HOUSE OVERSIGHT 030203 resolution." The memorandum concluded that while the demands of the presidency preclude subjecting the chief executive to criminal process, no such importance attaches to the office of the vice president. Because Agnew pleaded no contest to an indictment in a negotiated agreement, there was no resolution of his claim of immunity from indictment. Although the charges had been serious (Agnew was said to have accepted containers of cash in the White House), he was allowed to plead to a single count and serve no prison time, essentially in exchange for his resignation from the vice presidency___an outcome that may not have been possible had Agnew not been susceptible to indictment. 3. The Feb. 12, 1974, Memorandum to Independent Counsel Leon Jaworski. The attorneys in the Office of Watergate Special Prosecutor Leon Jaworski concluded that there was no legal bar to indicting a sitting president and that the office should recommend either that the grand jury indict President Nixon or that criminal charges against him be incorporated into a formal grand jury presentment. Jaworski concluded that the best course, with impeachment proceedings in the offing, was to include Nixon as an unindicted co- conspirator in the indictment of the other Watergate defendants. The memo notes at the outset that As we understand it, the conclusions regarding indictment of an incumbent President reached by the Department of Justice, the U.S. Attorney's office, and this office, are all consistent: there is nothing in the language or legislative history of the Constitution that bars indictment of a sitting president, but there are a number of 'policy' factors that weigh heavily against it. The memo finds those policy considerations offset by competing considerations. For us or the grand jury to shirk from an appropriate expression of our honest assessment of the evidence of the President's guilt would not only be a departure from our responsibilitie