Savings and Loan Senate Ethics Investigation

The Senate Ethics Committee ended eight weeks of hearings on the conduct of five senators in the failure of the Lincoln Savings and Loan, a California banking institution. The senators were accused of accepting large donations to their campaign funds from the head of the failed savings and loan in return for interfering with and discouraging federal regulators from investigating the financial dealings of Lincoln Savings and Loan. In the concluding arguments, special counsel Robert Bennett to the ethics panel singled out Senators Cranston, DeConcini, and Riegle as

being most responsible for preventing federal regulators from their investigation of the savings and loan. The senators denied any connections between campaign contributions and their actions concerning the federal regulators, and they accused Mr. Bennett of fabricating rules of ethical conduct to frame the senators. Mr. DeConcini was the only senator to testify during the closing arguments. close