jah@philabs.UUCP (Julie Harazduk) (01/13/84)
While watching the debate of this subject on PBS' Agronski & Co. I heard something about Jackson's escapade as a violation of the "Logan Act". I never knew that Jesse was breaking any laws. does anyone know about this (so called) "logan act"? julie
abeles@mhuxm.UUCP (abeles) (01/17/84)
Most likely the Logan Act is the law that makes it a crime for any private citizen to conduct the foreign policy of the United States. President Reagan could have prevented Jesse Jackson (who has succeeded in making his ties to the extremist Arabs stronger while downplaying his well-known dislike for Jews--he blamed Jews for the problems of the Blacks in the U.S. a couple of years ago!) from going on this trip to Syria very trivially under the terms of this law. However, it is the responsibility of the Executive Branch to prosecute illegal actions such as this one, and thus it is possible for the head of that Branch who is the boss of the Attorney General who in turn runs the Justice Department, i.e., the President of the United States, to choose not to prosecute it. Clearly, Reagan found it to be politically wisest not to prosecute. Think about it...it would be more bad publicity at the polls for Ronald Reagan than it is good publicity for Jackson. So Jackson was able to force his way during this election year.