Presidential Impeachment
Impeachment of a President is in the United States Constitution as kind of a last resort to allow for the legislative branch of government to remove a President that was out of control. That is why, in my opinion, the requirements for an impeachment are relatively vague from a legal point of view. There are no specifics as what constitutes justification of impeachment. The “High Crimes and Misdemeanors” can, and has been, interpreted any which way Congress wants to do so. In fact, Representative Maxine Waters from California (in)famously, but accurately, proclaimed, “Impeachment is about whatever the Congress says it is. There is no law that dictates impeachment. What the Constitution says is ‘high crimes and misdemeanors,’ and we define that.”
Sadly, in the two cases of actual use of the impeachment clause that is exactly how the House of Representatives has used it, any old damned way they wanted to. We, the average citizen, seem to have this attitude that our Congress people act on some higher plain than they actually do. In truth, when actually given the opportunity, they have used the impeachment clause for petty, childish, political reasons that did not have anything to do with the President’s ability or integrity in running the country.
Andrew Johnson
When I went to school, all we heard about Andrew Johnson was, briefly:
- A self-educated man from Tennessee.
- Was a compromise Vice President for Abraham Lincoln’s second term.
- Drunk when he made his inaugural address.
- Was an incompetent president.
- Was impeached by Congress and remained in office by one Senate vote.
Now I am not going to address the veracity of the opinionated aspects of the above, but the facts are accurate as far as they go. But, hark! What was he impeached for? That either never is covered or is almost an afterthought. Even though I am a big student of history, I honestly cannot remember while in school that I even know what crime was that warranted his impeachment.
Simply put, he had the audacity to fire his Secretary of War, Edmund Stanton. You see, Congress passed a law called the “Tenure of Office Act” over the veto of President Johnson. It stated that the President could not remove an appointed officer from office without the approval of Congress if Congress were involved in the approval of that person’s appointment. If you look at the history of this act, it was passed specifically to restrict Andrew Johnson from removing Abraham Lincoln’s cabinet members. In particular, Edmund Stanton, a person who had, and exercised, and inordinate amount of personal power. Congress used that law to reinstated Stanton to office and to begin Articles of Impeachment against Andrew Johnson. By the way, this law was later ruled to be Unconstitutional.
So what they impeached Andrew Johnson for was firing one of his cabinet members without the approval of Congress. In no way was this an attempt to remove a President from office for any real abuse of power, any criminal activity whether a High Crime or a Misdemeanor. It was definitely a political move. If you look at the party affiliation, even though Andrew Johnson was a member of the “National Union” party, this was a party of convenience. In reality, he was a Democrat who ran with Abraham Lincoln as a coalition party candidate. Therefore, the Republican Party, which was in the majority, wanted to curtail the power of Andrew Johnson and exercise more control on how they, Congress, handled the South in post-war regulations and laws.
So, in my estimation, the first impeachment effort cannot be classified as using the act for real purposes but instead for purely venal political motives.
Bill Clinton
As this is in the recent past, we should all be aware of the reasons for the impeachment of William Jefferson Clinton. In short, he was impeached for lying. Lying specifically about having an extramarital affair with an intern. More specifically, lying about having oral sex from Monica Lewinsky. Now, I am not going to defend his actions, nor justify them in any way. What he did was wrong. Faced with the same situation, I might have done the same thing. Just to be clear, I would never have faced such a situation because I would not have done such a thing. The fact that he lied is not a surprise. In fact, I will even grant that technically they might have met the ground of impeachment. I do not think so, but I will grant the premise.
Here is the really cheesy, deplorable, base political aspect of it, though. The Republican Party lost the majority in the House of Representatives in the mid-term elections when all of this dustup was occurring. Because he had a short window to vent his political vitriol, a Congressman by the name of Newt Gingrich called congress back from hiatus before the new Congress would be sworn in to vote Articles of Impeachment on President Clinton.
Here is the thing. There was no consensus that the actions met the levels of impeachment. If Congress had met as they normally would have, there would be insufficient votes to get the vote of impeachment. It was totally political, completely along party lines, and did not meet the criteria that impeachment should meet.
Dishonorable Mention
These are at least some of the Presidents that should have, could have, or would have been impeached if the impeachment process had worked properly. This is not necessarily a complete list and might contain Presidents that you might not agree with, but, what the heck, it is my list. I also have my reasons and they are decided not political and are based upon my naïve opinion of what the impeachment articles should be used for.
I did not reach back into the 19th Century as the rules and sensibilities of government were so very different than they are now it is hard to apply 21st Century ideals now. Also, let’s face it, time has a way of abrogating their actions.
Richard Nixon
Richard Nixon broke the law! That is a fact. We need not dwell into what he did but here are the basics. He was involved in:
- Illegal campaign contributions being funneled into his campaign.
- Condoning illegal wiretapping and break-ins by White House employees with this full knowledge.
- Actively condoning and supporting the cover-up of these activities, including suborning perjury.
To top this all off, he taped himself do it. Not only was he a criminal, he was a stupid criminal. This is a classic example of an intelligent individual being stupid.
He would have been impeached. The numbers were there. I was just a matter of the vote occurring. I believe, and the evidence bears this out, he would have been removed from office. Thus, he would have been (at that time) the second President impeached he would have been the first President removed from office by the Articles of Impeachment.
As history shows us, the only reason that he did not get impeached was he resigned. Not because of a lack of guilt but because he avoided the realities of his fate.
Warren G. Harding
Now here was a piece of work. Warren baby was such a sweetheart that he gambled away the White House china in a poker game. How’s that for being a man of the people. But that would not have put him on the map for impeachment. Where he shined was when he signed executive orders to set in place the leasing of federal oil reserves to private companies without bid. This became known as the Teapot Dome Scandal. The sad thing is that this is just one of many scandals that history has laid on the doorstep of Warren G. Harding.
Why wasn’t he impeached? The main reason, in all likelihood, is that most of the scandals that are associated with Harding were made public after he had died in office. In fact, conspiracy theorists have bandied about the idea that he conveniently died in office before he could be prosecuted.
Ronald Reagan
I know, I know. This looks like I am being political, especially given my political bent. However, look at it from the LAW’s point of view. On his watch, people working in the White House did the following illegally sold weapons to Iran and took the profits to fund the Contra’s in Nicaragua. Let me repeat this; it was against the law. We were in a state of conflict with Iran – remember the Iran hostage situation anyone? Also, Congress had specifically passed laws to deny U.S. support to the Contra’s.
This is not my opinion. These are the facts. It is available for anyone to read. Look at the indictments. Look at the convictions.
There is reasonable, reliable, evidence that this was directed by the Oval Office (a.k.a., Ronald Reagan). Let us be honest; there was sufficient evidence that a formal investigation should have been done. At the very least, a Special Prosecutor should have been put in place. In reality, the evidence was sufficient to begin Articles of Impeachment with the Senate making the final decision.
The reason it was not done. Politics. The Republican Party was in the majority and Ronald Reagan was too popular.
Now there is another, hidden, possibility. It may be that key Congressmen were aware that Ronald Reagan was suffering from Alzheimer’s and was not cognizant of what was going on.
George W. Bush
Here is the thing. I do not know if impeachment would have been the right action for the power grab of George W. Bush. The problem is that I do not know if there would have been any other avenue to correct his actions – actions that could be exercised by any other President if s/he so chooses in the future.
Specifically, the use of Signing Statements. In July 2006, a task force of the American Bar Association stated that the use of signing statements to modify the meaning of duly enacted laws serves to “undermine the rule of law and our constitutional system of separation of powers”. Pretty heady stuff don’t you think.
Now W. did not originate their use, not did their use end with him. He just took it to new heights, essentially usurping the will of Congress. The worse part was that he was doing it based upon advice of the new Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. This means that it was pretty tricky to get an impartial opinion.
My take was that it would have taken an impeachment hearing to settle this once and for all given that a hearing before the Supreme Court seemed to be out of the question. Was this the right venue – probably not. Was there another venue – probably not.
CONCLUSION
The use of the Articles of Impeachment should be the last resort to remove a despot from office or to curtail the powers of said despot. When those opportunities have availed themselves, political realities have protected these people from Impeachment.
Conversely, when Impeachment have been used, it has been used specifically for the most venal forms of politics.
We are currently in a situation where we have a President that is obviously corrupt and out of control. At the same time, it is becoming increasingly obvious that he has lost touch with reality and is surrounded by people who are willing to take advantage of his mental incompetence. The fact that nothing has been done so far is, once again, proof that Impeachment is a political football. Sadly, it will need a change in the political makeup to possibly implement Articles of Impeachment. Also, sadly, delusional people who support his actions will feel that these actions are politically motivated.
