Pardon me for posting this again here...
Impeachment of Supreme Court Justices
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Constitution of the United States
Article I Section 2: The House of Representatives shall choose their speaker and other officers; and shall have the sole power of impeachment.
Article II Section 4: The President, Vice President and all civil officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.
Article III Section 1: The judicial power of the United States shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish. The judges, both of the supreme and inferior courts, shall hold their offices during good behavior, and shall, at stated times, receive for their services, a compensation, which shall not be diminished during their continuance in office.
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A Supreme Court Justice may be impeached by the House of Representatives and then removed from office if convicted in a Senate trial, but only for the same types of offenses that would trigger impeachment proceedings for any other government official under Article I and II of the Constitution.
Article III, Section 1 states that judges shall hold their offices “during good behavior.” The courts have interpreted the phrase “good behavior” to be the same level of seriousness as “high crimes and misdemeanors”.
So, although the mechanism for doing so exists, NO Supreme Court justice has EVER been “removed from office” by the Senate, and ONLY ONE Supreme Court Justice has ever been “impeached” by the House of Representatives.
In 1804, the House of Representatives accused Samuel Chase (a signer of the Declaration of Independence) of letting his political leanings affect his rulings, and served him with eight articles of impeachment. One article concerned Chase’s handling of the trial of John Fries; two concerned his conduct in the trial of James Callender; four concerned Chase’s procedural errors on various matters; and the eighth article had to do with Chase’s “intemperate and inflammatory”; “indecent and unbecoming”; “highly unwarrantable”; and “highly indecent” remarks made to a Baltimore grand jury. In 1805, the Senate acquitted Chase of all charges, establishing the right of the judiciary to independent opinion. Chase continued on the Court until his death in June 1811.
In 1957, Georgia Governor Marvin Griffin signed a resolution passed by the Georgia General Assembly titled “The Impeachment of Certain U.S. Supreme Court Justices”. The resolution targeted six Supreme Court Justices (Earl Warren, Hugo Black, William O. Douglas, Tom Campbell Clark, Felix Frankfurter, and Stanley Forman Reed) who were believed to be enabling communism with their decisions “for usurping the congressional power to make law in violation of Article I, Sections I and 8”, “violations of Sections 3 and 5 of the 14th Amendment”, and “nullification of the 10th Amendment of the Constitution.” Nothing ever came of their efforts. Signs were erected across the south saying “Impeach Earl Warren”, many of which were still standing when Warren retired from the bench in 1969.
Abe Fortas (served from 1965-1969) was almost impeached due to a tax and financial scandal involving Wall Street financier, Louis Wolfson. When President Richard Nixon learned of the scandal, he said Fortas should be “off of there”. The House of Representatives had already taken preliminary steps toward impeachment. Chief Justice Earl Warren urged Fortas to resign, to save the reputation of the Court. Fortas resisted at first, but eventually stepped down “to avoid damaging his wife’s legal career”.
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