1996 Senator Joe Biden son Beau hired by Department Of Jus

A1996 Article Covers Some Conflict of Interest Questions Raised Regarding the Department of Justice Hiring of Senator Joe Biden's 27 Year Old Son, Beau Biden.

Article also mentions Senator Joe Biden's younger brother, Frank Biden, was appointed by President Clinton to a $78,000-a-year govt post in 1993 as director of congressional, legislative and public
affairs, making him the agency's chief lobbyist.

The article also mentions potential upcoming conflicts for Senator Joe Biden's other son, Hunter Biden.

Monday, June 17, 1996
The News Journal (Willmington, Delaware

Did Biden name help young lawyer\u2019s (Senator Joe Biden\u2019s son) prospects?
Biden: No conflict in Washington job, son says

By LACRISHA BUTLER Washington reporter

WASHINGTON-- - There were as many as 4,000 applicants last year for an entry-level program for lawyers at the Justice Department, but only 163 were hired. One was Joseph R. "Beau" Biden III.

For most young lawyers, snaring a job at the Justice Department is a major coup. But when your father is Joseph R. Biden Jr., the U.S. senator from Delaware, the question inevitably comes up: Just how much of a coup was it?
The Bidens, both the elder a four-term Democratic senator, former chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee and now the ranking minority member on that 1 Senator's son committee and the younger say there is nothing amiss.

Beau landed an entry-level legal job at the Justice Department, the department his father's committee oversees, on his own merits, they say. "The idea that my son has a job as a counsel down there a young lawyer I don't see any conflict," Biden said. "Why would there be? The Justice Department is a gigantic department and he's qualified. At least they assumed he was."

Beau got his law degree in 1994 from Syracuse University as did his father in 1968. Beau earned a 2.69 grade-point average defends his Washington job (out of a possible 4.0), not high enough to make the top 25 percent in his class. He also has a degree in European history from the University of Pennsylvania.
Prior to joining the Justice Department, he clerked for one year in Concord, N.H., for U.S. District Judge Steven McAuliffe the husband of the teacher, Christa McAuliffe, who perished in the Challenger explosion in 1986.
"He's a terrific lawyer," said McAuliffe, who as an attorney served as New Hampshire co-chairman of Sen. Biden's aborted 1988 campaign for president. "He was a great clerk. He did a great job. I think he is very hard-working, very dedicated. He puts in long hours excellent judgment, a terrific young man."
Beau Biden, 27, works at the Justice Department's Office of Policy Development, which is charged with implementing the Justice Department-related laws Congress passes. More specifically, he is responsible for missing children's issues, the Brady bill and the Violence Against Women Act issues Sen. Biden has spearheaded.

"The fact that I am his son doesn't mean I can't be involved with helping to enforce or defend that law," Beau Biden said. "I would be closed out of doing just t about anything if you follow that logic."

The story of the Bidens is just one example of many of the conflicts that arise when your relative is a high-profile lawmaker. On the one hand, no one wants to be accused of nepotism or a conflict of interest; on the other, why should one's career be hampered because of whom they are related to?

"The fact that Sen. Biden ... has oversight responsibility for the very office that employs his son certainly raises at least an appearance of a conflict of interest," said Mark Ievin with the conservative Landmark Legal Foundation, which promotes government ethics.

"Let's not pretend that in the universe of, gosh-knows how many attorneys, that this one just happened to pop up on merit alone. That is not to say his son is not qualified, but he is Joseph Biden III. Does it violate any law? No. But, in my mind, at a minimum, it creates appearance of a conflict."

Sill Hogan, with the Washing top, D.C.-based Center for Public Integrity, said there is more involved when you are an elected official than just answering the legality question. "Having answered that, we need to go beyond that and say, what does this look like from the outside?" he said. "If you took a job that you think might be influenced by what your father did, I'd think you'd want to be sensitive to! it. Often like that, I think it's sensible for these kinds of situations to be avoided."

But Beau is not the only relative the senator has close by. Over at the Government Printing Office, Frank Biden is director of congressional, legislative and public affairs, making him the agency's chief lobbyist. Frank is the senator's younger brother. "Don't nail me on this," Frank Biden said when contacted in Wilmington. He was appointed by President Clinton to the $78,000-a-year post in 1993.

He said his job is completely outside the purview of his brother's responsibilities in the Senate. Frank, 42, whose background is in sales, said he got the job after being alerted to it by a friend, Anthony Zagami, who is general counsel at the Government Printing Office, and not through any assistance from his brother.

He said that throughout his career, he has "assiduously avoided" seeking out jobs at major corporations in Delaware because he was related to an influential, elected official. "People have a natural tendency to be kind to someone who is related to someone they admire," Frank Biden said.
Which gets back to Beau Biden. Beau Biden, his father and his immediate supervisor, Eleanor Acheson, insist the young lawyer applied for the $44,458-a-year job, was qualified and was hired without any intervention from his father.

Acheson, assistant secretary for the Office of Policy Development, defends hiring Beau, whom she said she chose after interviewing eight or nine applicants. She said she never had any contact with Sen. Biden about the job and said she does not recall getting recommendations for Beau Biden from any other member of Congress. Beau backs that up, saying he recalls no recommendations written on his behalf.

"Biden came in and got the job on his own merits," Acheson said.
The entry-level counsel job requires a law degree and, preferably, a clerkship or other legal or policy experience. But there are other qualities that Acheson said she looks for, such as the enthusiasm of a self-starter or ample experience analyzing legal issues.

Acheson, the granddaughter of Dean Acheson, President Truman's Secretary of State, is sensitive to questions about nepotism.

"I'm well aware of how difficult it is and how careful you have to be," she said. "This is a young man who has got a lot of ability and a lot of talent. That is the beginning and the end of it.

"And the suggestion, implicit in this whole inquiry, that he should not be permitted to have a job at the United States Department of Justice because his father is a United States senator ... is a crazy, crazy notion."

But, even so, how do you say no to Sen. Joseph R. Biden's son? "They said no when I applied initially, when I applied to the criminal division," Beau Biden says. "I am saying that people can say 'No' to me." Biden, the senator, also disagrees with the "how-could-they-say-no" tack.

"What would have happened if they didn't make Bill Roth's wife a judge?" he asked.

Eleven years ago, questions surfaced when Jane Richards Roth, a Wilmington lawyer, was appointed, first by President Reagan as a U.S. District judge, then by President Bush, to the Third Circuit.

At the time, Roth, who as senior Delaware Republican in a Republican administration, would have been responsible for nominating candidates to fill federal judgeships, said he did not recommend his wife, but had informed the White House of her interest in being a judge.

"I said that if they wanted a woman, I knew a good one," Roth told The New York Times.

The Biden saga may not be over yet, though.

Biden's other son, Robert Hunter, 26, graduated from Yale Law School this spring. He's studying for the bar exam in Connecticut, but before long -he, too, will be out searching for work. His brother has a word of advice for him.

"I would tell my brother to do what he wants to do and to be honorable doing it," he said, hesitating, before turning the question around. "Are you trying to say we both should have been doctors?"