Editorials

Of all the offices in this state that should be above suspicion, the Office of Attorney General leads the list.

The attorney general is our chief law enforcement officer. So it follows that the one who holds that office should understand and obey both the letter and the spirit of the law. Moreover, the attorney general must do nothing that would suggest that he or she would use the office to gain favors for themselves or their friends. In the recent election, with revelations of influence peddling scandalizing the nation, the very suggestion of this sort of impropriety could defeat a candidate.

Fortunately for Alabama Attorney General Troy King that election is over. Were the campaign still going on voters might have turned on him if they had learned that even as his office was investigating the state’s two-year college system, King was asking system then-Chancellor Roy Johnson to find a job for the mother of his top aide — and the chancellor did.

As far as we know, what King did was not illegal. However, dismissing the incident as something that was not “an uncommon thing” suggests that the attorney general does not understand that to voters, that sort of attitude is part of the problem in Montgomery. For the attorney general of Alabama to fail to grasp how the public perceives what he has done makes one wonder if he has the sound judgment and ethical standards the job requires.

Think about it.

You are the head of an agency that is being investigated and the head of the department doing the investigating calls and asks you to consider someone for employment. What do you do? Tell them no?

Or, do as Roy Johnson did. Get things lined up and call back to announce that “it might work out.”

And, of course, work out it did.

Now King says that because what he did was discovered, he will not take part in the investigation of Johnson and in any judicial action that might follow. Which, of course, is what he should do.

However, dropping out of the investigation deprives the state of the services of the man elected to handle cases such as this.

But on the other hand, if this had not been revealed and King had gone on to try the case, what sort of service would the state be getting?

We hope Troy King sees the problem here — and understands.