Talk:Impeachment/Archive 2

U.K. Impeachment goes beyond office holders
I just found this paper on U.K. impeachment. http://www.parliament.uk/commons/lib/research/notes/snpc-02666.pdf It suggests that the scope of parliament's impeachment powers go beyond office holders and whether they should continue in office. Instead, it seems that impeachment can bring a full range of penalties upon any person. The Wikipedia article, though, both in the introduction and in the U.K. section, only mention office-holders. Those sections should be revised to take into account the historical practice. Pmadrid (talk) 18:53, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Undoing historical vandalism regarding UK
I just put back into the article the section on the UK which was (until now) lost to the history of the article, due to vandalism on 4 Apr 2010, the vandalism was then removed instead of being undone which meant the UK section was not put back in. ThinkingTwice ''contribs 21:18, 11 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Looking back into 2007 I’ve found additional vandalism on 22 Jan 2007 when a number of paragraphs in the UK section were deleted by an IP address user 67.169.36.71 and not undone, see . I have put them back in. ThinkingTwice  ''contribs 23:22, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Impeachment for lawful activity
The first sentence says that one is impeached for unlawful activity but that is not always the case, strictly speaking. For instance, South Carolina (USA) Governor Mark Sanford was subjected to a vote on impeachment for an affair and for lies and abuse of power surrounding the affair. In the Philippines, one can be impeached for a "betrayal of public trust" regardless of whether that betrayal is technically illegal or can be proved in a court of law. Indeed, often impeachment cases surround interpretation of law and of the powers of an office, or involve not acting, for shirking one's responsibilities. I'm not sure how to rephrase the opening sentence but characterizing impeachment, which can often be a political exercise, as only involving illegal activity is not accurate, I don't think. --Bruce Hall (talk) 08:25, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

Layout
A user changed the layout of this article a little and i have reversed this. South Korea and Lithunia only have a few lines each so cant justify separate headings (i believe this rule is in the Manual of Style). The Republic of Ireland comes before the US and the UK alphabetically but these subjects are far more important--not just coz the Republic is smaller but also because impeachment is considered a highly obscure procedure even within the Republic. Iota 01:54, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Thanks for the hint on separate headings -- did you mean the non-prescriptive note: "In circumstances where there is not enough text to justify a sub-heading, it may be preferable to use bolded text or bullet points within a section instead of using sub-headings." in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style ? -- My NPOV-monitor shrieks alarm-bells at the phrase "far more important". The Republic of the US exceeds the UK in size. I get the impression that in the UK most citizens might also consider impeachment "a highly obscure procedure" or some sort of historical irrelevancy, but I have no evidence of this. -- No doubt the structure of the article will change just as soon as we get a substantial paragraph on impeachment theory and practice in the Sudan, which exceeds the size of the UK considerably. Pedant17 01:03, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC) By Jabari Attaway —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.223.67.79 (talk) 01:05, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

1848 attempt to impeach Palmerston
I think this was made by Thomas Chisholm Anstey and not David Urquhart. See Hansard. Opera hat (talk) 14:05, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

US Impeachment is misdefined.
In the US, impeachment is a result of a process that is analogous to appearance in court for the common man; congress votes to initiate the process (or not) and the senate convicts (or not.) If there is a conviction, then there is an impeachment. Congress voting to start the process is no more impeachment than appearing in court is a criminal conviction. This article needs a rewrite rather badly, at least in the US section.


 * That is a fundamentally incorrect grasp of impeachment. The article doesn't need a rewrite, and that proposed rewrite is invalid. In the US system, an impeachment is the formal accusation of wrongdoing by a civil officer of the United States. The "sole Power" to impeach is granted to the House. If your definition is correct and only upon a Senate conviction is there an "impeachment" then why is ONLY the House given the "sole Power" to impeach and the Senate given the "sole Power" to "try all impeachments."


 * If you want to draw the comparison between impeachment and an indictment, both of which are formal accusations that start the legal process of determining guilt or innocence, you have a point. If you want to assert that impeachment does not occur until someone has been convicted by the Senate/removed from office, then you'll have a fan in President Clinton but at the expense of the law and the Constitution.JasonCNJ 06:01, 3 July 2006 (UTC)


 * JasonCNJ is correct. Impeachment may or may not be followed by conviction, but the act of being impeached occurs only in the House.  JCO312 05:21, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Actually, the article *does* need a re-write, because it says what the original, incorrect comment above wants it to say - that 'impeachment is a two-part process and includes the trial as the second part'; though it then contradicts itself and correctly says the House process completes the impeachment. Craig234 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.7.1.175 (talk) 19:50, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

Minor error re Court the Lord High Steward?
"The differences between this court and the House of Lords are that in the House all of the peers are judges of both law and fact, whereas in the Court the Lord High Steward is the sole judge of fact and the peers decide the facts only; and the bishops are not entitled to sit and vote in the Court" - Should it read, the Lord High Stwerad is the sole judge of law? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.181.173.242 (talk) 16:40, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Impeachment of former officials
Is it possible to impeach a person who no longer holds a position from that very same position? What about stripping this person from benefits derived from his charge, like honors, pensions, monetary compensations? In particular, can an expresident of the U.S. be impeached (Like the Bushes, Clinton or Carter)? A more generic question, Is possible to remove honors from dead Presidents, Sheriffs, high officials, etc.? 79.156.192.195 (talk) 17:00, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

minor style change (I think)
I am not a subject matter expert (here looking stuff up) so I am documenting the change in case there is some technical meaning that escapes me in the rather stilted language I am changing.

"(In its more frequent and more technical usage, impeachment of a person in the role of a witness is the act of challenging the honesty or credibility of that person.)"

a person in the role of a witness? You mean, like, a witness?

Elinruby (talk) 20:47, 24 July 2014 (UTC)

Grammar change for accuracy
Many sections of this article assume that only men can hold certain political offices by using the pronouns “he” or “his.” I plan to replace “he” and “his” with “the officer” and “the officer's” (or “the president”/“the president's” or whatever the office is) for greater accuracy and equity for all gender identities. I need to check first that certain countries do allow women to hold the discussed offices. I'm new to editing and I want to make sure this is an acceptable edit. Clark.margaret.a (talk) 02:12, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

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Introduction first paragraph
The second sentence of the first paragraph appears to focus on the American (United States) mode of impeachment, where one legislative body impeaches an official and a second body tries the impeachment, with conviction resulting in removal. The sentence asserts that impeachment is only part of the process rather than the entire process of legislative accusation and trial, and this assertion appears to be contradicted repeatedly in through the article in discussion of impeachment in various countries. I don't have the expertise in the constitutional laws of various nations to rewrite the introduction so that it reflects a more international perspective, but perhaps someone else could? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.195.160.44 (talk) 17:17, 26 December 2018 (UTC)

Article needs to be split into two articles
They are Impeachment (witness) and Impeachment (governance). The former refers to reliability in court, see Discrediting tactic.--Epiphyllumlover (talk) 23:48, 29 January 2019 (UTC)


 * There is already a link to the Witness impeachment article at the top of the page, where it clearly states: "This article is about a step in the removal of a public official. For challenging a witness in a legal proceeding, see Witness impeachment." Vyselink (talk) 00:07, 30 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Thank you. Now I've changed the wikilink in the Discrediting tactic article.--Epiphyllumlover (talk) 04:13, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Trump subsection should be only linked to its dedicated page
I would request that the Trump subsection of the United States specific impeachment law be only detailed on its own dedicated wiki entry instead of being poorly summarized here, where the subject matter is general law and procedures, not expanding to particular occurrences of impeachment.

As such, it should remain a jump-link on this page only.

Please discuss. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.229.234.93 (talk) 23:43, 15 December 2019 (UTC)


 * The Trump subsection should absolutely be removed. Like you said, this is a poorly summarized section of one impeachment that hasn't even happened yet. Three US presidents have been impeached, and we are going to dedicate an entire article subsection to the one president that hasn't been impeached yet? Doesn't make sense. Should be removed. ZachofMS (talk) 01:12, 16 December 2019 (UTC)


 * I agree with 98.229.234.93 and . I think the last para in United States should be Two United States Presidents have been impeached: Andrew Johnson in 1868 and Bill Clinton in 1998; neither was convicted by the Senate; additionally, there were efforts to impeach John Tyler and Richard Nixon (Nixon resigned before proceedings began). On September 24, 2019, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi announced that the House was "moving forward with an official impeachment inquiry" into President Donald Trump. (with "official impeachment inquiry" linking to Impeachment inquiry against Donald Trump as it does now, and the rest of the Donald Trump section should be removed. Schazjmd   (talk)  18:03, 16 December 2019 (UTC)


 * Pinging the editors who seem to have contributed actively to that section recently, for more input:, , , , . Schazjmd   (talk)  00:54, 18 December 2019 (UTC)
 * I think eliminating that subsection would be best, for now, otherwise it's going to be a constant pain in the you-know-what. WQUlrich (talk) 01:14, 18 December 2019 (UTC)
 * , Impeachment isn't specifically a presidential phenomenon but it's most notable for presidents. I don't have strong feelings on the wording but the green text above seems fine with appropriate links peppered into it. ―Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 01:15, 18 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks for asking. I have no problem with removing the subsection. RobP (talk) 06:12, 18 December 2019 (UTC)
 * I don't have a strong view. The summary could be improved - the main article will likely be moved soon. I think the subsection is useful to readers looking for information on Donald Trump's impeachment who search for "Impeachment" and land on this page. Magil8216 (talk) 07:16, 18 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks, all, for weighing in, and thanks to for cleaning up the language and linking to the main article.   Schazjmd   (talk)  14:09, 18 December 2019 (UTC)

This page should be locked to prevent abuse
It has already been vandalized today and needs protection until the turmoil dies down Ciper (talk) 02:16, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 19 December 2019
Three United States Presidents have been impeached: Andrew Johnson in 1868, Bill Clinton in 1998 and Donald Trump in 2019.[30][31] Neither Johnson nor Clinton were convicted by the Senate, while Trump has been fully impeached.

Trump hasn't been fully impeached. The Senate hearing isn't until January. I'm no Trump supporter, but I do try and hold Wikipedia to a higher standard. 64.216.56.106 (talk) 14:27, 19 December 2019 (UTC)



Semi-protected edit request on 19 December 2019
President Trump has not been fully removed from office as of 12/19. That is disinformation. 2601:803:4300:455F:580C:7393:AC4F:FA1A (talk) 15:00, 19 December 2019 (UTC)


 * ✅ I agree the wording is incorrect and reverted it to "awaits the senate" as it was prior to that edit. -- Sirfurboy (talk) 15:15, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Phrasing needs changing
The article says "Neither Johnson nor Clinton were convicted by the Senate, while Trump has been fully impeached". This makes it sound like trump was convicted by the Senate, when in fact there has been no senate trial yet. Also, what exactly is "fully impeached"? Xv929182 (talk) 15:16, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Already done. All three have been impeached. "Fully impeached" is not clearly defined. The previous wording was "awaits the senate" which is better so I reverted it to that. -- Sirfurboy (talk) 15:21, 19 December 2019 (UTC)