The raging furor over Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, which continues to put focus onto America’s 93 U.S. Attorneys, is now hometown news because Maine’s U.S. Attorney was among 26 more attorneys eyed for dismissal.

Though Paula Silsby’s job no longer seems in jeopardy, the controversy is an occasion to look at others from Maine who have served as its powerful federal prosecutor. I spoke with several of them about whether they, like those recently fired by the Bush administration, were subjected to political pressures in the conduct of their office.

Silsby’s immediate predecessor was Jay McCloskey, a Democrat tapped by Sen. George Mitchell for the job in 1993. Now in private practice, McCloskey was in the news earlier this month for testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee opposing prosecution of executives of Purdue Pharma, makers of the painkiller OxyContin.

Like Silsby, McCloskey rose through the ranks in the U.S. Attorneys office, serving 13 years as an assistant before being nominated for the top position, a position which – like prominent cabinet level posts – in susceptible to political shifts within the White House. McCloskey’s resume also includes time as a state legislator in the l970s.

“I can’t remember a single instance when Mitchell’s office even inquired about an ongoing case. As best I can recall, the same was true of other members of the [Congressional] delegation. Normally speaking if a member of Congress has a question about something, it will get passed up through the Justice Department,” says McCloskey, when asked whether pressures from Maine’s Congressional delegation ever influenced prosecutions.

As for Justice Department intrusion, McCloskey recalls his boss, Attorney General Janet Reno, “gave a great deal of discretion and placed a great deal of confidence in her U.S. Attorneys,” and “the political hat was left at the door.”

McCloskey’s predecessor was Richard Cohen, a Republican who served under the Reagan and first Bush administrations. Like the appointment of all Maine U.S. Attorneys in modern times, Cohen’s selection in 1981 came at the behest of the ranking member of the president’s party in the state’s Congressional delegation.

In Cohen’s case, this meant sponsorship by Sen. William (no relation) Cohen. Though Richard Cohen hadn’t been an Asst. U.S. Attorney, like Silsby and McCloskey, was a career prosecutor. Cohen’s death in 1998 deprives us of his reflections on the relationship between his enforcement priorities and political influence.

Cohen assumed the job from Lewiston’s Thomas E. Delahanty, II, who was recommended by Sen. Ed Muskie in 1980 to succeed Mitchell, who served as U.S. Attorney from 1977-1979.

Like Cohen, Delahanty had been a prosecutor in Maine courts, and has been a Superior Court Justice for the past 24 years. Delahanty recalls his superiors in Washington D.C. had “a push on local corruption,” and seemed disappointed about the perceived lack of zeal in pursuing it.

Delahanty’s reply was: ‘This is Maine, we do things the way they ought to be done. If you have any information about corruption, let me know ASAP.’ I never heard from them.”

Maine’s oldest living former U.S. Attorney is 76-year-old Lloyd LaFountain of Biddeford, who served from 1966-1969. Like Delahanty, LaFountain was named by a Democratic president on Muskie’s recommendation and had been an elected state prosecutor.

“Nobody ever called me from Washington,” LaFountain says about interference with his prosecutorial discretion, though he, like others, occasionally called upon Justice Department expertise. Nor did LaFountain recall attempts by his patron, Muskie, to meddle with office affairs. When it came to hiring his assistant, LaFountain says Muskie told him,”Pick your own man.”

In a testament to choosing merit over cronyism, LaFountain appointed Brunswick native Ed Hudon, a fastidiously loyal Democrat with a distinguished academic resume.

Hudon worked in the Supreme Court library for 20 years before returning to Maine to serve under LaFountain. An accomplished scholar who taught at several law schools, Hudon was called back to Washington to become chief Supreme Court librarian in the early l970s.

Though the tenure of Maine’s U.S. Attorneys since the advent of the two-party system were tied to the political parties controlling the White House, none say their service was otherwise involuntarily truncated.

In all, only 31 people have been Maine’s U.S. Attorney since George Washington appointed the first one in 1789; it’s a tribute to Maine so many have not only assembled remarkable accomplishments, but also none appear to have been blemished by scandal. It’s a history in contrast other districts outside Maine.

Take the case of Miami-based U.S. Attorney Kendall Coffey. According to The Associated Press, Coffey fled from office in 1996 “amid accusations that he bit a topless dancer on the arm during a visit to an adult club after losing a big drug case.” If past is prologue, such a scenario is unlikely in our state.

After all, in Delahanty’s words, “This is Maine.”

Paul H. Mills is a Farmington attorney well known for his analyses and historical understanding of Maine’s political scene, and the son of a former U.S. Attorney from Maine. E-mail him at [email protected].