WASHINGTON (AP) – House Speaker Dennis Hastert demanded Wednesday that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) surrender documents it seized and remove agents involved in the weekend raid of

Democrat William Jefferson’s office, under what lawmakers of both parties said were unconstitutional circumstances.

“We think those materials ought to be returned,” Hastert said, adding that the FBI agents involved “ought to be frozen out of that (case) just for the sake of the constitutional aspects of it”.

The Saturday night search of congressman Jefferson’s office on Capitol Hill brought Democrats and Republicans together in rare election-year accord, with both parties protesting agency conduct they said violated the Constitution’s separation of powers doctrine.

Democrats, meanwhile, sought to get Jefferson to resign his seat on the House’s most prestigious panel.

“In the interest of upholding the high ethical standard of the House Democratic Caucus, I am writing to request your immediate resignation from the Ways and Means Committee,” wrote House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi in the one-sentence correspondence.

Jefferson was defiant.

“With respect, I decline to do so,” he wrote back to Pelosi.”I will not give up a committee assignment that is so vital to New Orleans at this crucial time for any uncertain, long-term political strategy.”

His spokeswoman, Melanie Roussell, added that Jefferson will not resign from Congress.

Republicans, meanwhile, were being careful to protest the raid without defending Jefferson, in an increasingly tense relationship with the White House over its use of executive power.

A day earlier, Hastert (R-Ill), complained personally to President Bush about the raid. Other House officials have predicted that the case would bring all three branches together at the Supreme Court for a constitutional showdown.

In April, Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter personally told Bush that “the president doesn’t have a blank check” during a discussion of Bush’s domestic wiretapping programme.

Hastert kept up the drumbeat after the FBI’s raid of Jefferson’s office.

“My opinion is that they took the wrong path,” Hastert said after meeting with Bush in the White House. “They need to back up, and we need to go from there.”

The developments are the beginning of what lawmakers predict will be a long dispute over the FBI’s search of Jefferson’s office last weekend. Historians say it was the first raid of a representative’s quarters in Congress’ 219 years.

FBI agents searched Jefferson’s office in pursuit of evidence in a bribery investigation. The search warrant, signed by US District Court Judge Thomas Hogan, was based on an affidavit that said agents found US$90,000 (euro70,000) in cash wrapped and stashed in the freezer of Jefferson’s home.

White House officials said they did not learn of the search until after it happened. They pledged to work with the Justice Department to soothe lawmakers.