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“REQUISITES FOR IMPEACHMENT” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Justice was published in the House of Representatives section on pages H7573-H7575 on Sept. 27, 2017.
The Department is one of the oldest in the US, focused primarily on law enforcement and the federal prison system. Downsizing the Federal Government, a project aimed at lowering taxes and boosting federal efficiency, detailed wasteful expenses such as $16 muffins at conferences and board meetings.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
REQUISITES FOR IMPEACHMENT
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of January 3, 2017, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Al Green) for 30 minutes.
Mr. AL GREEN of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to make one point. That one point is that a President need not be convicted of a criminal offense to be impeached; in fact, need not be charged with a criminal offense; need not be charged with a statutory offense; need not be charged with a codified offense to be impeached.
But before I make this point, Mr. Speaker, I have to acknowledge that I am always in awe of this well, and I don't take for granted this great opportunity that has been accorded me to stand in the well of the Congress of the United States of America. I believe that those of us who have been so blessed should acknowledge our blessings. This is a blessing.
Mr. Speaker, there are many people who don't have this opportunity, so I am going to take one liberty before going into my message. I just want people to know what I see as I stand here in the well of the Congress of the United States of America.
As I look forward, Mr. Speaker, I would have those who have not had the opportunity to stand here to know that there is above the doors at the second level a depiction of Moses the Lawgiver.
I would have people know, Mr. Speaker, that behind me, of course, is the flag of the United States of America.
And I would have persons know, Mr. Speaker, that we have these two podiums, and that, typically, Democrats will occupy this side and Republicans the other. We can go to either side. There is no requirement that I stand where I am standing. I can stand at many other places in this room.
But, Mr. Speaker, I want people to know that this is a special place, and I am honored to have the opportunity to stand here tonight and to speak to the issue of a President not having the necessity of committing a crime to be impeached. There is no requirement that a crime be committed. There is no requirement that a statutory offense be violated.
Let's take, for a moment, a look through the vista of time. Let us go back to the Constitutional Convention, and let us hear now the words of George Mason. George Mason reminded his colleagues that no one should be above justice. His words were: ``Shall any man be above justice?''
These words were put before his colleagues because, at the time, they were considering what they could do to deal with the possibility of a runaway Presidency. What could they do? How could they stop it? What would be the methodology by which a President could be extricated from his position?
And they had good reason to give consideration to this, Mr. Speaker. They had good reason because the President was probably the most powerful person in the country. The President would be the most powerful person in the country. The President is the Commander in Chief of the military. The President has the awesome power to pardon anyone, saving himself.
So the question becomes: How do you remove a President from office?
This is what they had to grapple with. And, of course, they considered a judicial process. They considered persons who might be a part of a jury. They considered these things.
The Federalist Papers, if you would care to read, will give you a rendition of what their thoughts were. Start with Federalist Paper No. 65.
But they considered these things, and they concluded that the process should not be judicial. They concluded that if a President is to be removed from office, it should be by persons who are in the political arena. They concluded that this should be something that would be, in fact, political, not judicial. They concluded that a President need not commit a crime to be removed from office.
I am emphasizing this, my dear friends, because there is a lot of confusion about this question. And if you would care to read something that could summarize what I am saying, you might look at an article that was written by a person with the Cato Institute, Gene Healy, August 7, 2017, styled ``The Overcriminalization of Impeachment.'' I would commend it to you. Please read it if you want to read a good summary of what impeachment is all about.
So they had to grapple with this question, and they concluded that it would be a political one, not a judicial question. And in so doing, in concluding that it would be a political one, they incorporated into the Constitution Article II, section 4--Article II, section 4 of the Constitution--that addresses the question of impeachment.
And in so doing, at some point after the codification and ratification of the Constitution, there was a person to be impeached. The first person was a Federal judge, Judge John Pickering. Judge Pickering was not accused of committing a crime. There was not an allegation that he committed a crime.
If you read the Articles of Impeachment, you will find that Judge Pickering, once he was convicted, was convicted, generally speaking, for having loose morals and intemperate habits, not a crime. But the questions did deal with morality.
Shall any man be above justice?
Not above the law. The law codified. Justice carries with it a certain amount of morality.
Shall any man--and today I would say ``any person''--be above justice? Shall any person be above justice?
The Framers of the Constitution concluded that Article II, section 4 would address it, and they, themselves--a good many of them--were there when the first person was impeached in 1804, Judge John Pickering.
So for those of you who are believers in the original intent, the best way to ascertain the original intent of the Framers would be to look at what the Framers did when they had the opportunity.
What did Madison do?
Madison, the father of the Constitution, it is said, and other Framers who were actually there when Article II, section 4 was put in place, found that Judge Pickering, who committed no crime or no allegation of a crime being committed, with reference to his impeachment, should be impeached because of moral reasons and an intemperate habit or habits.
Mr. Speaker, I mention these things because it is important for us to understand that we have made a mistake. We have made a mistake in that we have outsourced--this is from Gene Healy, by the way--the responsibility of investigating the acts of a President to the executive branch itself.
Think for just a moment, dear friends. The Justice Department is an arm of the executive branch. We in Congress have outsourced the investigation to the executive branch by and through the Justice Department.
Mr. Speaker, that can give the appearance of impropriety. We live in a world where it is not enough for things to be right; they must also look right. It could look to some like that outsourcing has created a circumstance by which the chief executive, the President, could influence the Attorney General. That is the way it could look.
But, Mr. Speaker, that is not what the intent is that we have in the Constitution, Article II, section 4. That is not the intent. The intent was for the Judiciary Committee in the Congress of the United States of America to investigate. That is where the power to investigate lies, because it is for impeachment.
By outsourcing it to the executive branch, such that the Justice Department might perform dysfunction, we give the appearance that impeachment requires the commission of a crime, because that is what the Justice Department is looking for, criminality, not morality. The Justice Department wants to know what crime was committed, under what circumstances.
And too many people believe that if the Justice Department does not find that a crime was committed, then there is no impeachable offense. Nothing could be further from the truth, Mr. Speaker.
Regardless as to what a Justice Department concludes, regardless as to whether a good lawyer would bring charges by way of something from what the Justice Department concludes, the Congress of the United States of America still has the power, the prowess, the potency, if you will, to impeach, notwithstanding any finding of a Justice Department, notwithstanding any conclusions of the Justice Department, because it is not the responsibility of the Justice Department to investigate and then pass it on to the Congress with some recommendation. That is not their responsibility. That is the Judiciary Committee and the Congress of the United States of America.
So, Mr. Speaker, we have given this false impression that somehow there must be an offense committed. But, Mr. Speaker, I assure you that it is not the case, and the evidence is there for those who care to read the article that I have called to your attention. It is a short read.
Or if you care to read the Federalist Papers, Federalist Paper No. 65, you can read some of the conclusions that Madison and others have presented.
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This is something that is important to this country. So I am standing here in the well of the House tonight to make one point, a place that I am in great awe of, a place that I consider sacred. I am standing here in the well of the House tonight to make the point that a President need not commit a crime, a statutory offense, to be impeached. Impeachment belongs in one place, and one place only, and that is right here where I stand now, in the House of Representatives.
If the House of Representatives, upon receiving articles of impeachment, should vote to impeach, that means that a President would be indicted. It does not mean that the President--the 218 votes, assuming all persons in the House are present. It doesn't mean that the President is going to be removed from office.
Impeachment does not mean removal from office. Impeachment means that the President must now face a trial in the Senate, to be presided over by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States of America. That is what impeachment does. It moves it along.
And, by the way, there is no requirement that you assure anyone that you can get the votes necessary to impeach to bring an impeachment before the House. A privileged resolution to impeach does not necessitate your being able to prove before you present it that you are going to prevail with it. That is not the case.
If you can think of it in terms of the real world, while this is real--we say that term loosely, I assure you. If you think in terms of the world beyond these walls where a person might be indicted, in this country, every day, people are indicted who are not convicted. So impeachment is not tantamount to conviction. Impeachment merely means that there is reason now for the Senate to take up this cause.
The Senate, upon taking up the cause, can find the President not guilty or guilty. If the President is found guilty, the President is removed from office. There is no other punishment. The President is removed from office. After the President is removed from office, if the Justice Department or some other agency, some other arm of the government concludes that the President has committed a criminal offense, then a President would be prosecuted.
Now, there is some debate amongst some constitutional scholars as to whether or not a President can be prosecuted while the President still holds office. I think most of them would agree that it would happen after the President leaves office, but that is a debate that I don't care to enter.
My point is the President would be removed from office. Now, that is important to consider because removal from office is not punishment. Criminal acts have punishment upon conviction. The President is not punished. The President is removed from office. That is not considered punishment. The President does not face punishment upon being convicted of impeachment. The President is removed from office.
Now, that, in and of itself, is not something that I believe we should take lightly. I think it is serious, but it is not tantamount to punishment.
For those of you who may just be joining us for this statement that I am making tonight, I have taken this position tonight in the well of the Congress of the United States of America for one reason: to make the point that a President need not be charged with a criminal offense to face impeachment in the Congress of the United States of America. The Constitution doesn't require it. The Framers did not make that an issue when they impeached the first person, Judge Pickering, and it is not an issue to the extent that most of the people who have been impeached have not been charged with a criminal offense--not, N-O-T, charged with a criminal offense.
I close with this. The Framers, very much concerned about a runaway President, runaway Presidency, very much concerned about the awesome amount of power that they were according one person: the power to be commander of all of the Armed Forces; the power to send persons into battle; the power to send people, literally, in harm's way such that many might not return; the power to impeach, nearly with impunity--not with absolute impunity, but nearly with impunity. There are some opportunities for the President to provide a person not with impeachment, but with exoneration for a crime, and that President could be impeached for the way that exoneration took place, depending on the relationship that the person had with the President.
But the point is impeachment is there because it is an awesome power that we have given the President; and because we have given the President this awesome power, it is important that we have a check on the President that does not require the commission of a crime.
Mr. Speaker, I thank you for the generosity of this Special Order. I thank the leadership as much, and I yield back the balance of my time.
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