In recent weeks, Americans received a refresher course on impeachment. Following the procedures outlined in the United States Constitution, the U.S. House of Representatives held an impeachment hearing and brought charges against the president. The charges then were delivered to the Senate, which conducted a trial and, eventually, acquitted the president.
It might come as a surprise to many to learn impeachments in Missouri do not follow the same course. Our state’s original 1820 Constitution mirrored the federal model, but the process changed with the adoption of a new constitution in 1945.
Impeachments in Missouri still begin with the House of Representatives bringing charges, but the similarity to the way Congress (and 48 other states) impeaches officials ends there. Since 1945, impeachment trials in Missouri would be tried by the Missouri Supreme Court, or in the case of a governor or Supreme Court judge, by a panel of “seven eminent jurists.” Instead of a trial by 34 elected officials, we hold a trial by seven unelected ones.
Senate Joint Resolution 33, would ask voters to return Missouri’s Constitution back to the more appropriate model with impeachment trials held before the full Senate. Missouri would once again parallel the federal system, restoring the impeachment procedures that were in place in Missouri from 1820 until 1945.
For reference, Missouri is virtually alone in its method of impeachment. Only Nebraska, which doesn’t have a Senate, defers solely to its state Supreme Court for trials. The New York impeachment court includes both judges and senators. The fact that the vast majority of states hold impeachment trials in their senates reflects a long-standing commitment to checks and balances in American governance. In Missouri, as in the nation as a whole, government consists of three separate and co-sovereign branches – the executive, the legislature and the judiciary. Each branch of government is provided mechanisms and powers to limit the reach of the others, and thus none reigns supreme.
By placing the responsibility of impeachment trials in the hands of the Supreme Court, Missouri upset the important balance of essential checks and balances. Of the ten impeachments begun throughout Missouri’s 199-year history, eight have involved members of the judiciary. Missouri’s current impeachment method requires judges to judge judges. Where is the separation of powers in that?
A 1993 U.S. Supreme Court case highlighted the problems with our impeachment process. Nixon v. United States involved the impeachment of a federal judge in Mississippi. In deciding that case the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously agreed that impeachment was the only check on the judicial branch available to the legislature, and that the judiciary should have no part in it. It would be “counterintuitive,” the court said, to place the impeachment power in the hands of the same body the process was meant to regulate.
Between 1777 and 1778, three of America’s Founding Fathers penned a series of 85 essays in defense of the newly drafted U.S. Constitution, all published under the pseudonym Publius. In Federalist 51, James Madison took up the quill to discuss the separation of powers. “If men were angels, no government would be necessary,” he wrote.
“If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary.” Madison concluded that controls were necessary when men governed men. The best way to assure control, he said, was to rely on the self-interest, or ambition, of each branch of government to limit the dominance of the others. As each sought to protect their own turf, they wouldn’t allow the others to usurp authority. “Ambition must be made to counteract ambition,” he wrote.
Given that 80 percent of Missouri’s impeachments have involved judges, does it make sense to invest the final authority of their fate to fellow judges? Like the federal system, the impeachment process Missouri had in place prior to 1945 preserved a balance of power. Each branch of government was able to offset the power of the others. I believe the framers of our original constitution got it right, and SJR 33 restores the proper balance.
SJR 33 will require a vote of the people in order to become law. If SJR 33 survives the legislative process, you will see it on an upcoming ballot.
Given that 80 percent of Missouri’s impeachments have involved judges, does it make sense to invest the final authority of their fate to fellow judges? Like the federal system, the impeachment process Missouri had in place prior to 1945 preserved a balance of power. Each branch of government was able to offset the power of the others. I believe the framers of our original constitution got it right, and SJR 33 restores the proper balance.
SJR 33 will require a vote of the people in order to become law. If SJR 33 survives the legislative process, you will see it on an upcoming ballot.
1 comment:
"The charges then were delivered to the Senate, which conducted a trial and, eventually, acquitted the president."
Sorry sir but you are either a liar or totally ignorant of the actual facts. The house held an INVESTIGATION into the obvious charges to gather the facts and evidence and to hear from witnesses that corroborated the evidence. There was no TRIAL because there were no witnesses called and no evidence was allowed.
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