President Trump’s Thanksgiving eve pardon of legally beleaguered retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn will surely be controversial, but it was the right thing to do.

Flynn, who was national security adviser for the first 22 days of Trump’s presidency, had engaged in some decidedly dubious foreign business dealings and then been significantly less than forthright about that work and about conversations he had with a Russian diplomat. Still, there is a distinction to be made between actions that can be described in common parlance as “unethical” and those that are criminal. For almost four years now, Flynn has been harried by prosecutors and judges and had his name besmirched (including through unethical leaks, to the potential harm of national security) without solid evidence of having committed a crime.