Ex-Republican, former Congressman from Florida David Jolly laid out on Nicolle Wallace’s MSNBC show Deadline White House just who the Framers of the Constitution had in mind when they put the impeachment clause in the Constitution. He cited James Madison, George Mason, and Edmund Randolph of Virginia. They were most concerned with abuse of power
James Madison worried about a deceitful president, one who lied to the people and to Congress.
Edmund Randolph wanted to stop payments to the president from entities that could sway his judgment and allegiance, like a foreign power.
George Mason was concerned about disloyalty to our nation and favoring another nation; also tampering with elections or investigations was seen as possible “high crimes and misdemeanors.”
It was left up to Congress, beginning with the House of Representatives, to decide whether the president deserved impeachment on any grounds they decided, i.e. he did not have to break the law in order to merit impeachment. Violation of the norms in any of the above areas and in any area whatsoever needed to be taken into account. Once the House had drawn up and voted on the articles of impeachment, they were turned over to the Senate as the jury.
There is not a whole lot about impeachment I know, but I thought Jolly’s way of listing the major concerns of these Framers stood out because Trump has abused his power in every one of these areas.
Jolly and several others on Nicole’s panel warned against throwing the kitchen sink at Trump. The best thing is to use the phone call to Ukraine’s president as an exemplar. Impeach him on what he has confessed to publicly. Jolly had a touching picture he evoked: grabbing the flag before it hit the muddy floor of the Oval Office, evoking the image of the soldier on the battle field grabbing the falling flag from a fallen comrade. Wow!