Better Know the Impeachment Process 12.11.19 "Is Impeachment a Criminal Proceeding?"

IS IMPEACHMENT, WITH TRIAL THEREON, A “CRIMINAL PROCEEDING”?  

The president is impeachable for “Treason, Bribery, and other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.” Treason is a crime. Bribery is a crime. It would seem that a “high Crime” must in some sense be a crime. What about a “misdemeanor” or “high misdemeanor”? It seems unlikely that such a phrase, in such a string, abruptly changes the subject. Nevertheless, some have contended that impeachment, and Senate trial, are not criminal proceedings at all.

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It makes no difference whether we call impeachment a “criminal” proceeding or not, any more than it makes any difference whether we call it a “judicial” proceeding or not. What does make a difference is ascertaining those things in the impeachment process that should be treated like the same things in a criminal trial, and what things need not be. On this question, or set of questions, much can usefully be said. 

Let us take first the question of proper attitude toward the facts, and toward the problems of proof, and of burden of proof. As a simple, and typical, factual question, let us take, “Did the president, on a given day, and at a given time, say ‘X’ or ‘Y’?”

Black, Charles L., Jr. & Bobbitt, Philip, Impeachment: A Handbook, New Edition (p. 15). Yale University Press. Kindle Edition.