WASHINGTON, March 14 — As he pressed his case to be confirmed as attorney general, Alberto R. Gonzales made a promise to the Senate Judiciary Committee — and to the nation at large.

“I will no longer represent only the White House,” he testified in 2005 as he prepared to leave his job as White House counsel. “I will represent the United States of America and its people. I understand the differences between the two roles.”

Yet in one of his first acts in his new job, Mr. Gonzales brought over two top White House aides and elevated a third, D. Kyle Sampson, a Justice Department staff member who had worked in the White House. Within days, Mr. Sampson began identifying federal prosecutors to oust, an effort initiated by Harriet E. Miers, the fellow Texan who succeeded Mr. Gonzales at the White House.

The attorney general’s accumulating critics point to the removal of seven prosecutors in December as evidence that Mr. Gonzales, a longtime Bush loyalist, had failed to distance himself and his agency from the White House and its political agenda.