©Wendell
Griffen, 2018
Justice Is a Verb!
December 30,
2018
In
my December 26, 2018 post I declared that the House Judiciary Committee should
hold an impeachment hearing concerning whether President Donald Trump has
committed “high crimes and misdemeanors.
I write now to respond to concerns about that position.
President
Trump’s supporters do not believe impeachment proceedings are warranted. They object to his impeachment the same way
they condemn and denounce the investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller
concerning whether Mr. Trump and his associates engaged in criminal activity related
to the 2016 presidential election.
Trump’s
supporters also condemn and denounce the lawsuits filed against him in federal
court. Those lawsuits allege that he is
violating the ban on emoluments expressed at Article I, Section 9.8 to the
federal Constitution which declares that “…no person holding any office or
profit or trust under them, shall, without the consent of the Congress, accept
of any present, emolument, office, or title, of any kind whatever, from any
king, prince, or foreign state.” [Mr.
Trump owns a hotel near the White House that is regularly patronized by foreign
governments and others who seek favorable treatment from his administration.]
Others who either disagree with
President Trump’s policies or who may be offended by his personal and business conduct
hold serious reservations about whether impeachment is politically expedient. Those persons doubt that the Republican
majority in the Senate would vote to convict Mr. Trump even if the House of
Representatives votes in favor of articles of impeachment recommended by the
House Judiciary Committee. Among other
things, they are concerned that Trump would use the impeachment controversy and
spectacle to stoke support for his re-election campaign in 2020.
Another
concern is that if Trump is impeached by the House and convicted by the Senate,
Vice President Pence would become President, and then pardon Trump the way
President Gerald Ford pardoned Richard Nixon after Nixon’s resignation in the
face of impeachment proceedings surrounding his efforts to obstruct investigation of the Watergate scandal. These
observers prefer that Trump and Pence be voted out of office in 2020 rather
than risk a Pence presidency.
Here’s
my rejoinder to these and other objections to impeaching President Trump: appendectomy.
When
the human appendix is infected with bacteria and inflamed, doctors know that an
emergency exists that requires surgical removal of the infected appendix. It is medical malpractice for a doctor to
examine a patient, confirm that the patient has appendicitis (inflammation of
the appendix), and release the patient with a prescription to relieve pain associated
with appendicitis.
Appendectomy,
a common emergency surgery, is the long-recognized and accepted way to treat
appendicitis. Patients recover from that routine surgical procedure and go on
to live well for a simple reason. The
human body does not need an appendix to function normally or well.
More
to the point, the human body is threatened by an infected appendix. A pus-filled appendix will rupture if it is
not surgically removed. The ruptured
appendix then discharges bacteria into the abdominal cavity which requires emergency
appendectomy followed by aggressive treatment with antibiotics to save the
patient’s life. In some cases, a
ruptured appendix can lead to death.
Donald
Trump’s presidency is the political equivalent of appendicitis for the United
States. However much his supporters and
detractors dislike it, Trump’s impeachment is the political equivalent of an
appendectomy for the nation because Trump’s political incompetence and personal
corruption has infected the presidency with pus-filled policies and practices that
threaten domestic, national, and global well-being.
The
nation does not need sedatives from politicians and pundits, be they Trump
supporters or Trump opponents. We need
surgery. The infected appendix called
the Trump presidency must be surgically removed before it ruptures and
threatens our survival.
We
should stop hoping that heaven will deliver us from Trump’s poisonous
presidency and personality. In the
Biblical account of the Exodus, God told Moses to use the staff in his hand
when Moses complained that Egyptian chariots threatened his people as they
stood on the shore of the Red Sea (Exodus 14:15-16). Impeachment is the tool in our hand. It won’t work unless we use it.
That
is why the House Judiciary Committee should schedule and conduct public hearings
on impeachment. If hearings demonstrate
that President Trump has committed treason, bribery, or other high crimes and
misdemeanors, the Judiciary Committee should issue Articles of Impeachment. If a majority of the House votes to approve
Articles of Impeachment, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell must convene
the Senate as jurors. Chief Justice John
Roberts must preside over Trump’s trial. If two-thirds of the Senators vote for conviction,
Chief Justice Roberts must declare President Trump ousted from office. That process requires human competence and
courage, not divine intervention.
The
U.S. House of Representatives and Senate must, like emergency room physicians, think
about what is best for the patient.
Donald Trump is not the patient.
Partisan political loyalists are not the patient. The 2020 election outcome is not the
patient. The patient is the democratic
republic known as the United States of America.
That
patient is threatened by the pus-filled appendix known as Donald Trump’s presidency. The nation can survive without that appendix if
the House and Senate will act the way responsible doctors routinely act.
We
can’t survive if the medical team won’t use competent and courageous judgment
and do their job.
