Legally speaking, is a commutation of sentence considered a type of pardon, carrying with it all the implications of accepting a full pardon, such as an admission of guiltcite? By accepting a pardon, does one forfeit 5th amendment protections related to this crime, since he cannot be prosecuted (again) for the crime?
This is obviously related to Scooter Libby. I’ve heard a few claims that for Libby’s case the commutation is better because it carries no admission of guilt, and still leaves him the option of 5th amendment protections if he is subpoenaed. However, It’s not clear to me if commutation of sentence is just a type of pardon, or if there is a potential advantage is opting for less than a pardon. I think this information would be useful in any debate about the reasons for the Libby commutation.
Commutation does not affect the issue of guilt, which has already been determined. It simply says that you don’t have to fulfill the full amount of the sentence.
Unless and until Mr. Libby manages to obtain a reversal of his conviction, he is guilty as determined by the court; his own opinion or willingness to “admit” same is rather irrelevant.
And, as noted by the Wiki article you cited, it’s not clear that “acceptance” of a pardon truly carries an admission of guilt, contrary to the holding of the Burdick case (note that was from 1918).
I don’t think the “implicit assumption of guilt” once thought to be inherent in a pardon is the law anymore. Your link leads to a discussion of the Burdick case which reitereated the rule that the person to be pardoned had the right to accept or reject the pardon (the “acceptance doctrine”). That rule was abandoned in Biddle v. Perovich, 274 U.S. 480 (1927), which stated “A pardon in our days is not a private act of grace from an individual happening to possess power. It is a part of the Constitutional scheme. When granted it is the determination of the ultimate authority that the public welfare will be better served by inflicting less than what the judgment fixed.” To my knowledge, modern pardons don’t require any kind of acceptance or admittance of guilt on the part of the pardoned.
Well, the pardon of the dead guy didn’t constitute an admission of guilt, but I’m not sure that means that pardons no longer do so for normal cases like Libby’s.
We learn in Biddle v. Perovich that a pardon does not require the consent of the pardoned… Does this mean that a pardon can not be an admission of guilt because a pardon isn’t accepted or denied, meaning that the pardoned cannot make any admission (or denial?)
I suppose they still can, it’s just that the granting of an unconditional pardon may not necessarily carry an implicit acknowledgement of guilt. Ford’s pardon of Nixon was full and unequivocal, but it’s possible Nixon could have refused to accept it and maintained his innocence. Ford could have in turned “refused his refusal,” so to speak, aying in essence “I’m not doing this for Richard Nixon, I’m doing it for the good of the countrty.”
There are those who say Nixon’s acceptance of the pardon was tantamount to admitting his guilt, but he never explicitly did so. Ford could have made Nixon’s pardon conditional on an explicit acknowledgement of guilt, but chose mot to (and caught major flak for it). In that circumstance, Nixon could have refused the pardon by failing to admit his guilt and fulfilling the condition.