Posted on 12/20/2019 7:37:01 AM PST by NobleFree
The United States Supreme Court ruled in Nixon v. United States (1993):
"the three very specific requirements that the Constitution does impose on the Senate when trying impeachments [are]: The Members must be under oath, a two-thirds vote is required to convict, and the Chief Justice presides when the President is tried. These limitations are quite precise, and their nature suggests that the Framers did not intend to impose additional limitations on the form of the Senate proceedings" (emphasis added)
Ergo, if Mad Nan chooses not to 'formally deliver' the articles of impeachment and/or to not send 'managers' to present the House's case, the Senate is well within its Constitutional authority to proceed without them.
There are no entries for the senate on the CR of that date.
The CR of January 6 includes "Messages from the House". That entry confirms your statement.
The message further announced that the House has agreed to the following resolution:house resolution 10, in the House of Representatives, January 6, 1999
Resolved, That in continuance of the authority conferred in House Resolution 614 of the One Hundred Fifth Congress adopted by the House of Representatives and delivered to the Senate on December 19, 1998 ...
51 votes since they’ve essentially gotten rid of the 60 vote Cloture option under the Democrats several years ago and filibusters are not so powerful as they once were.
He was talking about the process\procedures.
The Constitution doesn’t provide for process.
Article I, Section 2, Clause 5 provides:
The House of Representatives ... shall have the sole Power of Impeachment.
Article I, Section 3, Clauses 6 and 7 provide:
The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments. When sitting for that Purpose, they shall be on Oath or Affirmation. When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside: And no Person shall be convicted without the Concurrence of two-thirds of the Members present.
Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States; but the Party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment and Punishment, according to Law.
Process for those above is left up to each of the House and Senate.
A number of rules have been adopted by the House and Senate and are honored by tradition.
The House had already violated its rules\process during the course of the impeachment inquiry.
Not following rules\process\procedures doesn’t mean he’s not impeached.
And no I’m not a lawyer...
If this ever if brought to SCOTUS,(and the fact that it hasn’t already should mean something) I’m guessing they don’t take it.
The Senate ought to demand one.
The dems are saying that they’ve released the articles of impeachment and that the Senate can act on that.
But if they are not formally delivered the official final copy, the House Dems could later turn around and claim that what the Senate took from whatever source it had, was not the OFFICIAL final version of the articles of impeachment, therefore the whole Senate hearing and vote was invalid and needed to be repeated.
They can claim what they want - the Senate has the sole power to try impeachments according however it decides.
I respectfully disagree. Until the Articles are officially transmitted, they have nothing official to take official notice on, requiring any action for them to make any act at all. They’ve got nothing to work with. All they would be doing is spinning their wheels. Pointless.
Stay in the real world, Noble. Law is about dotting the real “i”s and crossing real “t”s, not wasting time with hypothetical ones that may never arrive, because Queen Nancy is playing games, holding a football, ala Lucy van Pelt for Charlie Brown to kick in Peanuts.
See too, MESSAGES FROM THE HOUSE RECEIVED SUBSEQUENT TO SINE DIE ADJOURNMENT
MESSAGES FROM THE HOUSE RECEIVED SUBSEQUENT TO SINE DIE ADJOURNMENTUnder the authority of the order of the Senate of January 7, 1997, the Secretary of the Senate, on December 19, 1998, subsequent to the sine die adjournment of the Senate, received a message from the House of Representatives announcing that the House of Representatives has impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors William Jefferson Clinton, President of the United States; the House of Representatives adopted articles of impeachment against William Jefferson Clinton, which the managers on the part of the House of Representatives have been directed to carry to the Senate; and Mr. Hyde of Illinois, Mr. Sensenbrenner of Wisconsin, Mr. McCollum of Florida, Mr. Gekas of Pennsylvania, Mr. Canady of Florida, Mr. Buyer of Indiana, Mr. Bryant of Tennessee, Mr. Chabot of Ohio, Mr. Barr of Georgia, Mr. Hutchinson of Arkansas, Mr. Cannon of Utah, Mr. Rogan of California, and Mr. Graham of South Carolina, have been appointed as managers. ...
This is followed by the full text of H.Res.611, the articles of impeachment, and H.Res.614 appointing managers and resolving to send them to the senate.
Link?
They have Congressional Record entries for the article text and finalized votes to pass. Whether that's "official" is for them to decide.
The only law requiring official transmission is the rules the Senate has chosen, and can change - so all power re the impeachment is now with the Senate.
Think about it. Any action by the Senate, without a bill or articles passed to them officially by the House, cannot be said to have legally been originated by the sole power of the House of Representatives per the Constitution. Any Trial, disposal, etc, without using the official work product of the House, must a priori have originated in the Senate, and therefore be null and void for being unconstitutional.
Until the House’s original work product, the Articles of Impeachment, are officially transmitted from the House, the Senate can take no action on it, otherwise it has not constitutionally been originated in the House. Legally and Constitutionally it, because that product MUST originate with the house because the Constitution requires it. The Senate MUST be working with the legally transmitted documents, not something they just imputed or assumed to have been delivered. Anything less is constitutionally challengeable. . . And would be.
I clearly remember watching the newly appointed managers, along with the the Clerk of the House, walking out of House chambers, across the Capitol, and to the doors of the Senate. There, the Senate secretary signed a ledger and took possession of the folders containing the articles.
Quite a show for TV.
But good memory, and thank you for correcting me.
The clauses dicussing the impeachment power don't refer to "originated" nor any synonym.
And your claim is wrong anyway; if the House takes a vote and finalizes it as set down in the Congressional Record prior to any Senate action, then the matter did indeed originate in the House.
The resolution says that "the articles of impeachment be exhibited to the United States Senate".
There's a difference between exhibiting something and exhibiting "to" something.
Until the House compels Nancy to send the resolution "to" the Senate, the impeachment resolution hasn't been met.
But the Senate doesn’t have a valid impeachment resolution to work with. The resolution exhibited at the official site says that the resolution is only valid when sent “to” the Senate.
But the House says the resolution isn't an impeachment until it is exhibited "to" the Senate.
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