St. Clair

(b. Akron, Ohio, 14 April 1920; d. Westwood, Mass., 10 March 2001), lawyer. In United States v. Nixon, presidential attorney St. Clair unsuccessfully argued that executive privilege allowed President Richard Nixon to withhold tape recordings; he also defended the president in the impeachment inquiry. Nixon's tight personal control of his defense strategy and tactics unquestionably hampered St. Clair.

— Stanley I. Kutler

St. Clair, Arthur (1737-1818) Revolutionary War army officer and territorial governor, born in Scotland. St. Clair gave up his commission in the British army when he married Phoebe Bayard, of Boston, and, thanks to her wealth, assumed the life of a gentleman in Pennsylvania, where he took on several local political offices. At the outbreak of the Revolution, he raised a regiment, which named him colonel, and fought at Trenton (1776) and Princeton (1777). Named to command Fort Ticonderoga, he withdrew under the assault by Gen. John Burgoyne (1777), for which he was much criticized. St. Clair led a weak expedition in 1791 against Indians in the Northwest Territory that suffered the highest casualties ever taken by U.S. forces in battle with Native Americans; although not blamed, St. Clair nonetheless resigned his military commission.

See the Introduction, Abbreviations and Pronunciation for further details.

James Draper St. Clair is a distinguished attorney who attained national prominence in 1974 as special counsel to President Richard M. Nixon during the Watergate scandal. As special counsel, St. Clair defended Nixon before the U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary Committee during its impeachment hearings against the president and argued before the U.S. Supreme Court that Nixon did not have to turn over his secretly recorded White House tapes to the Watergate special prosecutor.

St. Clair was born on April 14, 1920, in Akron, Ohio. He graduated from the University of Illinois in 1941 and served in the Navy during World War II. Following the war St. Clair attended Harvard Law School, graduating in 1947. He was admitted to the Massachusetts bar that year and began work at Hale and Dorr, the most prominent law firm in Boston. St. Clair remained with the firm during his entire legal career.

A skilled litigator, St. Clair assisted Joseph N. Welch, a senior attorney with Hale and Dorr, at the Army-McCarthy hearings in 1954. These hearings marked a turning point in Senator Joseph R. McCarthy's four-year quest to expose supposed Communist subversion in the federal government. Welch, representing the Army, skillfully rebuffed McCarthy's charges during the televised hearings.

St. Clair returned to Washington, D.C., and political controversy in 1974, when Congress and a special criminal prosecutor moved aggressively to obtain information on Nixon's role in the Watergate scandal. By early 1973 the botched 1972 burglary of the Democratic National Committee's offices in the Watergate building complex in Washington had been linked to members of Nixon's campaign and White House staff. The revelation in the summer of 1973 that Nixon had secretly recorded all conversations in the Oval Office led to demands by special prosecutor Archibald Cox that Nixon surrender the tapes. Nixon refused, firing Cox. Cox's replacement, Leon Jaworski, renewed the demand.

Nixon then hired St. Clair to argue against disclosure of the tapes and to prevent the House of Representatives from voting impeachment charges against the president. In the Judiciary Committee proceedings, St. Clair was permitted to hear the evidence, question witnesses, and present a defense. He argued that Nixon could be impeached only on hard proof that the president had committed serious criminal acts. Most committee members believed that a president might also be impeached for wrongdoing that was not strictly criminal. In July 1974, the committee approved impeachment resolutions that charged Nixon with assisting in the Watergate cover-up, abusing his powers, and failing to honor committee subpoenas for the White House tapes.

As to the question of producing evidence, St. Clair argued that the doctrine of executive privilege gave Nixon the right to withhold the tapes. In United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683, 94 S. Ct. 3090, 41 L. Ed. 2d 1039 (1974), the Supreme Court agreed with St. Clair that executive privilege was a legitimate shield for the executive branch but held that the doctrine could not prevent the disclosure of materials needed for a criminal prosecution.

Shortly after the Supreme Court decision, St. Clair learned that one of the sixty-four tapes in question included a conversation between Nixon and his chief of staff, H.R. (Harry Robbins) Haldeman, in which Nixon sought to stop the Federal Bureau of Investigation from investigating the Watergate burglary. The conversation, which took place a few days after the 1972 burglary, was the so-called smoking gun that proved Nixon had obstructed justice. St. Clair insisted that Nixon publish the tape. After its disclosure, Nixon's political support vanished. He resigned on August 9, 1974, rather than face certain impeachment and removal from office.

Following the Nixon debacle, St. Clair returned to Boston and his litigation practice. He lectured at Harvard Law School for twenty-five years and has remained active in many civic and philanthropic organizations.

Quotes:

"Whenever I get to a low point, I go back to the basics. I ask myself, Why am I doing this? It comes down to passion."

Coordinates: 43°41′17.58″N 79°23′38.91″W / 43.6882167°N 79.3941417°W / 43.6882167; -79.3941417

St. Clair 1441 Yonge Street
Opened	March 30, 1954
District	Toronto (former city)
Line	Yonge-University-Spadina line 512 St. Clair Streetcar
Next station	Yonge-University-Spadina line: ≅1.1 km north to Davisville 2 min ≅0.6 km south to Summerhill 1 min 512 St. Clair LRT: west to Deer Park Crescent
Daytime Connections	74 Mt. Pleasant, 88 South Leaside, 97 Yonge
Night Connections	312 St. Clair, 320 Yonge
Daily Boardings	33,660
Platforms	Side platforms
Accessibility	2 elevators

St. Clair is a station on the Yonge-University-Spadina line of the subway system in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Its address is 1441 Yonge Street, at the intersection with St. Clair Avenue East, but its street entrances are on St. Clair and on Pleasant Boulevard. The station's site has no frontage on Yonge. The station was opened in 1954 as part of the original Yonge Street subway.

The station has been fully accessible since 2007. A McDonald's is located at the entrance to St. Clair Station.

Contents 1 Subway infrastructure in the vicinity 2 Nearby landmarks 3 Surface connections 4 External links

Subway infrastructure in the vicinity

North of the station, the tunnel jogs left to cross to the west side of Yonge Street. Then the line runs in an open cut for 1.3 kilometres, between Yonge Street and the Davisville Yard, the TTC's original subway yard.

Nearby landmarks

Nearby landmarks include the David A. Balfour Park (Vale of Avoca section of Rosedale ravine), St. Michael's Cemetery, Deer Park, Moore Park, Upper Canada College, and Forest Hill.

Surface connections

• '74 Mt. Pleasant to Eglinton and Mt. Pleasant
• 88 South Leaside
• 97 Yonge
• 512 St. Clair to Keele (Gunn's Loop)

External links

• Official TTC page for St. Clair Station

v • d • e Stations of the Toronto Transit Commission Yonge–University–Spadina line Finch  • North York Centre  • Sheppard-Yonge ■ • York Mills  • Lawrence • Eglinton  • Davisville  • St. Clair  • Summerhill • Rosedale • Bloor-Yonge ■ • Wellesley • College • Dundas  • Queen  • King • Union  • St. Andrew • Osgoode  • St. Patrick • Queen's Park  • Museum • St. George ■ • Spadina ■ • Dupont • St. Clair West • Eglinton West  • Glencairn • Lawrence West • Yorkdale • Wilson  • Downsview  • Sheppard West • Finch West • York University • Steeles West • Highway 407 Transitway • Vaughan Bloor–Danforth line Kipling  • Islington • Royal York • Old Mill • Jane  • Runnymede • High Park • Keele • Dundas West  • Lansdowne • Dufferin • Ossington • Christie • Bathurst  • Spadina ■ • St. George ■ • Bay • Bloor-Yonge ■ • Sherbourne • Castle Frank • Broadview  • Chester • Pape • Donlands • Greenwood • Coxwell • Woodbine • Main Street  • Victoria Park • Warden  • Kennedy ■ Scarborough RT Kennedy ■ • Lawrence East • Ellesmere • Midland • Scarborough Centre  • McCowan Sheppard line Sheppard-Yonge ■ • Bayview  • Bessarion  • Leslie  • Don Mills Streetcar stations Queen's Quay-Ferry Docks • Exhibition Loop Legend: - wheelchair-accessible |  washroom |  ■ - connection  |  proposed station

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