Government has the role of suiting people for freedom. People aren't made for freedom spontaneously. There's sort of a 19-year race between when people are born and when they become adults. And government has a role in making them at the end of 19 years suited to be upright trustworthy repositories of popular sovereignty.
If we had failed to pursue the facts as far as they led we would have denied the public any knowledge of an unprecedented scheme of political surveillance and sabotage.