Posted on 03/30/2014 8:54:52 AM PDT by sgtyork
This may come as a shock to Lois Lerner, but the House of Representatives has the authority to jail her unless she changes her mind about refusing to answer questions about her role in the IRS scandal. Essentially, what is required for that to happen is for a House majority to vote for a motion holding her in contempt and House Speaker John Boehner to then direct the House sergeant at arms to arrest and confine her. Under the Constitution, the House can do that under its “inherent contempt” authority, which was initially exercised in 1795 during the First Congress and on multiple occasions thereafter. Lerner could be held until January 2015 when a new Congress is seated, which could issue another subpoena and throw her in the clink again if she still balks at testifying.
According to a 2012 Congressional Research Service report, inherent contempt has the unique advantage that it doesn’t require “the cooperation or assistance of either the executive or judicial branches. The House or Senate can, on its own, conduct summary proceedings and cite the offender for contempt.” The prospect of an eight or nine month stretch in the congressional slammer might have a sobering effect on Lerner. On the other hand, neither the House nor the Senate has used this authority since 1935, according to the CRS report, because the process can be “unseemly” and time-consuming.
The prospect of an eight or nine month stretch in the congressional slammer might have a sobering effect on Lerner.
Plus, Lerner may be on solid ground in thinking Boehner and other House Republicans don't have the political spine to jail her. But just as the South's “massive resistance” in the 1950s to racial integration was doomed to fail because it could not be sustained over time, the Obama administration's comprehensive refusal since November 2010 to cooperate with legitimate congressional oversight by House committees may be sowing seeds of frustration that eventually undercut Lerner's calculation of how long she can keep silent. Chairman Darrell Issa of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and Rep. Jim Jordan, who heads that panel's oversight subcommittee, are patient individuals but perhaps not that patient.
Something else is also clear: House leaders have effectively laid the legal predicate for a contempt vote. Earlier this week, the Office of General Counsel for the House delivered its opinion that Issa's committee has satisfied all legal requirements in its dealings with Lerner and her Fifth Amendment claim, so “there is no constitutional impediment to … the committee approving a resolution recommending that the full House hold Ms. Lerner in contempt of Congress …”
Contempt citations aren't common but neither are they a thing of the past. Among those cited for contempt just since 1980 are such notables as Attorney General Eric Holder, then-White House Chief of Staff Joshua Bolten and then-White House General Counsel Harriet Miers, then-Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Anne Gorsuch Burford and then-EPA Assistant Administrator Rita Lavelle.
Every person who having been summoned as a witness by the authority of either House of Congress to give testimony or to produce papers upon any matter under inquiry before either House, or any joint committee established by a joint or concurrent resolution of the two Houses of Congress, or any committee of either House of Congress, willfully makes default, or who, having appeared, refuses to answer any question pertinent to the question under inquiry, shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, punishable by a fine of not more than [$100,000] nor less than $100 and imprisonment in a common jail for not less than one month nor more than twelve months.
But will the House have the b*lls to put her behind bars?
Imagine the backlash coming from Obama, RATS and MSM.
Such action would set a precedence for future revenge when the tables are turned.
Lois Lerner knew instinctively, that, it was in the best interest of bigger government and its enablers, the Bolshecrat Party, the TEA party needed to be stopped. Should she ever get immunity it will stop with her and no one else will be charged.
Oh yes, Lois Lerner could go to jail. And monkeys could fly out of my rear end. Frankly with the sort of Republican leadership we now have I believe the latter possibility to be more likely.
Surely not Shirley!
Step One in this process is trying to figure out how to retrive certain important body parts Boehner needs from the Clinton Lock Box.
Concur, John Boehner is compromised and Lizard Queen Jarrett put him on call a long time ago.
Unfortunately, there is ALWAYS a “next election” to worry about. Ergo, nothing EVER gets done. Except for the continual ratchet toward full dictatorship and communism.
I would agree....that advice on how to handle the fifth was not understood at all. For anyone, who should ever get called in front of a grand jury or congress....if you think you are involved in something sneaky or illegal....from the minute you walk in....just keep to ‘no comment due to the fifth amendment’ routine. Don’t say anything else.
I’d love it.
Today and tomorrow, and I'm outta here!
Barring a clearly documented National-security reason, a public official taking the 5th in a Congressional hearing is essentially incompatible with their Constitutional oath.
On the other hand, bringing up contempt charges against the IRS employee might be just the thing that is needed...in this election year. You can bet that the Dems in the IRS are planning some stupid stuff.
Incompatible?
It is misprision of felony by Issa and Cummings and the
rest, who are too busy with THEMSELVES and their brothels
and schemes to even address one (1) of the scores
of criminal and treasonous acts ubiquitously around them.
As probable as this may be, her demeanor has been one of defiance, not fear.
A bit of time in a cell might prove interesting.
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