Ashcroft's Complex Tenure At Justice

Ashcroft was a failed presidential candidate and a Missouri senator who had just lost reelection to a dead man when Bush picked him to become attorney general in 2001. A favorite of Christian conservatives, he quickly drew attention when he held prayer sessions in his Justice Department office and when aides ordered $8,000 drapes to cover the bare-breasted "Spirit of Justice" sculpture in the building's Great Hall. He fought vigorously against abortion, affirmative action and gun control.

After Sept. 11, his department became the crucible for forging new law enforcement and intelligence-gathering methods, and he pressed aides to be creative in the use of power to stop any further attacks. He helped push through the Patriot Act by the end of that year, and he faced off against then-Secretary of State Colin L. Powell over whether to grant Guantanamo detainees the protections that prisoners of war are entitled to under the Geneva Conventions.

Ashcroft wanted to be able to interrogate detainees, while Powell argued that observing the conventions would discourage abuse of captured U.S. soldiers. The White House largely sided with Ashcroft, deciding not to grant detainees prisoner of war status.

But former officials said Ashcroft also rejected ideas he considered extreme. When one aide made such a suggestion, colleagues said Ashcroft replied, "I know I asked you to think outside the box, but I don't want you to think outside the Constitution." Chuck Rosenberg, who was Comey's chief of staff and is now a U.S. attorney in Virginia, said, "I always thought Ashcroft was an extremely principled guy."

Ashcroft wanted to interrogate Guantanamo detainees, but former officials said he also argued that they had to be given some form of legal process, putting him at odds with Rumsfeld and Cheney. When Rumsfeld backed off and proposed creating military tribunals, Ashcroft again chafed. For instance, former officials said, he objected to the fact that detainees would have no right to appeal verdicts and forced that to be changed.

"He was personally offended about the way they went about it," said one former aide who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. "He said something to Rumsfeld like, 'You guys gave more process to [Oklahoma City bomber] Tim McVeigh than you are doing in this case, and you knew he did it.' He understood we had to hold these guys and that it could still be done with some sense of process and American fairness. He kept asking, 'Why are we creating problems?' "

Out of loyalty to Bush, former aides said, Ashcroft did not make these dissents public.

"He was a voice for moderation on a wide range of issues that he never got credit for because he did it the right way, behind the scenes," said another former official who asked not to be named. "On many, many issues the administration has gotten itself in trouble on, if they had listened to his advice, they would have been better off."

That is not the way it was seen in the White House. Ashcroft was viewed by some Bush aides as too independent and eager for the spotlight; he particularly irritated them by arranging a satellite hookup from Moscow, where he was visiting, to announce the arrest of terrorism suspect Jose Padilla.

"They resented some of his showboating," said a former White House aide who did not want to be identified to avoid offending Ashcroft. "Almost alone among the Cabinet secretaries, he was seen as a self-promoter and grandstander."

By the time Bush won a second term, Ashcroft had decided to step down and the White House made clear that was fine. But he feared internal rivals would leak his decision, so he wrote his resignation letter by hand and personally delivered it to Bush on Election Day, Corallo said.

"He was not going to trust these people to spin his resignation and backstab him any more," he said. "In the end, the only one he trusted was the president."

Staff writer John Solomon contributed to this report.