{"id":800779,"date":"2019-10-28T13:49:18","date_gmt":"2019-10-28T19:49:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.summitdaily.com\/?p=373702"},"modified":"2019-10-28T13:49:18","modified_gmt":"2019-10-28T19:49:18","slug":"opinion-morgan-liddick-impeachment-then-and-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/local-news\/opinion-morgan-liddick-impeachment-then-and-now\/","title":{"rendered":"Opinion | Morgan Liddick: Impeachment, then and now"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Capitol Hill Democrats are now at the
\nsmear-by-faux-impeachment phase of their efforts to reverse the 2016
\npresidential election, so let\u2019s review some of what the founders themselves
\nthought about impeachment.<\/p>\n

Impeachment stirred a long discussion in the Constitutional
\nConvention, well-documented in James Madison\u2019s notes conveying the gravity with
\nwhich the convention\u2019s delegates considered it. Benjamin Franklin argued for including
\nimpeachment July 20, 1787. Three other delegates, including Charles Pinkney, were
\ndubious, holding that the remedy
\nto a bad executive lay in elections<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Rufus King put his finger on an important point against
\nimpeachment: Giving the legislative branch power to remove the president \u201ctends
\nto undermine the power of the executive<\/a>\u201d and the principle of divided
\ngovernment. As political parties \u2014 called \u201cfactions\u201d by many of the founders \u2014
\nemerged, impeachment also became an \u201cextra-electoral\u201d device to exercise power
\nas some of the founders feared. This took a while, but by the time Andrew
\nJohnson was set up by the Tenure of Office Act, impeachment for political
\npurposes was a fact.<\/p>\n

From Madison\u2019s notes, it was clear that delegates considered
\nimpeachment important, but specific offenses posed problems. Many
\npossible crimes \u2014 from \u201cbetrayal of trust to foreign interests\u201d to outright
\ncorruption and theft of public funds \u2014 were considered<\/a>. \u201cTreason\u201d was clear.
\nSo was bribery. Other crimes were trickier. \u201cMaladministration\u201d was suggested
\nbut rejected as too vague. Finally, the convention settled on George Mason\u2019s
\n\u201chigh crimes and misdemeanors,\u201d a British legal term of art indicating crimes
\nby public officials against the government itself.<\/p>\n

Delegates also had several ideas about the purposes of
\nimpeachment. Some, not anticipating its use for partisan purposes, suggested it
\nmight actually provide public
\nvindication for the accused official<\/a> through quick and open inquiry.  <\/sup>This general attitude of fairness with regard
\nto impeachment also informed the founders\u2019 development of the process for it. Until
\nlate in the convention, it was argued that the House of Representatives should
\nbring an impeachment with trial before the Supreme Court. It was only on Sept.
\n8, 1787, that agreement
\nwas reached to move any trial to the Senate<\/a>. Despite that, it was clear
\nthat almost all delegates saw the process as judicial and expected it would conform
\nto expectations of a \u201cspeedy and public trial.\u201d This attitude was confirmed by
\npractice; the Senate has voted impeachments with reticence and in ways that
\nsuggest officeholders should be removed only
\nfor criminal offenses or gross incompetence<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Now this judicial tradition of an impeachment involving probity,
\nopenness and reliance on evidence is being destroyed before our very eyes. In
\nthe House of Representatives, a single standing committee has, without a vote
\nof authorization from the entire body, apparently begun an impeachment
\ninvestigation. This is not what Thomas Jefferson\u2019s manual of procedures for the
\nHouse \u2014 still in use, barely \u2014 indicates should happen; if not expressly
\nforbidden, it has never happened before.<\/p>\n

More disturbing, Democrats are holding this investigation in
\nsecret, with secret witnesses giving secret testimony, which is then edited,
\nmassaged, embellished and leaked to the credulous media, who are happy to
\nspread the confabulations and half-truths far and wide. As a Department
\nof Justice briefing paper notes<\/a>, while this sort of ex-parte impeachment
\nhearing was practiced very early, it has not been done for a very long time.   <\/p>\n

Is this the sort of government we want? Partisan
\ninvestigation out of the public eye, with no opportunity for the accused or his
\ndefenders to challenge witnesses, many of whom have consorted with those
\nrunning the investigation? No opportunities to present exculpatory information?
\nAccusations based on hearsay, innuendo, rumor and opprobrium, often spread by
\nthe committee chairman himself, who has a problem with the truth. Unless Adam
\nSchiff really has the \u201cevidence of collusion\u201d between Trump and Russia he
\npromised back in May<\/a>. Or the false \u201ctranscript\u201d of Trump\u2019s phone call with
\nthe Ukrainian president he presented to the public wasn\u2019t the \u201cparody\u201d he
\nclaims it was now
\nthat he\u2019s been caught fibbing<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The entire sordid process only needs some stars painted on
\nthe ceiling of the Judiciary Committee\u2019s rooms to make the re-creation of
\nStuart monarchs\u2019 Star Chamber complete. Not incidentally, the abuses of that
\noffice were behind the creation of the fifth and sixth amendments to our
\nConstitution; Democrats \u2014 who claim such concern for the document nowadays \u2014
\nshould probably stop shredding that part of it if they wish to retain any
\nsemblance of credibility.<\/p>\n

Morgan Liddick\u2019s column \u201cOn Your Right\u201d publishes Tuesdays in the Summit Daily News. Liddick spent 27 years working for the U.S. Foreign Service, primarily living abroad. He also spent 12 years teaching U.S. history and Western civilization at community colleges in Colorado and Texas. He lived in Summit County as recently as 2015. Contact him at <\/em>mcliddick@hotmail.com<\/a><\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

via:: Summit Daily<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Capitol Hill Democrats are now at the smear-by-faux-impeachment phase of their efforts to reverse the 2016 presidential election, so let\u2019s review some of what the founders themselves thought about impeachment. Impeachment stirred a long discussion in the Constitutional Convention, well-documented in James Madison\u2019s notes conveying the gravity with which the convention\u2019s delegates considered it. Benjamin […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[99],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-800779","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-27 15:39:01","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSMT The Mountain","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/800779","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=800779"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/800779\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=800779"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=800779"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=800779"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}