Roanoke, Va. – Samuel Alexander Garrison III, who as minority counsel for the House Judiciary Committee defended President Nixon in the 1974 impeachment hearings, died Sunday of leukemia at Friendship Healthcare Center. He was 65.
Garrison, then 32, was the last-minute replacement chosen by the committee’s 17 Republicans to present the minority view of the case against Nixon. With just days to prepare, he submitted a 41-page argument against impeachment.
“By all accounts, Sam Garrison did not exactly hit a home run,” The Washington Post reported on July 23, 1974. “But his performance satisfied the senior Republicans who wanted someone, for appearance’s sake if nothing else, to argue the soft spots in the Judiciary Committee’s evidence.”
The House Judiciary Committee passed the first of three articles of impeachment, charging obstruction of justice. Nixon resigned Aug. 8, 1974.
In the 33 years since that summer, Garrison divorced, went bankrupt, came out as a gay man, served time in prison for embezzlement and was disbarred. A former business partner conspired to kill him. He recovered his right to vote and his law license, and resumed his legal career.
Once described as a tough, highly partisan Nixon defender, Garrison joined the Democratic Party and became active in party politics, the gay-rights movement and a hate-crimes task force in southwestern Virginia.
A short, stocky man whose dark good looks seemed to accentuate his youth, Garrison graduated from the University of Virginia and then from its law school in 1966. He immediately became an assistant commonwealth’s attorney in his hometown of Roanoke. In 1969, at 27, he became the youngest person elected commonwealth’s attorney.
In 1971, he moved to Washington to be staff counsel and legislative liaison to Vice President Spiro Agnew. After Agnew resigned in 1973, Garrison began working on the House Judiciary Committee’s impeachment staff. He later was chosen to replace the committee’s chief minority counsel, Albert Jenner, who called the impeachment case against Nixon persuasive.
After Nixon’s resignation, Garrison left his job on Capitol Hill and returned to Roanoke. About that time, he came out as gay, said his best friend, Hal Cohen of Alexandria, Va.
He was a partner in a failed Roanoke restaurant and disco. The business had $1 million in debts, and Garrison declared bankruptcy. His partner, left with the debt, conspired to kill him to recover $300,000 in insurance, a court found.
