Dave Bugg wrote:
wrote:
Dave Bugg wrote:
wrote:
Dave Bugg wrote:
wrote:
If there is insufficient evidence it may be because there
is insufficent support in the House of Representatives for
impeachment hearings. Sufficient evidece to support
an impeachment of Richard Nixon did not appear until
after the impeachment hearing had begun.
Actually, Nixon resigned PRIOR to the House even beginning to
consider the merits of the articles of impeachment. So there was no
impeachment hearing.
To be precise, the House Judiciary comittee held hearings on the
Watergate break in and cover up and thereby discovered the
evidence needed to support articles of impeachment. While no
'impeachment hearings' oper se were held, articles of impechment
had been introduced and had Nixon not resigned, one or more would
surely have been pased by the comittee. E.g. no 'impeachment
hearing' per se would have been held.
But that wasn't your point. You stated that evidence to support an
impeachment did not appear until *after* the impeachment hearing
began. You were incorrect. The hearings of the judiciary committees
WERE NOT an impeachment hearing.
Yes, and I remind you that I corrected that error myself above.
My point still stands that Articles of Impeachment must
contain relevant facts and evidence to support itself when presented
to the House for passage.
I agree that they should. 'Must' is too strong a term as the House
_may_ pass whatever they wish, no matter how absurd it may be.
Articles of Impeachment have to have a valid basis for
consideration *prior* to presenting them to Congress. This means
that there must
be evidence in existence. The basis for Impeachment must already be
in-place.
Could you cite somethign to support this?
Look at the Constituitonal description of Impeachement.
I am unaware of
any requirement stated in or implied by the Constitution that
prohibits the House from investigating allegations and discovering
evidence of an impeachable offense on its own intitiative.
That was not what I said, nor is it what you stated. You stated that
Articles of Impeachment could be a period of evidenturary discovery,
which of course, they cannot be.
No, I did not.
You did when you stated "Sufficient evidece to support an impeachment of
Richard Nixon did not appear until after the impeachment hearing had begun".
To me this indicated that you thought that discovery could be conducted
during the actual impeachment hearing.
It doesn't matter what "Sufficient evidece to support an impeachment of
Richard Nixon did not appear until after the impeachment hearing
had begun". meant to you. I did NOT state that "Articles of
Impeachment
could be a period of evidenturary discovery,"
Nor can I parse your statement in such a way as
to produce anything intelligible. I think that we both have been
hasty and written sentences with such bad syntax as to obscure
whatever it was we wished to communicate.
Sorry, too much time spent empaneled on Grand Juries. Evidenturary discovery
is the investigative period needed to gather evidence of wrong doing.
I don't see how that addresses the bad syntax of the statement I did
not
make.
Regardless, it appears that you are aguing that one or more Articles of
Impeachment must be introduced before the House could hold hearings
to investigate allegation of impeachable acts.
That is just plain wrong.
The House could, and should, investigate and gather evidence before
any Articles of Impeachment are introduced. Indeed, that is just
what the House Judiciary Committee did during Watergate.
... But, unlike what
you had stated, discovery of facts are not undertaken *after* the
Articles are presented to the House. After the Articles are
presented, the facts in evidence are judged by the House members to
either support or not support impeachment.
I did not state that "discovery of facts are undertaken *after* the
Articles are presented to the House. " Nor did I state anything that
reasonably could be interpretted as such.
When you stated "Sufficient evidece to support an impeachment of Richard
Nixon did not appear until after the impeachment hearing had begun", I
reasonably interpreted such.
That interpretation is unreasonable because it presuposes that Articles
of Impeachment MUST be introduced before the House could hold hearings
to investigate allegations of impeachable acts.
My statement was erroneous, because the House never conducted
'impeachment hearings' per se, for the impeachment of Richard Nixon.
E.g. I incorrectly called the Watergate hearings, Impeachment hearings.
I corrected that error in my next article, and then in the next article
after
that pointed out to you that I had done so. Here we are three (3)
articles
later and you are still writing as if I had never corrected that error.
Regardless, had Nixon not resigned, the House Judiciary Committee
undoubtrable would have voted to send one or more Articles of
Impeachment
to the House for debate.
Even if Nixon had not resigned and had been impeached, there is no
reason to suppose that 'impeachment hearings' would ever have been
held. The Watergate hearings were sufficient to produce the evidence
needed for Articles of Impeachment.
Moreover the historical
example I presented, that of the House Judiciary Comittee's Watergate
hearings, is an example of Articles of Impeachment being introduced
after evidence was discovered, not befor
But, Articles of Impeachment were NOT introduced to the House. Nixon
resigned prior to that event
Three articles were introduced into the committee, without 'impeachment
hearings' per se, being held. There is no reason to suppose that the
committee would have adjourned the Watergate investigation and then
held impeachment hearings before sending the Articles to the House
for debate.
The sequence of events was:
Watergate hearings by the House judiciary committee.
Articles of Impeachment introduced into the House Judiciary Committee
Nixon resigned.
Had Nixon not resigned then the follwoing sequence is likely:
Articles of Impeachment sent from teh Judiciary Committee to
the floor of the House for debate.
One or more Articles of Impeachment passed by the House.
No 'impeachment hearings' per se.
Articles of Impeachment do not precede investigation, they are written
(or not) based on evidence developed during the investigation.
Indeed,
historically, that seems to have been the norm. Prior to the
creation of the Office of the Independent Counsel, which no longer
exists, impeachment investigations were conducted by the House
independently of any criminal investigations on the part of the
Justice Department.
You seem to lack knowledge of what Articles of Impeachment are and
the purpose that they serve. Any investigation to determine if facts
are in evidence is put into play PRIOR to the Articles being
drafted, because the Articles are all about facts in evidence to
support the alleged reasons for impeachment.
You seem to have not read my example of how the House Judiciary
Comittee did just that, in that order.
I did, but I think you need to re-read the thread.
Perhaps you need to do so, noted where I admitted having
incorrectly referred to the Watergate Hearings as impeachmetn
hearings.
...
And if you would have taken the time to read my post prior to
responding, you would have seen that I properly covered who has
responsibility to determine impeachment vs which house is
responsible for the trial.
I thought "congressfolk" was ambiguous.
Please cite the House rules which allow the majority to do this.
Quite the contrary, the minority has procedural abilities to conduct
whatever hearings and factfinding is necessary in cases of misdeeds
by the Executive branch.
Please cite the House Rules that allow a minority on a committee
to conduct hearings before a House committee, when the majority
of committee members vote against doing so.
...snip of requests for citations
Sure. I'll show you mine when you show me yours.
Mine is consistent with the general principle of majority rule.
Yours is consitent with, what?
A minority can meet in caucus and conduct 'hearings' of their own
and indeed, the Democrats have done just that. But those hearings
are no way comparable to hearings held by House committees.
--
FF