The US supreme court yesterday issued an order disbarring former president Bill Clinton from practising law before the high court. The ruling is seen as marking the official end of the Monica Lewinsky scandal.

The ruling struck a jarring note in the current mood of national unity. Mr Clinton has been praised for the supportive role he has been playing and the way he has thrown his political weight behind President George Bush.

The court did not explain its reasons for the disbarment, although such a decision usually follows disbarment in a lower court. In April, Mr Clinton's Arkansas law licence was suspended for five years and he was given a $25,000 fine.

He had agreed to that disbarment as a form of plea bargain in January, on the day before he left office, after reaching a deal to bring an end to the Lewinsky investigation, in which he could have faced charges for contempt.

There is no fine involved in the supreme court ruling and no vote was taken by the judges on their decision. His lawyer, David Kendall, said that his client would be contesting the disbarment. Mr Kendall said it was "inappropriate".

Mr Clinton has not practised law since 1983; his main income now is from speech-making and the advance for his proposed memoirs.

The original disbarment lawsuit was brought by a professional conduct committee of the Arkansas supreme court in the wake of the Lewinsky revelations and Mr Clinton's admission that he lied to the investigation. The committee had also sought to disbar the ex-president for giving misleading testimony in the Paula Jones sexual harassment case.

Yesterday's ruling should mark an end to the legal process against Mr Clinton over the Lewinsky scandal, but an investigation is still under way into the pardons he granted during his last days in office. He is, however, unlikely to face charges.

Mr Clinton and Robert Ray, the Whitewater prosecutor, worked out their deal late last year. Mr Ray promised not to prosecute the president when he left office if Mr Clinton agreed to the suspension of his Arkansas law license for a significant period. The White House meeting between the two eventually led to the deal that spared Mr Clinton the prospect of indictment.

Yesterday's supreme court ruling came at a time when Mr Clinton had been praised for launching a scheme to raise money for scholarships for the children of victims of the September 11 terrorist attacks, and for supporting President Bush.

His speedy return from Australia in the wake of the tragedy - he visited New York before Mr Bush - and his presence at memorial services has helped to erase in the public mind the issue of the dubious pardons.

 The supreme court rejected arguments that Terry Nichols, the accomplice of Timothy McVeigh in the Oklahoma City bombing, was entitled to a new trial because of FBI blunders.

Nichols claimed that the FBI's failure to give McVeigh's lawyers all documents relevant to that trial supported his own assertion that government lawyers had failed to turn over material that could have helped him during his 1997 trial.