It seems to be ”accepted wisdom” that impeachment and prosecution in the Senate are fundamentally political acts, along the lines of the equally “accepted wisdom” that a grand jury will even “indict a ham sandwich.” One need only review the report of the House Judiciary Committee charged with considering the impeachment of President Nixon to recognize that the “accepted wisdom” is sorely lacking. Implicit in its “logic” is that, in light of the separation of powers doctrine, impeachment proceedings are unreviewable by a court and thus, whatever Congress does in in the case of impeachment is “the law of the land”, no matter how arbitrary or capricious.
But if that is so, why did the Framers include in the Constitution the specific legal terms “treason”, “bribery” and “other high crimes and misdemeanors,” and why did they designate the Chief Justice, the highest-ranking member of the judicial branch to preside over the impeachment trial in the Senate or, for that matter, empower the Senate to impeach judges as well as a sitting president?
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