REALLY? SERIOUSLY?

• Author: Fischer, Raymond L.
• Position: POLITICAL LANDSCAPE

DISTINGUISHED professor of history, former associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, and chair of the Department of History at American University, Allan J. Lichtman has authored or coauthored eight books, most recently, The Case for Impeachment, where he offers historical perspectives of presidential impeachments and, with point-by-point analysis, reasons Congress should terminate Donald Trump's term in the Oval Office.

America's Founders recognized the possibility of a "runaway presidency": a president could corrupt his Administration into a "scheme of peculation or oppression," "betray his trust to foreign powers," or produce an outcome "fatal to the Republic." To ensure the fate of presidents, the Founders gave absolute power of impeachment to elected members of the House of Representatives and Senate for establishing an impeachment case on law intertwined with "political, practical, moral, and legal judgment." The "genius of impeachment" lies in the power to punish the president without endangering the institution of the presidency.

The House has impeached two presidents: Andrew Johnson in 1868 and Bill Clinton in 1998, both acquitted in the Senate; Richard Nixon avoided impeachment by resigning. Any case for impeaching Trump will progress according to the Constitution and in the context of past impeachments.

The process for impeachment begins in the House with an investigation by the Judiciary Committee, which, by majority vote, recommends to the full House articles of impeachment. If a majority in the House ratifies any of the articles of impeachment, the case moves to a Senate trial over which the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court presides. At the end of the trial, by a two-thirds vote, the Senate can remove the president from office and revoke both presidential immunity and the right to appeal.

At a time millions of Americans and many people worldwide have "risen in protest against the dangerous presidency of Donald Trump," comparison of Trump's transgressions to those of Johnson, Nixon, and Clinton demonstrates remarkable similarities.

In 1865, few people expected Johnson to become president; he was an "accidental president" following Abraham Lincoln's assassination. Johnson felt "incompetent to perform duties so important and responsible as those thrown upon [him]." Johnson's humility soon turned to "stubbornness, hasty action, disdain for cautious advice, and ill-tempered retorts against critics." In a speech to a group of white men, Johnson claimed to be "their Moses," destined to emancipate "white men" from restrictions under postwar Reconstruction, and he termed Frederick Douglass (former slave, poet, and abolitionist) "no friend of our race."

Long after Watergate, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, the Washington Post reporters who broke the scandal, assessed, "Nixon was far worse than we thought." Nixon acted above the law and, in pursuing his own agenda, he showed lack...