be here today. They
wouldn’t try to statutorily amend our nation’s founding document, except for
one man at 1600 and one new Justice across the plaza. Wouldn’t happen.

“But, in my years
working on this hill I’ve learned that you play the cards you’re dealt. So, Mr.
Chairman, members of the Committee, let’s play this high stakes game out. Let’s
see if you’ve got enough votes in the House. It’s clear McAlister will pass
this body. We know that the President will sign the bill into law, if you’ve
got the votes in the House. How will the new Justice across the plaza vote?
Flip those cards up and let’s see if Americans can continue to speak freely,
and continue to keep and bear arms, or, alternatively, if we’re going to lose
those precious rights. Are we going to stay under martial law even if the bill
becomes law? Let’s see who’s got the votes. Deal ‘em, Mr. Chairman, deal
‘em.”  

The other members of
the Committee on the Judiciary delivered their opening statements, alternating
between Democrat and Republican members. There were no surprises, as the
Members had declared well before the hearings where they stood on the McAlister
Bill, and how they intended to vote. At the conclusion of the opening
statements, Chairman Blevins declared a short recess, which actually was brief,
as everybody in the vast hearing room was anxious for the blood sport to begin.
It was time to watch the Committee ‘Grill the Witness’

Senator Blevins
wheeled back to his position and loudly banged his gavel, calling the hearing
back in session, “Mr. Madison, suh, my staff’s report on ya, Mr. Madison, and
the information provided to our Committee by various federal law enforcement
agencies, tells me that ya were a
very active Texan
in the campaign that
just concluded last November, about nine weeks ago. Would ya agree, Mr. Madison
that ya worked almost full time in the campaign to defeat our incumbent
President and to deny him, I might say, his well-earned second term?”

Chuck Webster had
warned his client about compound and loaded questions, so he was ready for the
Senator’s initial jab. “Senator, let me take the various parts of your
question. First, I was not a full time, as you say, campaigner in last year’s
campaign. I have a job as an executive officer of an insurance company, so what
I did in the…..”

“Come on, now Mr.
Madison. Ya gonna tell this Committee, this Congress,
under oath
, that
ya weren’t active in the campaign, even though ya gave over, I hear, a hundred
or so speeches?”

John Madison
instinctively bristled at having his words misinterpreted. In practice sessions
in Tyler, the local county prosecutor that Chuck Webster had recruited to help
prep his client for the hearing had done exactly the same thing – make it sound
like he was lying, when he wasn’t. So he was ready for the Senator.

“With all due
respect, Senator Blevins, I gave forty some speeches, best I can recall. I did
not work full-time, though I was active in the campaign. I was merely
exercising my First Amend….”

“Fine, Mr. Madison,
just fine, we’re not here today to hear lectures on ancient documents. No
sirree, we are here to talk about guns and hate speech…so, Mr. Madison, let’s
talk first about --- your guns. How many guns ya own and or possess, Mr.
Madison, and I remind ya,
ya’re under oath
.”

“Senator, it’s hardly
relevant how many guns I may or may not…”

“Suh, ya lawyer there
sittin’ by ya will tell ya that relevancy is
our call
, not ya all’s
call. Now answer my question, if ya would be so kind – and listen carefully to
what I asked ya – how many guns do ya own and or possess?”

Attorney Webster
leaned over to his client, cupping his hand around his ear, and gave him
hurried advice. John Madison frowned slightly, started to whisper to his
attorney, apparently had second thoughts, then addressed the Chairman. “Mr.
Chairman, I own two handguns, and also a rifle, a shotgun and an antique long
rifle, alleged to be from the Revolutionary War, that had passed down through
the family to my father before he died.”

“Is that
all
,
Mr. Madison? Sounds like ya got yaself a veritable
arsenal
there. Ya
worried about somethin? Or someone? “

“Senator, in Texas,
and I think in lots of areas of the country mine would not be an unusually high
number of weapons for self-protection and as part of a collection.” Webster
flinched slightly, a movement picked up by his client, causing him to raise his
guard for how the Senator would likely respond.

“
Self-protection
?
Is that what ya said, Mr.Madison?
Self protection
? When was the last
time you shot somebody comin’ in ya house? Is that what you intend to do, Mr.
Madison, shoot people that come in ya house? Ya call shootin’ people just
‘cause they might drop by ya house
self-protection
? Ya make me sick, Mr.
Madison, sick with fear that people like ya want to hang onto ya many
guns….It’s the law-abidin’ citizens of this country that need to be protected
against ya, and all ya many hate weapons….I….I’m so….why, ya just…”

A Senate staff member
hustled forward and handed a note to the Chairman, whose face had visibly
reddened. He glanced at the note, banged his gavel loudly and announced, “We’ll
take a brief recess, I’ve got a call from the President that I need to return.”
A wire service photographer with access in the Committee room casually walked
up during the recess and read the note that the Chairman had left after reading
it at his seat at the committee table. It read “SENATOR – GOOD TIME TO CALL A
RECESS.”