CLASS #24  Rewind  10/22/2012
Principles of the U.S Constitution

This class was driven by the following essential question for Topic #2a

1. How the Constitution both empowers and limits the Congress, the Supreme Court, and the President?

2. What are the roles of Congress, the Supreme Court, and President have changed over time?

3. Explain and evaluate the division of power between the states and the national government

4. Eplain and evaluate the separation of power in the national government

ANNOUCEMENTS: Please make sure you are working on your first WIRE assignment. It is due by Sunday 10/28 at 11:00 pm. I will be after Wednesday 10/24 in Room 242 if you need assistance

PRINCIPLES of THE CONSTITUTION 

I presented a summary of Constitutional Themes in class today based on the following powerpoint
Constitution Themes 12.ppt . This discussion focused on explanations of each theme, followed by examples

In addition to the notes and examples I provided in class, please consult your US History Resource book and you first WIRE assignment on Constituional Principles

HW:Finish WIRE assignment "Constitutional Principles" (due sunday10/28/2012)

VIDEO SUPPORT - Flexibility of the US Constitution (8 minutes) 

CASE STUDY  of PRINCIPLES of CONSTITUTION -  Barbara Jordan Video  

Barbara Jordan

Statement on the Articles of Impeachment

Delivered 25 July 1974, House Judiciary Committee

VIDEO  

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Earlier today, we heard the beginning of the Preamble to the Constitution of the United States: "We, the people." It's a very eloquent beginning. But when that document was completed on the seventeenth of September in 1787, I was not included in that "We, the people." I felt somehow for many years that George Washington and Alexander Hamilton just left me out by mistake. But through the process of amendment, interpretation, and court decision, I have finally been included in "We, the people."

Teacher's Note: This was the real focus of the clip - Mrs. Jordan references the flexibility of the Constitution and how it has now included her (a black women from the South)  Mr.H

Today I am an inquisitor. And hyperbole would not be fictional and would not overstate the solemnness that I feel right now. My faith in the Constitution is whole; it is complete; it is total. And I am not going to sit here and be an idle spectator to the diminution, the subversion, the destruction, of the Constitution.

"Who can so properly be the inquisitors for the nation as the representatives of the nation themselves?" "The subjects of its jurisdiction are those offenses which proceed from the misconduct of public men." And that's what we're talking about. In other words, [the jurisdiction comes] from the abuse or violation of some public trust.

It is wrong, I suggest, it is a misreading of the Constitution for any member here to assert that for a member to vote for an article of impeachment means that that member must be convinced that the President should be removed from office. The Constitution doesn't say that. The powers relating to impeachment are an essential check in the hands of the body of the legislature against and upon the encroachments of the executive. The division between the two branches of the legislature, the House and the Senate, assigning to the one the right to accuse and to the other the right to judge, the framers of this Constitution were very astute. They did not make the accusers and the judgers and the judges the same person. We know the nature of impeachment. We've been talking about it awhile now. It is chiefly designed for the President and his high ministers to somehow be called into account. It is designed to "bridle" the executive if he engages in excesses. "It is designed as a method of national inquest into the conduct of public men." The framers confided in the Congress the power if need be, to remove the President in order to strike a delicate balance between a President swollen with power and grown tyrannical, and preservation of the independence of the executive.

James Madison again at the Constitutional Convention: "A President is impeachable if he attempts to subvert the Constitution." The Constitution charges the President with the task of taking care that the laws be faithfully executed, and yet the President has counseled his aides to commit perjury, willfully disregard the secrecy of grand jury proceedings, conceal surreptitious entry, attempt to compromise a federal judge, while publicly displaying his cooperation with the processes of criminal justice. "A President is impeachable if he attempts to subvert the Constitution."

If the impeachment provision in the Constitution of the United States will not reach the offenses charged here, then perhaps that 18^th century Constitution should be abandoned to a 20^th century paper shredder. Has the President committed offenses, and planned, and directed, and acquiesced in a course of conduct which the Constitution will not tolerate? That's the question. We know that. We know the question. We should now forthwith proceed to answer the question. It is reason, and not passion, which must guide our deliberations, guide our debate, and guide our decision.

I yield back the balance of my time, Mr. Chairman.

Barbara Jordan 

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