[Political Junkie Too]

I played that same linguistic game with the impeachment clause.

Instead of:

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.

This has led the Senate to believe that they can remove someone from office and separately vote to disqualify someone from future office.

Does a plain reading of this suggest that it is a dual and conjoined punishment, that is, that someone convicted of impeachment is both removed from office and denied future office; or is it two separate and distinct punishments?

If they are separate and distinct punishments, can the Senate vote to keep someone in office but disqualify them from running for future office? Is there a dependency defined by the conjunction AND that implies order? There is no "normal" reading of such conjunction language that suggests that the order of the actions that are conjoined has any bearing on the meaning of the phrase.

Yet somehow, these punishments have been separated; the Senate can remove someone from office and still remove the "disability" of holding future office. Separate votes have been held to remove someone from office but still let them run for future office.

Similarly, the impeachment clause could have been written like the 14th amendment as:

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 Senate may by a vote of two-thirds remove such disability: but the Party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment and Punishment, according to Law.

This would make it clear that the Senate has a second interdependent power to remove the disability of a bar on future office, but it's not written that way.

We have to interpret it the way it's written, not the way we would like it to be written. Article VI is written the way it is written, too, and says that "any thing in the Constitution" is supreme law of the land.

-PJ

[Ultra Sonic 007]

There is no linguistic game being played. The plain meaning of "notwithstanding" in that clause of Article VI means that, even if there should appear something contrary anywhere in the Constitution or in any state law, the Constitution, laws made pursuant to it, and treaties made by the United States, are all considered "the supreme Law of the Land" regardless.

We have to interpret it the way it's written, not the way we would like it to be written. 

Then why are you ignoring the plain meaning and purpose of "notwithstanding" in the clause? This comes off as pure projection on your part.

The Preamble, despite being a "thing in the Constitution", is not a law.