Boilerplate Special

Considering how fast the blogosphere and media can get out a story, you've probably already heard this:

Housing and Urban Development Secretary Alphonso Jackson was back home in Dallas on April 28 giving a speech to minority real estate folks and offering a most interesting take on how business is done in Washington.

Jackson, former head of the Dallas Housing Authority, recounted a conversation he had in the nation's capital with a minority publisher.

"He had made every effort to get a contract with HUD for 10 years," Jackson said of the bidder, according to an account of the speech in the Dallas Business Journal. "He made a heck of a proposal and was on the GSA [General Services Administration] list, so we selected him. He came to see me and thank me for selecting him.

"Then he said something. . . . He said, 'I have a problem with your president.' I said, 'What do you mean?' He said, 'I don't like President Bush. ' I thought to myself, 'Brother, you have a disconnect -- the president is elected, I was selected. You wouldn't be getting the contract unless I was sitting here. If you have a problem with the president, don't tell the secretary.' "He didn't get the contract," Jackson continued. "Why should I reward someone who doesn't like the president, so they can use funds to try to campaign against the president? Logic says they don't get the contract. That's the way I believe."

While the same article says that Jackson's contract denial violates "the Constitution's prohibitions on government retaliation for speech" and perhaps federal procurement law, a government contracts specialist that I interviewed says that may not be true.

An agency may be able to drop a contract for any reason, or none at all, depending on how the specific contract is written. Many of the state and federal government contracts he has worked on have a clause in the boilerplate (legal fine print) that stipulates that the government can terminate the contract for any reason or none at all with a 30-day notice. He said he sees contracts terminated for political reasons "all the time."

Let me be very clear in saying that I think it is morally shameful for Jackson to fire a qualified vendor over political differences. A federal agency works for all Americans regardless of political stripes, not just Democrats or Republicans.

Alphonso Jackson should certainly step down for his behavior, but it doesn't appear that he'll fact criminal charges for a practice that seems something less than rare.