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N.Y. governor's journey toward resignation
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After breaking the news to his family Sunday, Spitzer summoned his closest advisers, Lloyd Constantine and Richard Baum. The small group huddled at his home until midnight.
Spitzer thought his career was over, said aides, all speaking to the AP on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the discussions. Constantine and Spitzer's wife urged him not to resign right away.
"He thought he should resign from the very beginning," one aide said. "It was really family and others' suggestion that he should hang on."
Monday morning, Spitzer was visited by his sister Emily, an accomplished attorney. A half-dozen personal and political advisers were told. So was Michele Hirshman, a criminal defense attorney and his former deputy attorney general.
Aware that the Times was close to posting a story about the investigation, Spitzer scheduled an announcement at his midtown Manhattan office.
Headline on Times' Web site
At about 2 p.m., a headline flashed across the top of the Times' Web site: "Spitzer linked to prostitution ring."
More than an hour later, a pale, watery-eyed Spitzer took his wife before national TV cameras, bit his lip and apologized.
"I have acted in a way that violates my obligations to my family and violates my — or any — sense of right and wrong," he said.
"I apologize first and most importantly to my family. I apologize to the public, whom I promised better."
He didn't say then what he was apologizing for, or what he would do next.
It took less than an hour for the first Republican to call for his resignation; others soon talked of impeachment.
No Democrats came forward to defend him.
On Wall Street, where Spitzer built his reputation as a crusader against shady practices and overly generous pay, cheers erupted on the trading floor. Many financial industry types thought the "Sheriff of Wall Street" was a holier-than-thou bully who had overzealously ruined many careers.
'Eliot and the Call Girl'
By Tuesday, more details had seeped out. A law enforcement official said Spitzer was a repeat customer of the Emperors Club, paying up to $80,000 over an extended period.
Serious criminal charges were possible: soliciting sex; violating the Mann Act, the 1910 federal law that makes it a crime to induce someone to cross state lines for immoral purposes; and arranging cash transactions to conceal their purpose.
Newspapers plastered photos of Spitzer next to his sad-eyed wife across front pages under headlines like "Pay for Luv Gov," and "Eliot and the Call Girl." Late-night comedians devoted entire monologues to the scandal.
Spitzer and family, holed up at the Fifth Avenue apartment, hardly ate or slept. He talked occasionally to his defense team that grew to include Ted Wells, a lawyer for I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff. Hirshman spent hours with prosecutors learning more about the possible case against Spitzer.
Silda Wall Spitzer stopped telling her husband not to resign, aides said.
One poll said 70 percent of the state wanted him to step down.
The governor steps down
On Wednesday, national TV showed a macabre motorcade carrying the Spitzers back to midtown, to the same conference room he used for his announcement two days earlier.
Reading a statement calmly, without his trademark rapid-fire bravado, Spitzer ended his career, opening the way for Lt. Gov. David Paterson to become the first black governor of New York.
"Over the course of my public life I have insisted, I believe correctly, that people, regardless of their position or power, take responsibility for their conduct. I can and will ask no less of myself," Spitzer said.
"For this reason I am resigning from the office of governor."
Silda Wall Spitzer, dark circles under her eyes, stood a few inches farther from him than she had Monday, staring blankly into space.
"It wasn't real to me until I saw her face," one close aide said.
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