Few mourn exit

WASHINGTON -- For more than a decade, Alberto Gonzales kept President Bush's secrets -- personal and political.

Not surprisingly, perhaps, he kept his own resignation as attorney general from the public, too, telling Bush on Friday what became public only three days later.

The decision, marking the end of a controversial tenure, drew expressions of relief from Republicans and a vow from Democrats to pursue their investigation into fired federal prosecutors.

Bush, Gonzales' most dogged defender, told reporters he had accepted the resignation reluctantly. "His good name was dragged through the mud for political reasons," Bush said.

The president named Paul Clement, the solicitor general, as a temporary replacement. With less than 18 months remaining in office, there was no indication when Bush would name a successor -- or how quickly or easily the Senate might confirm one.

Apart from the president, there were few Republican expressions of regret after the departure of the nation's first Hispanic attorney general, a man once hailed as the embodiment of the American Dream.

"Our country needs a credible, effective attorney general who can work with Congress on critical issues," said Sen. John Sununu of New Hampshire, who last March was the first GOP lawmaker to call on Gonzales to step down. "Alberto Gonzales' resignation will finally allow a new attorney general to take on this task."

Sen. Chuck Grassley, an Iowa Republican, added, "Even after all the scrutiny, it doesn't appear that Attorney General Gonzales committed any crimes, but he did make management missteps and didn't handle the spotlight well when they were exposed."

Democrats were less charitable.

Under Gonzales and Bush, "the Department of Justice suffered a severe crisis of leadership that allowed our justice system to be corrupted by political influence," said Sen. Patrick Leahy, a Vermont Democrat who has presided over the investigation into the firings of eight prosecutors whom Democrats say were axed for political reasons.

Majority Leader Harry Reid said the investigation would not end with Gonzales' leaving.

"Congress must get to the bottom of this mess and follow the facts where they lead, into the White House," said the Nevada Democrat.

Gonzales made a brief appearance before reporters at the Justice Department to announce his resignation. "Even my worst days as attorney general have been better than my father's best days," said the son of migrants.

In many ways, Gonzales was a case study in cronyism: a nice guy and presidential pal who became attorney general on the strength of those two credentials.

In the end, his greatest achievement may be he produced a rare note of unanimity among Republicans and Democrats in Washington: Most agree his tenure was a failure.

"Reasonable people have been saying since the spring that Gonzales should resign, and four months later everybody says this should have happened a long time ago," said Republican consultant Joe Gaylord. "My guess is the close ties to George W. Bush made that impossible."

Every public service job Gonzales held he owed to Bush -- general counsel to the Texas governor, Texas secretary of state, state Supreme Court justice, White House counsel and finally attorney general.

That debt may have made Gonzales too eager to please his boss, too deferential toward higher-powered Texans like Karl Rove, and too dismissive of critics in Congress.

His rapid rise may have left him ill-equipped to manage the huge Justice Department and unseasoned in Washington politics.

Whatever the reason, Gonzales' record of scandal would have more quickly doomed a less-connected public official.

One of his first acts in the White House was to urge Bush to waive anti-torture laws and international treaties that protect prisoners of war. Critics say the policy led to abuses of the type seen at Abu Ghraib.

As the White House's top lawyer, Gonzales notified chief of staff Andy Card after the Justice Department opened an investigation into who revealed a CIA agent's identity. Gonzales waited 12 hours to tell anyone else in the White House, a gap that could have helped aides cover their tracks.

In 2004, Gonzales visited the hospital bed of then-Attorney General John Ashcroft to get the Justice Department's approval of certain intelligence gathering methods.

Gonzales later denied under oath he pressured the ailing Ashcroft to re-certify the "terrorist surveillance program," testimony contradicted by FBI Director Robert S. Mueller and former Deputy Attorney General James Comey.

As attorney general, he told Congress in 2005 the president was fully empowered to eavesdrop on Americans without warrants as part of the war on terror.

Under his and Ashcroft's watch, the FBI improperly and, in some cases, illegally obtained personal information about people in the United States.

His testimony about the firings of several U.S. attorneys was contradicted at least three times during congressional hearings -- once by Gonzales himself.

This was the most avoidable controversy, because the president has every right to fire federal prosecutors. But Gonzales kept changing his story and dodging direct questions, giving his critics the rope to hang him.