Barbara Jordan on Impeachment

[ashling]

It is wrong, I suggest, it is a misreading of the Constitution for any member here to assert that for a member to vote for an article of impeachment means that that member must be convinced that the President should be removed from office. The Constitution doesn't say that. The powers relating to impeachment are an essential check in the hands of the body of the legislature against and upon the encroachments of the executive. The division between the two branches of the legislature, the House and the Senate, assigning to the one the right to accuse and to the other the right to judge, the framers of this Constitution were very astute. They did not make the accusers and the judgers -- and the judges the same person.

We know the nature of impeachment. We've been talking about it awhile now. It is chiefly designed for the President and his high ministers to somehow be called into account. It is designed to "bridle" the executive if he engages in excesses. "It is designed as a method of national inquest into the conduct of public men."² The framers confided in the Congress the power if need be, to remove the President in order to strike a delicate balance between a President swollen with power and grown tyrannical, and preservation of the independence of the executive.

The nature of impeachment: a narrowly channeled exception to the separation-of-powers maxim. The Federal Convention of 1787 said that. It limited impeachment to high crimes and misdemeanors and discounted and opposed the term "maladministration." "It is to be used only for great misdemeanors," so it was said in the North Carolina ratification convention. And in the Virginia ratification convention: "We do not trust our liberty to a particular branch. We need one branch to check the other."

http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/barbarajordanjudiciarystatement.htm

[Horse with no Name]

1. What a stateswoman

Absolutely one of the best things to come out of Texas ever.

[aquart]

2. She was my first choice for first woman president.

Way back then.

We were so lucky to have her.

[RushIsRot]

4. Mine too. I wrote her name in. I only wish she had lived.

What a wonderful mind. What a commanding voice. I miss her terribly.

[ashling]

3. My wife did a presentation on her

in one of our graduate classes. We need her for a keynote to the convention again (sigh) We we won in '76 and '92. :)

[TahitiNut]

14. Without a doubt in my mind. I rank her as among the best of the 20th Century.

<--- She's a model of principle, courage, determination, and intellectual integrity. I adored her.

[Senator]

5. K&R&ImpeachToUniteUsAgain

[druidity33]

6. wonderful Texas women

Jordan, Richards, Ivins...

how did all these incredible women come from TEXAS?!

and why did they have to leave so soon...

:(

[ehrnst]

10. Having lived for a time in TX....

And there's an attitude that being top dog is sometimes the only way to be heard and get things done. So if you want to get things done, be the boss, or be the one who's got the power to make the decisions. Boss or be bossed.

I think that there's a statistic that there are more women mayors in TX than anywhere. I think that they understand that it's the only way that some men will listen - when they have to.

[ashling]

12. Hey! I was raised by strong liberal Texas Women!

your comment is a little shortsighted.

Read Women in the Texas Populist Movement: Letters to the Southern Mercury by Marion K. Barthelme

:)

these are my people -- the people I came from. My greatgrandparents were Texas Populists. This is where that movement grew up. Mary Elizaeth Lease, attorney, farmer, Activist,was raised on a Texas farm before she moved to Kansas. This is one of my favorite quotes from her:

"If one man has not enough to eat and another has a milion dollers, then I say the second has something that belongs to the first." (maybe not an exact quote ..from a rather hazy-right now-memory)

She also told the farmers of Kansas to raise less corn and more hell.

[Maraya1969]

7. I just sent this to Nancy Pelosi. Anyone want to join me?

http://www.speaker.gov/contact/

[Hun Joro]

9. I just did the same.

[Fleshdancer]

8. My mom took an ethics course taught by Barbara Jordan

I'm still extremely jealous about it. From what my mom told me, Ms. Jordan was just as intense and incredible in person as you can imagine.

As for her views on impeachment, I agree 100%.

[flashl]

11. Great Lady.

[ashling]

13. Given today's news of further lies,

I am going to kick this again.

[HCE SuiGeneris]

15. Where are our sworn in Representatives? Why are they being

derelict in their duty? What are our choices to uphold the Constitution now?

[deacon]

16. A great read. n/t