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Impeachable Offenses?

~ Examining the Case for Removal of the 45th President of the United States

Impeachable Offenses?

Tag Archives: sitting

Criminal Prosecution of a President

12 Tuesday Mar 2019

Posted by crosbysamuel in Articles, Uncategorized

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British, Crimes, donald trump, Founder, impeach, impeaching, Impeachment, indictment, Jurisdiction, president, prosecution, removal, sitting, W. Burlette Carter

Can a sitting president be indicted? W. Burlette Carter approaches this question from a historical perspective in her forthcoming article Can a Sitting President be Federally Prosecuted? The Founders Answer. Carter asserts that the Founder’s answer would be one based on jurisdiction:

The Founders would have recognized that, before the formal issuance of Articles of Impeachment, courts of law have the power to stay their own proceedings against a President for good cause, just as English/British common law courts with concurrent jurisdiction always could. And they would have have accepted that courts of law can, in the first instance, decide evidentiary issues such as executive privilege for matters proceeding in their fora. Again, despite Parliamentary power over impeachment, common law courts had long done so in England and Great Britain, so long as they otherwise had jurisdiction.

For an in-depth examination of the British and early American view on jurisdiction to prosecute the president, follow the link above.

190311-donald-trump-ap-773.jpgAlex Brandon/AP Photo

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Kavanaugh, Kavanaugh, Kavanaugh

10 Tuesday Jul 2018

Posted by crosbysamuel in Articles, Uncategorized

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appointed, Congress, immunity, impeach, indictment, judge, justice, kavanaugh, kennedy, law, law review, minnesota, Mueller, pardon, roberts, shield, sitting, suit, trump

Have you heard? A new Supreme Court Justice has been appointed. His name is Brett Kavanaugh, he hails from the U.S. Court of Appeals, D.C. Circuit, and he’s got Democrats a little bit nervous. Why? Because they think he may try to shield Trump from the Mueller investigation.

Kavanaugh argued in an article written for the Minnesota Law Review in 2009 that sitting presidents should be immune from civil suit and criminal indictment. He cited the investigation of Clinton as a reason for this view, and has implied “that the Starr investigation distracted Clinton from focusing on Osama bin Laden.” Some find this view alarming — however, take a deep breath. As Noah Feldman points out, in an article published by Bloomberg Law, what Kavanaugh actually suggests is that Congress should pass a law that would protect the President. Inherent in that suggestion is an admission that the Supreme Court does not have the power to immunize the President itself. So worries that the Justices may, for instance, enjoin Mueller’s invesitgation, are probably unfounded.

That being said,  that doesn’t mean Kavanaugh cannot be of use to the President in other ways. Kavanaugh may rule that the President can pardon himself, as Trump has suggested in the past. Alternatively, Congress may just take Kavanaugh up on his suggestion and pass a law immunizing Trump. Much remains to be seen.

1200x-1.jpgAl Drago/Bloomberg

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Frank O. Bowman, III


Floyd R. Gibson Missouri Endowed Professor of Law
University of Missouri School of Law

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