Tuesday, December 31, 2019
Tuesday, December 24, 2019
Merry Christmas Everyone ~ Joseph H. Bryan-Royster, Publisher
~ LANTERN OF THE HERMIT ~
"Old Lamplighter", as performed by The Lennon Sisters
My Vision for the Lanternlight Minstrels was Realized at Sirius...
On December 13th, 2015 a group of us started at the Community Center, walking by lantern and candle-light through the residences of Sirius and then along Baker Road, singing Yuletide carols together and sharing Joy of the Holiday Season within the Hearthstone Village. ~ JDHWB-R
Carols were first sung in Europe thousands of years ago, but these were not Christmas Carols. They were pagan songs, sung at the Winter Solstice celebrations as people danced round stone circles (The word carol originally meant to dance to something). The Winter Solstice is the shortest day of the year, usually taking place around the 22nd December. The word Carol actually means dance or a song of praise and joy! Carols used to be written and sung during all four seasons, but only the tradition of singing them at Christmas has really survived.
Early Christians took over the pagan solstice celebrations for Christmas and gave people Christian songs to sing instead of pagan ones. In AD 129, a Roman Bishop said that a song called "Angel's Hymn" should be sung at a Christmas service in Rome. Another famous early Christmas Hymn was written in 760 AD, by Comas of Jerusalem, for the Greek Orthodox Church. Soon after this many composers all over Europe started to write 'Christmas carols'. However, not many people liked them as they were all written and sung in Latin, a language that the normal people couldn't understand. By the time of the Middle Ages (the 1200s), most people had lost interest in celebrating Christmas altogether.
This was changed by St. Francis of Assisi when, in 1223, he started his Nativity Plays in Italy. The people in the plays sang songs or 'canticles' that told the story during the plays. Sometimes, the choruses of these new carols were in Latin; but normally they were all in a language that the people watching the play could understand and join in! The new carols spread to France, Spain, Germany and other European countries.
The earliest carol, like this, was written in 1410. Sadly only a very small fragment of it still exists. The carol was about Mary and Jesus meeting different people in Bethlehem. Most Carols from this time and the Elizabethan period are untrue stories, very loosely based on the Christmas story, about the holy family and were seen as entertaining rather than religious songs. They were usually sung in homes rather than in churches! Traveling singers or Minstrels started singing these carols and the words were changed for the local people wherever they were traveling. One carols that changed like this is 'I Saw Three Ships'.
When Oliver Cromwell and the Puritans came to power in England in 1647, the celebration of Christmas and singing carols was stopped. However, the carols survived as people still sang them in secret. Carols remained mainly unsung until Victorian times, when two men called William Sandys and Davis Gilbert collected lots of old Christmas music from villages in England.
Before carol singing in public became popular, there were sometimes official carol singers called 'Waits'. These were bands of people led by important local leaders (such as council leaders) who had the only power in the towns and villages to take money from the public (if others did this, they were sometimes charged as beggars!). They were called 'Waits' because they only sang on Christmas Eve (This was sometimes known as 'watchnight' or 'waitnight' because of the shepherds were watching their sheep when the angels appeared to them.), when the Christmas celebrations began.
Also, at this time, many orchestras and choirs were being set up in the cities of England and people wanted Christmas songs to sing, so carols once again became popular. Many new carols, such as 'Good King Wenceslas', were also written in the Victorian period.
New carols services were created and became popular, as did the custom of singing carols in the streets. Both of these customs are still popular today! One of the most popular types of Carols services are Carols by Candlelight services. At this service, the church is only lit by candlelight and it feels very Christmassy! Carols by Candlelight services are held in countries all over the world.
The most famous type of Carol Service might be a Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols, where carols and Bible readings tell the Christmas Story.
Source: http://www.whychristmas.com/customs/carols_history.shtml
Image Source: http://www.spiritofchristmasmountholly.com/tag/christmas-carols/
In 1977 my intention was to establish the Commonwealth of Lanternshire, an intentional community on property located in the Town of Stetson, Maine with a collective "barn-raising" style erection of a post-and-beam community house to be named Rosebriar Hall at the high point of a seven-day summer Festival of Lanterns July 1st through 7th of that year...
"A Lanternshire Christmas" was to be initiated at the start of Advent in 1977 with lighting of the trees and dwellings on Burleigh Road in Stetson and continue through New Year's Day in 1978. Part of this intended annual event was to walk along this road singing Christmas carols as "The Lanternlight Minstrels" with the carrying of a lighted lantern among us as we walked from Rosebriar Hall to the House at Pinewoods Hollow...
This never manifested into reality... as an 8' x 10' shed, built in the fall of 1976, was not expanded into the 18' x 24' camp that was to be the House at Pinewoods Hollow on my original 14-acre parcel of land until the Fall of 1978. This structure was never finished, as funds dried up and my dream of building an intentional community put on hold...
Now, as I explore membership at Sirius Community in Shutesbury, I have an opportunity to shine the Threshold Lantern as a bringer of Yuletide cheer singing carols with members and guests as we stroll through the Hearthstone Village along Baker Road on Sunday evening, December 13th, starting at 7:00 pm from the Community Center... ~ JDHWB-R
(I originally posted this December 13, 2015 on my Lantern of the Hermit internal illumination blog)
~ Picturesque scene of carrollers from Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol ~
YouTube Video Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CN_lUVt0Wj4
The Lanternlight Ministry of Christian Metaphysics
Church of Jesus the Lamplighter
Commissioned October 4th, 2009 C.E.
NEW THOUGHT MULTIDIMENSIONAL METAPHYSICS
IN THE LIGHT OF ESOTERIC CHRISTIAN TEACHING
Inspired by
YESHUA bin YOSEF of NAZARETH
"Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door,
I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me." - Revelation 3:20
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son,
that whosoever believeth in him should not perish,
but have everlasting life. - John 3:16
"While I AM in the world, I AM the light of the world.” John 9:5
Rev. Dr. Joseph H. Bryan-Royster, Ph.D., Msc.D
Organizational Clerk for this Ministry
"As Above, So Below. As Is, So Be It... And So It Is!"
Affiliated with the International Metaphysical Ministry
Saturday, December 21, 2019
Winter Solstice 2019 at the Sirius Community, Shutesbury, MA...
Happy Solstice from Sirius! Congratulations Geni and Stephen!
~ Linda Reimer & Bruce Davidson together, before his passing ~
Dear Friends
November 15th this year marked the second anniversary of Bruce's passing. As we sit here in reflecting what has transpired. In the last two years, we find that some of his thoughts and musings are more relevant and important than ever.
From an article he wrote in communities magazine we would like to offer you the following quote:
"All life is sacred and everything is interconnected. If you live from that perspective, you become a deep ecologist. In order to be Spiritually minded, one must do more than teach and learn skills. one must embody the principles and values that lead to a sustainable life; love compassion and commitment to the highest good for all beings."
Much love and blessings.
Linda
Sirius Community, 72 Baker Rd., Shutesbury, Massaxhusetts 01072 ~ Ph: 413-259-1251
Thursday, December 19, 2019
Senator Mitch McConnell Responds to Impeachment of Trump...
Partisan Vote by Democrats in House sends it to Senate for Trial!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9EVJOXmnCA&t=125s
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer on Impeachment
Wednesday, December 18, 2019
IMPEACHMENT OF PRESIDENT DONALD JOHN TRUMP...
By Martin Falbisoner - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES VOTE: H.R # 755
IN THE WAKE OF HOUSE IMPEACHMENT VOTE...
IMPEACHMENT OF DONALD TRUMP
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The impeachment of Donald Trump, the 45th president of the United States, occurred on December 18, 2019, when the House of Representatives approved articles of impeachment on abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.[2] This came after a House impeachment inquiry found that in the Trump–Ukraine scandal, Trump allegedly solicited foreign interference in the 2020 U.S. presidential election to help his re-election bid, and then obstructed the inquiry itself by telling his administration officials to ignore subpoenas for documents and testimony. The inquiry reported that Trump withheld military aid and an invitation to the White House in order to influence Ukraine into announcing investigations into Trump's political rivals.[3][4][5]:8,208
The inquiry stage of Trump's impeachment lasted from September to November 2019, in the wake of an August 2019 whistleblower complaint alleging abuse of power by Trump. In October 2019, three congressional committees (Intelligence, Oversight, and Foreign Affairs) deposed witnesses. In November 2019, the House Intelligence Committee held a number of public hearings in which witnesses testified publicly. On December 3, the House Intelligence Committee voted 13–9 along party lines to adopt a final report.
A set of impeachment hearings before the Judiciary Committee began on December 4, 2019. On December 13, the House Judiciary Committee voted 23–17 along party lines to recommend two articles of impeachment: abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. The Judiciary Committee also released a report on the articles of impeachment on December 16. On December 18, the full House approved both articles of impeachment, making Trump the third president in U.S. history to be impeached. A Senate trial is currently in the planning stages.
Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impeachment_of_Donald_Trump
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| ~ By Theodore R. Davis - Illustration in Harper's Weekly, April 11, 1868 ~ From Wikimedia Commons, the free media repository |
IMPEACHMENT OF ANDREW JOHNSON
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The impeachment of Andrew Johnson was initiated on February 24, 1868, when the United States House of Representatives resolved to impeach Andrew Johnson, 17th president of the United States, for "high crimes and misdemeanors", which were detailed in eleven articles of impeachment. The primary charge against Johnson was violation of the Tenure of Office Act, passed by Congress in March 1867, over his veto. Specifically, he had removed from office Edwin M. Stanton, the Secretary of War—whom the Act was largely designed to protect—and attempted to replace him with Brevet Major General Lorenzo Thomas. (Earlier, while the Congress was not in session, Johnson had suspended Stanton and appointed General Ulysses S. Grant as Secretary of War ad interim.)
Johnson became the first American president to be impeached on March 2–3, 1868, when the House formally adopted the articles of impeachment and forwarded them to the United States Senate for adjudication. The trial in the Senate began three days later, with Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase presiding. On May 16, the Senate failed to convict Johnson on one of the articles, with the 35–19 vote in favor of conviction falling short of the necessary two-thirds majority by a single vote. A ten-day recess was called before attempting to convict him on additional articles. The delay did not change the outcome, however, as on May 26, it failed to convict the president on two articles, both by the same margin, after which the trial was adjourned.
The impeachment and trial of Andrew Johnson had important political implications for the balance of federal legislative–executive power. It maintained the principle that Congress should not remove the President from office simply because its members disagreed with him over policy, style, and administration of the office. It also resulted in diminished presidential influence on public policy and overall governing power, fostering a system of governance which Woodrow Wilson referred to in the 1870s as "Congressional Government". Johnson remained the only U.S. president to have been impeached and faced a Senate trial for over a century, until Bill Clinton became the second in 1998.
Tension between the executive and legislative branches had been high prior to Johnson's ascension to the presidency. Following Union Army victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg in July 1863, President Lincoln began contemplating the issue of how to bring the South back into the Union. He wished to offer an olive branch to the rebel states by pursuing a lenient plan for their reintegration. The forgiving tone of the president's plan, plus the fact that he implemented it by presidential directive without consulting Congress, incensed Radical Republicans, who countered with a more stringent plan. Their proposal for Southern reconstruction, the Wade–Davis Bill, passed both houses of Congress in July 1864, but was pocket vetoed by the president and never took effect.
The assassination of Abraham Lincoln on April 14, 1865, just days after the Army of Northern Virginia's surrender at Appomattox briefly lessened the tension over who would set the terms of peace. The radicals, while suspicious of the new president and his policies, believed, based upon his record, that Andrew Johnson would defer, or at least acquiesce to their hardline proposals. Though a Democrat from Tennessee, Johnson had been a fierce critic of the Southern secession. Then after several states left the Union, including his own, he chose to stay in Washington (rather than resign his U.S. Senate seat), and later, when Union troops occupied Tennessee, Johnson was appointed military governor. While in that position he had exercised his powers with vigor, frequently stating that "treason must be made odious and traitors punished". Johnson, however, embraced Lincoln's more lenient policies, thus rejecting the Radicals, and setting the stage for a showdown between the president and Congress. During the first months of his presidency, Johnson issued proclamations of general amnesty for most former Confederates, both government and military officers, and oversaw creation of new governments in the hitherto rebellious states – governments dominated by ex-Confederate officials. In February 1866, Johnson vetoed legislation extending the Freedmen's Bureau and expanding its powers; Congress was unable to override the veto. Afterward, Johnson denounced Radical Republicans Representative Thaddeus Stevens and Senator Charles Sumner, along with abolitionist Wendell Phillips, as traitors. Later, Johnson vetoed a Civil Rights Act and a second Freedmen's Bureau bill; the Senate and the House each mustered the two-thirds majorities necessary to override both vetoes, setting the stage for a showdown between Congress and the president.
At an impasse with Congress, Johnson offered himself directly to the American public as a "tribune of the people". In the late-summer of 1866, the president embarked on a national "Swing Around the Circle" speaking tour, where he asked his audiences for their support in his battle against the Congress and urged voters to elect representatives to Congress in the upcoming midterm election who supported his policies. The tour backfired on Johnson, however, when reports of his undisciplined, vitriolic speeches and ill-advised confrontations with hecklers swept the nation. Contrary to his hopes, the 1866 elections led to veto-proof Republican majorities in both houses of Congress. As a result, Radicals were able to take control of Reconstruction, passing a series of Reconstruction Acts—each one over the President's veto—addressing requirements for Southern states to be fully restored to the Union. The first of these acts divided those states, excluding Johnson's home state of Tennessee, into five military districts, and each state's government was put under the control of the U.S. military. Additionally, these states were required to enact new constitutions, ratify the Fourteenth Amendment, and guarantee voting rights for black males.
Tenure of Office Act
Congress's control of the military Reconstruction policy was mitigated by Johnson's command of the military as president; however, Johnson had inherited, as Secretary of War, Lincoln's appointee Edwin M. Stanton, a staunch Radical Republican, who as long as he remained in office would comply with Congressional Reconstruction policies. To ensure that Stanton would not be replaced, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act in 1867 over Johnson's veto. The act required the President to seek the Senate's advice and consent before relieving or dismissing any member of his Cabinet (an indirect reference to Stanton) or, indeed, any federal official whose initial appointment had previously required its advice and consent.
Because the Tenure of Office Act did permit the president to suspend such officials when Congress was out of session, when Johnson failed to obtain Stanton's resignation, he instead suspended Stanton on August 5, 1867, which gave him the opportunity to appoint General Ulysses S. Grant, then serving as Commanding General of the Army, interim Secretary of War. When the Senate adopted a resolution of non-concurrence with Stanton's dismissal in December 1867, Grant told Johnson he was going to resign, fearing punitive legal action. Johnson assured Grant that he would assume all responsibility in the matter, and asked him to delay his resignation until a suitable replacement could be found. Contrary to Johnson's belief that Grant had agreed to remain in office, when the Senate voted and reinstated Stanton in January 1868, Grant immediately resigned, before the president had an opportunity to appoint a replacement. Johnson was furious at Grant, accusing him of lying during a stormy cabinet meeting. The March 1868 publication of several angry messages between Johnson and Grant led to a complete break between the two. As a result of these letters, Grant solidified his standing as the frontrunner for the 1868 Republican presidential nomination.
Johnson complained about Stanton's restoration to office and searched desperately for someone to replace Stanton who would be acceptable to the Senate. He first proposed the position to General William Tecumseh Sherman, an enemy of Stanton, who turned down his offer. Sherman subsequently suggested to Johnson that Republican radicals and moderates would be amenable to replacing Stanton with Jacob Cox, but he found the president to be no longer interested in appeasement.[20] On February 21, 1868, the president appointed Lorenzo Thomas, a brevet major general in the Army, as interim Secretary of War. Johnson thereupon informed the Senate of his decision. Thomas personally delivered the president's dismissal notice to Stanton, who rejected the legitimacy of the decision. Rather than vacate his office, Stanton barricaded himself in there and ordered Thomas arrested for violating the Tenure of Office Act. He also informed Speaker of the House Schuyler Colfax and President pro tempore of the Senate Benjamin Wade of the situation. Thomas remained under arrest for several days before being released, and having the charge against him dropped after Stanton realized that the case against Thomas would provide the courts with an opportunity to review the constitutionality of the Tenure of Office Act.
Johnson's opponents in Congress were outraged by his actions; the president's challenge to congressional authority—with regard to both the Tenure of Office Act and post-war reconstruction—had, in their estimation, been tolerated for long enough. In swift response, an impeachment resolution was introduced in the House by representatives Thaddeus Stevens and John Bingham. Expressing the widespread sentiment among House Republicans, Representative William D. Kelley (on February 22, 1868) declared:
Sir, the bloody and untilled fields of the ten unreconstructed states, the unsheeted ghosts of the two thousand murdered negroes in Texas, cry, if the dead ever evoke vengeance, for the punishment of Andrew Johnson.
Impeachment
On February 24, 1868, three days after Johnson's dismissal of Stanton, the House of Representatives voted 126 to 47 (with 17 members not voting) in favor of a resolution to impeach the president for high crimes and misdemeanors. Thaddeus Stevens addressed the House prior to the vote. "This is not to be the temporary triumph of a political party," he said, "but is to endure in its consequence until this whole continent shall be filled with a free and untrammeled people or shall be a nest of shrinking, cowardly slaves."
One week later, the House adopted eleven articles of impeachment against the president.
Andrew Johnson ~ 17th President of the USA
Trial
Pretrial
On March 4, 1868, amid tremendous public attention and press coverage, the eleven Articles of Impeachment were presented to the Senate, which reconvened the following day as a court of impeachment, with Chief Justice Salmon Chase presiding, and proceeded to develop a set of rules for the trial and its officers.[14] The extent of Chase's authority as presiding officer to render unilateral rulings was a frequent point of contention during the rules debate and trial. He initially maintained that deciding certain procedural questions on his own was his prerogative; but after the Senate challenged several of his rulings, he gave up making rulings. On one occasion, when he ruled that Johnson should be permitted to present evidence that Thomas's appointment to replace Stanton was intended to provide a test case to challenge the constitutionality of the Tenure of Office Act, the Senate reversed the ruling.
When it came time for senators to take the juror's oath, Thomas Hendricks questioned Benjamin Wade's impartiality and suggested that Wade abstain from voting due to a conflict of interest. As there was no constitutional provision at the time for filling an intra-term vacancy in the vice presidency (accomplished a century later by the Twenty-fifth Amendment), the office had been vacant since Johnson succeeded to the presidency. Therefore, Wade, as president pro tempore of the Senate, would, under the Presidential Succession Act then in force and effect, become president if Johnson were removed from office. Reviled by the radical majority, Hendricks withdrew his objection a day later and left the matter to Wade's own conscience; he subsequently voted for conviction.
The House impeachment committee was made up of: John Bingham, George S. Boutwell, Benjamin Butler, John A. Logan, Thaddeus Stevens, James F. Wilson, and Thomas Williams.[29] The president's defense team was made up of Henry Stanbery, William M. Evarts, Benjamin R. Curtis, Thomas A. R. Nelson and William S. Groesbeck. On the advice of counsel, the president did not appear at the trial.
The trial was conducted mostly in open session, and the Senate chamber galleries were filled to capacity throughout. Public interest was so great that the Senate issued admission passes for the first time in its history. For each day of the trial, 1,000 color coded tickets were printed, granting admittance for a single day.
Testimony
On the first day, Johnson's defense committee asked for 40 days to collect evidence and witnesses since the prosecution had had a longer amount of time to do so, but only 10 days were granted. The proceedings began on March 23. Senator Garrett Davis argued that because not all states were represented in the Senate the trial could not be held and that it should therefore be adjourned. The motion was voted down. After the charges against the president were made, Henry Stanbery asked for another 30 days to assemble evidence and summon witnesses, saying that in the 10 days previously granted there had only been enough time to prepare the president's reply. John A. Logan argued that the trial should begin immediately and that Stanbery was only trying to stall for time. The request was turned down in a vote 41 to 12. However, the Senate voted the next day to give the defense six more days to prepare evidence, which was accepted.
The trial commenced again on March 30. Benjamin Butler opened for the prosecution with a three-hour speech reviewing historical impeachment trials, dating from King John of England. For days Butler spoke out against Johnson's violations of the Tenure of Office Act and further charged that the president had issued orders directly to Army officers without sending them through General Grant. The defense argued that Johnson had not violated the Tenure of Office Act because President Lincoln did not reappoint Stanton as Secretary of War at the beginning of his second term in 1865 and that he was therefore a leftover appointment from the 1860 cabinet, which removed his protection by the Tenure of Office Act. The prosecution called several witnesses in the course of the proceedings until April 9, when they rested their case.
Benjamin Curtis called attention to the fact that after the House passed the Tenure of Office Act, the Senate had amended it, meaning that it had to return it to a Senate–House conference committee to resolve the differences. He followed up by quoting the minutes of those meetings, which revealed that while the House members made no notes about the fact, their sole purpose was to keep Stanton in office, and the Senate had disagreed. The defense then called their first witness, Adjutant General Lorenzo Thomas. He did not provide adequate information in the defense's cause and Butler made attempts to use his information to the prosecution's advantage. The next witness was General William T. Sherman, who testified that President Johnson had offered to appoint Sherman to succeed Stanton as Secretary of War in order to ensure that the department was effectively administered. This testimony damaged the prosecution, which expected Sherman to testify that Johnson offered to appoint Sherman for the purpose of obstructing the operation, or overthrow, of the government. Sherman essentially affirmed that Johnson only wanted him to manage the department and not to execute directions to the military that would be contrary to the will of Congress.
Verdict
The Senate was composed of 54 members representing 27 states (10 former Confederate states had not yet been readmitted to representation in the Senate) at the time of the trial. At its conclusion, senators voted on three of the articles of impeachment. On each occasion the vote was 35–19, with 35 senators voting guilty and 19 not guilty. As the constitutional threshold for a conviction in an impeachment trial is a two-thirds majority guilty vote, 36 votes in this instance, Johnson was not convicted. He remained in office through the end of his term the following March 4, though as a lame duck without influence on public policy.
Seven Republican senators were concerned that the proceedings had been manipulated to give a one-sided presentation of the evidence. Senators William P. Fessenden, Joseph S. Fowler, James W. Grimes, John B. Henderson, Lyman Trumbull, Peter G. Van Winkle, and Edmund G. Ross, who provided the decisive vote, defied their party by voting against conviction. In addition to the aforementioned seven, three more Republicans James Dixon, James Doolittle, Daniel Norton, and all nine Democratic Senators voted not guilty.
The first vote was taken on May 16 for the eleventh article. Prior to the vote, Samuel Pomeroy, the senior senator from Kansas, told the junior Kansas Senator Ross that if Ross voted for acquittal that Ross would become the subject of an investigation for bribery. Afterward, in hopes of persuading at least one senator who voted not guilty to change his vote, the Senate adjourned for 10 days before continuing voting on the other articles. During the hiatus, under Butler's leadership, the House put through a resolution to investigate alleged "improper or corrupt means used to influence the determination of the Senate". Despite the Radical Republican leadership's heavy-handed efforts to change the outcome, when votes were cast on May 26 for the second and third articles, the results were the same as the first. After the trial, Butler conducted hearings on the widespread reports that Republican senators had been bribed to vote for Johnson's acquittal. In Butler's hearings, and in subsequent inquiries, there was increasing evidence that some acquittal votes were acquired by promises of patronage jobs and cash cards. Political deals were struck as well. Grimes received assurances that acquittal would not be followed by presidential reprisals; Johnson agreed to enforce the Reconstruction Acts, and to appoint General John Schofield to succeed Stanton. Nonetheless, the investigations never resulted in charges, much less convictions, against anyone.
Moreover, there is evidence that the prosecution attempted to bribe the senators voting for acquittal to switch their votes to conviction. Maine Senator Fessenden was offered the Ministership to Great Britain. Prosecutor Butler said, "Tell [Kansas Senator Ross] that if he wants money there is a bushel of it here to be had." Butler's investigation also boomeranged when it was discovered that Kansas Senator Pomeroy, who voted for conviction, had written a letter to Johnson's Postmaster General seeking a $40,000 bribe for Pomeroy's acquittal vote along with three or four others in his caucus. Butler was himself told by Wade that Wade would appoint Butler as Secretary of State when Wade assumed the Presidency after a Johnson conviction. An opinion that Senator Ross was mercilessly persecuted for his courageous vote to sustain the independence of the Presidency as a branch of the Federal Government is the subject of an entire chapter in President John F. Kennedy's book, Profiles in Courage. That opinion has been rejected by some scholars, such as Ralph Roske, and endorsed by others, such as Avery Craven.
Not one of the Republican senators who voted for acquittal ever again served in an elective office.[44] Although they were under intense pressure to change their votes to conviction during the trial, afterward public opinion rapidly shifted around to their viewpoint. Some senators who voted for conviction, such as John Sherman and even Charles Sumner, later changed their minds.
Friday, December 13, 2019
A HOUSE... DIVIDED AGAINST ITSELF... CANNOT STAND
An impeachment inquiry against Donald Trump was initiated by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on September 24, 2019, after a whistleblower alleged that President Donald Trump may have abused the power of the presidency by withholding military aid as a means of pressuring newly elected president of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky to perform two favors: to pursue investigations of Joe Biden and his son Hunter, and to support a conspiracy theory that Ukraine, not Russia, was behind interference in the 2016 presidential election. More than a week after Trump had put a hold on the previously approved military aid, he made the aforementioned requests in a July 25 phone call with the Ukrainian president, which the whistleblower alleged was intended to help Trump's reelection bid.
Believing that critical military aid would be revoked, Zelensky made plans to announce investigations of the Bidens on the September 13 episode of CNN's Fareed Zakaria GPS. After Trump was told of the whistleblower complaint in late August, and elements of the events had begun to leak, the aid was released on September 11 and the planned interview was cancelled. Trump declassified a non-verbatim transcript of the call on September 24, the day the impeachment inquiry began. The whistleblower's complaint was given to Congress the following day and subsequently released to the public. The White House corroborated several of the allegations, including that a record of the call between Trump and Zelensky had been stored in a highly restricted system in the White House normally reserved for classified information.
In October, three full Congressional committees (Intelligence, Oversight, and Foreign Affairs) deposed witnesses including Ukraine ambassador Bill Taylor, Laura Cooper (the top Pentagon official overseeing Ukraine-related U.S. policy), and former White House official Fiona Hill. Witnesses testified that Trump wanted Zelensky to publicly announce investigations into the Bidens and Burisma (a Ukrainian natural gas company on whose board Hunter Biden had served) and 2016 election interference. On October 8, in a letter from Counsel Pat Cipollone to Speaker Pelosi, the White House officially responded that it would not cooperate with the investigation due to concerns including that there had not yet been a vote of the full House and that interviews of witnesses were being conducted behind closed doors. On October 17, White House acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney said, in response to a reporter's allegation of quid pro quo: "We do that all the time with foreign policy. Get over it." He walked back his comments later in the day, asserting that there had been "absolutely no quid pro quo" and that Trump had withheld military aid to Ukraine over concerns of the country's corruption.
On October 31, the House voted 232–196 to establish procedures for public hearings, which started on November 13. As hearings began, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff said Trump may have committed bribery, which is specifically listed as an impeachable offense in the Constitution. Private and public congressional testimony by twelve government witnesses in November 2019 presented a significant body of evidence indicating that Trump demanded a quid pro quo of political favors in exchange for official action. On December 3, the House Intelligence Committee published a report stating that "the impeachment inquiry has found that President Trump, personally and acting through agents within and outside of the U.S. government, solicited the interference of a foreign government, Ukraine, to benefit his reelection." On December 10, the House Judiciary Committee unveiled their articles of impeachment: one for abuse of power and one for obstruction of Congress. After several days of discussion, the Judiciary Committee voted along party lines, 23-17, to approve both articles of impeachment. The full House is expected to vote on the matter on December 18.
Further information: Efforts to impeach Donald Trump
Efforts to impeach President Trump have been made by a variety of people and groups. The first efforts in the Republican-controlled Congress were initiated in 2017 by Representatives Al Green and Brad Sherman, both Democrats, in response to Trump's obstructions of justice in the Russian influence investigations begun during the first year of Trump's presidency. A December 2017 resolution of impeachment failed in the House by a 58–364 vote margin.
Democrats gained control of the House following the 2018 elections and made Nancy Pelosi the new Speaker. While she consistently opposed any move toward impeachment, she currently supported multiple committees' respective investigations into Trump's actions and finances. On January 17, 2019, new allegations involving Trump surfaced, claiming he instructed his long-time lawyer, Michael Cohen, to lie under oath about Trump's conflict-of-interest involvement with the Russian government to erect a Trump Tower in Moscow. This also sparked requests for an investigation and for the president to "resign or be impeached" should such claims be substantiated.
The Mueller Report, released on April 18, 2019, reached no conclusion as to whether Trump had committed criminal obstruction of justice. Special Counsel Robert Mueller strongly hinted that it was up to Congress to make such a determination. Congressional support for an impeachment inquiry increased as a result. Speaker Nancy Pelosi initially continued to resist calls for impeachment. In May 2019, she indicated that Trump's continued actions, which she characterized as obstruction of justice and refusal to honor congressional subpoenas, might make an impeachment inquiry necessary. An increasing number of House Democrats and a then-Republican, Justin Amash (who later became an independent), were requesting such an inquiry.
H. Res. 13 (alleging interference with the Mueller investigation) introduced on January 3, 2019, by Representative Sherman (D-California): immediately referred to the Judiciary Committee and to Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties on February 4, 2019.
H. Res. 257 (which would launch an impeachment inquiry with no specific allegations) introduced on March 27, 2019, by Representative Rashida Tlaib (D-Michigan): referred to the Rules Committee.
H. Res. 396 (which names 19 areas of inquiry) introduced on May 22, 2019, by Representative Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas): referred to the Rules Committee.
H. Res. 498 (which alleges Trump is unfit for office due to racist comments) introduced on July 17, 2019, by Representative Green (D-Texas): a privileged resolution which was blocked from proceeding by a vote of 332–95.
Fewer than 20 Representatives in the House supported impeachment by January 2019, but this number grew after the Mueller Report was released and after Mueller testified in July, up to around 140 Representatives before the Trump–Ukraine scandal surfaced.
Soon after the release of the Mueller report, Trump began urging an investigation into the origins of the Russia probe, wanting to "investigate the investigators" and possibly discredit the conclusions of the FBI and Mueller. In April 2019, Attorney General William Barr announced that he had launched a review of the origins of the FBI's investigation, even though the origins of the probe were already being investigated by the Justice Department's inspector general and by U.S. attorney John Huber, who had been appointed to the same task in 2018 by then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions. Barr assigned U.S. Attorney John Durham to lead the probe, and Trump directed the American intelligence community to "promptly provide assistance and information" to Barr, and delegated to him the "full and complete authority" to declassify any related documents. Although Durham was nominally in charge of the investigation, Barr himself began contacting foreign governments to ask for information about the origins of the FBI probe. Barr personally traveled to the United Kingdom and Italy to seek information; Italy's parliament is expected to begin its own investigation into Barr's meetings with Italian secret services. At Barr's request, Trump himself phoned the prime minister of Australia, Scott Morrison, to ask for assistance.
Rudy Giuliani and his business associates
In 2018, Florida businessmen Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman hired Trump's personal attorney Rudy Giuliani as a consultant in their security company, paying him $500,000. In turn, Fruman and Parnas assisted him in his search in Ukraine for damaging information about Trump's political opponents. Giuliani sent Fruman and Parnas to Ukraine to seek information to undermine the Special Counsel's investigation and damage Biden's presidential campaign. At the same time, Fruman and Parnas were being paid by Dmytro Firtash, a Ukrainian oligarch, with alleged ties to Russian organized crime and the Kremlin, who is facing federal bribery charges in the U.S. and is fighting extradition from Austria.
From at least May 2019 to August 2019, Trump and Giuliani pressed the Ukrainian government to launch an investigation that would have negatively affected Trump's political rival Joe Biden in the 2020 election. Giuliani and his associates asked Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky to announce an investigation into the business activities of Hunter Biden. The pressure tactics were developed by Giuliani and Gordon Sondland and applied in part by Parnas and Fruman. Zelensky reportedly felt rattled by the pressure, according to Amos Hochstein, a former diplomat and a member of Naftogaz's supervisory board, who alerted the National Security Council (NSC) of the matter in May 2019. Fruman and Parnas were arrested at Washington Dulles International Airport on October 9, 2019, on campaign finance-related charges brought by federal prosecutors in New York City.
The proposed investigation of Biden was based on a 2015 push by the U.S. to remove the Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin because he had been ignoring corruption in Ukraine and protecting political elites. At the time, this request had bipartisan support in the U.S. Congress and was also supported by the European Union.[e] Joe Biden, who at the time was vice president, served as the face of this request. Ukraine fired Shokin in early 2016. Trump claimed that Biden's true motivation was to protect his son Hunter, who served on the board of directors of the Ukrainian natural gas company Burisma Holdings, even though Shokin had placed his predecessor's investigation into Burisma on hold. Despite Trump's allegations, no one has produced evidence of any criminal wrongdoing by the Bidens.
Withholding of military aid and July 25 phone call
On July 18, 2019, without explanation, Trump put a hold on $391 million in Congressionally approved military aid to Ukraine. In a July 25 phone call, Trump repeatedly asked Zelensky to launch two investigations in cooperation with Giuliani and Attorney General Barr. One proposed investigation would concern a conspiracy theory—which originated on 4chan in 2017 and was spread by blogs, social media, and Fox News— ]that connected the American cybersecurity technology company CrowdStrike to Ukrainian actors supposedly interfering in the 2016 election. Trump had been repeatedly told by his own aides that this allegation is false, but he refused to accept those assurances. The other proposed investigation would concern Joe and Hunter Biden. At the time of the inquiry, Joe Biden was the leading presidential candidate in Democratic Party primary polling, making him Trump's most likely 2020 opponent.
This July 25 phone call was the subject of an anonymous complaint filed on August 12 under the Intelligence Community Whistleblower Protection Act. In late August, Trump was notified of the whistleblower's complaint. Congress and the public became aware of it on September 9. Two days later, on September 11, Trump lifted the hold on military aid. House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff said on September 13 that he had issued a subpoena to Acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire, as Maguire had failed to release the whistleblower's complaint to the congressional intelligence committees, as was arguably required by the relevant statute. Schiff argued that the complaint might have been withheld from Congress "in an unlawful effort to protect the President and conceal from the Committee information related to his possible 'serious or flagrant' misconduct, abuse of power, or violation of law".
On September 25, the White House released a non-verbatim memorandum of Trump's conversation with Zelensky; on the same day, the whistleblower complaint was released to Congress. Trump did not mention the hold on military aid in his conversation with Zelensky, but he repeatedly pointed out that the U.S. has been "very very good" to Ukraine, with which Zelensky expressed agreement. Zelensky then asked about obtaining more U.S. missiles, to which Trump replied "I would like you to do us a favor though" and brought up his request for investigations. The memorandum of the conversation confirmed the allegations by the first whistleblower that Trump had requested investigations into the Bidens and had invoked a conspiracy theory involving a Democratic National Committee server, while repeatedly urging Zelensky to work with Giuliani and Barr on these matters.
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren described this sentence as a "smoking gun" suggesting a quid pro quo. Prominent Democrats, including Senators Robert Menendez and Chris Murphy, suggested that the hold may have been intended to implicitly or explicitly pressure the Ukrainian government to investigate Hunter Biden. Former Ukrainian presidential advisor Serhiy Leshchenko said it was made a "clear fact" that Ukraine's communication with the U.S. was dependent on discussing a future investigation into the Bidens, while another anonymous Ukrainian lawmaker said Trump attempted to "pressure" and "blackmail" them into accepting a "quid pro quo" agreement based upon cooperation.
Ukraine
On September 20, 2019, Roman Truba, head of the Ukraine State Bureau of Investigations, told The Daily Beast that his agency had not investigated the Biden–Burisma connection and there were no signs of illegality there. Anton Herashchenko, a senior advisor to the Ukraine interior minister, told The Daily Beast that Ukraine will open such an investigation if there is an official request, along with details of why an investigation is needed and what to look for; Trump's requests had come through unofficial representatives such as Giuliani.
Ukrainian foreign minister Vadym Prystaiko told a Ukrainian news outlet on September 21: "I know what the [phone] conversation was about and I think there was no pressure. This conversation was long, friendly, and it touched on many questions, sometimes requiring serious answers." Prystaiko was also quoted as saying: "I want to say that we are an independent state, we have our secrets." On September 22, Senator Murphy said Zelensky told him he had no intention to get involved with an American election.
In an interview released on September 24, Ukrainian diplomat and politician Valentyn Nalyvaichenko told The Daily Beast that Ukrainian authorities would be reopening corruption investigations into multiple individuals and organizations including, potentially, Burisma, Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort, TV host Larry King, and former prosecutor Yuriy Lutsenko. King was suspected of having received slush fund payments recorded in the "black ledger" that also named Manafort. Nalyvaichenko accused Lutsenko of having been in communication with associates of Trump "for vindictive purposes".
Trump and Zelensky held a joint press conference at the United Nations the same day the transcript of their phone call was released. Zelensky told reporters: "We had I think good phone call. It was normal. We spoke about many things. So, I think, and you read it, that nobody pushed me." The next day, Zelensky said President Trump had not pressured anyone nor made any promises, and that the Prosecutor General Ruslan Riaboshapka would investigate all domestic cases without prejudice. On September 30, Zelensky made it clear that he was not going to interfere with the intra-American party confrontation. Subsequently, at an all-day press conference on October 10, Zelensky said he had learned about the blockage of the military aid only after the July 25 phone call. "We didn't speak about this. There was no blackmail."
The New York Times reported on October 3 that Sondland, U.S. Ambassador to the European Union, and Kurt Volker, U.S. Special Envoy to Ukraine, had in August drafted a statement for Zelensky to sign that would commit Ukraine to investigate Burisma, the company that Hunter Biden worked for, as well as the conspiracy theory that Ukraine interfered with the 2016 election to benefit Hillary Clinton.
On September 22, shortly after the public had become aware of the existence of a whistleblower, Trump acknowledged that he had discussed Joe Biden during a call with Zelensky on July 25. Trump said, "The conversation I had was largely congratulatory, was largely corruption, all of the corruption taking place, was largely the fact that we don't want our people like Vice President Biden and his son creating to [sic] the corruption already in Ukraine." Trump denied that his hold on military aid for Ukraine was linked to the Ukrainian government's refusal to investigate the Hunter Biden controversy, while also saying that withholding aid for this reason would have been ethically acceptable if he had done it. On September 26, 2019, Trump accused the person who provided the whistleblower with information of the call of being a "spy" and guilty of treason, before noting that treason is punishable by death. The whistleblower's lawyers said their client feared for his or her safety.
Two people close to Trump told The New York Times that the behavior in the scandal was "typical" of his "dealings on the phone with world leaders", e.g. engaging in flattery, discussing mutual cooperation, and bringing up a personal favor which then could be delegated. In an interview, Giuliani defended Trump, calling the president's request of the Ukrainian president "perfectly appropriate", while also indicating that he himself may have made a similar request to Ukrainian officials. A second whistleblower, who is also an intelligence official, came forward on October 5 with "first-hand knowledge of allegations" associated with the phone call between Trump and Zelensky, according to the lawyer representing both whistleblowers.
Further revelations
On September 27, 2019, the White House confirmed an allegation by the first whistleblower that a record of the call between Trump and Zelensky was sealed in a highly classified computer system at the advice of National Security Council lawyers. This came alongside media reports that the White House had used the most highly classified system to store memorandums of conversations with the leaders and officials of countries including Ukraine, Saudi Arabia and Russia. Administration officials had began storing these transcripts into this system after Trump's conversations with Australia's prime minister Malcolm Turnbull and Mexico's president Enrique Peña Nieto leaked earlier in 2017. This was seen by critics and the media as a deliberate attempt to hide potentially damaging information.
On October 3, after saying the U.S. has "tremendous power" and "many options" in the trade war with China "if they don't do what we want", Trump was asked by a reporter on what he hoped Zelensky would do after his phone call. Trump responded by publicly urging both Ukraine and China to investigate the Bidens.
House investigations
On the evening of September 24, 2019, Pelosi announced that six committees of the House of Representatives would begin a formal impeachment inquiry into President Trump. Pelosi accused Trump of betraying his oath of office, U.S. national security, and the integrity of the country's elections. The six committees charged with the task are those on Financial Services, the Judiciary, Intelligence, Foreign Affairs, Oversight and Reform, and Ways and Means.
Maguire, who had delayed the whistleblower complaint from reaching Congress, testified publicly before the House Intelligence Committee on September 26. Maguire defended his decision not to immediately forward the whistleblower complaint to Congress and explained that he had consulted the White House Counsel and the Office of Legal Counsel at the Justice Department, but was unable to determine whether the document was protected by executive privilege. Democrats on the committee questioned his actions, arguing that the law demands the forwarding of such complaints to the committee. Maguire countered that the situation was unique since the complaint involves communications of the president. Members of the Intelligence Committee also asked Maguire why he chose to consult with White House lawyers when he was not required to do so by law, to which he responded that he believed "it would be prudent to have another opinion".
In a private conference call with Democratic lawmakers on September 29, Pelosi laid out how three of these House committees would begin investigating the President's alleged abuse of power. The Intelligence Committee would focus on the contents of the whistleblower complaint and whether the complaint may have been wrongfully hidden from Congress, while the Foreign Affairs Committee would focus on interactions the State Department may have had with the president's personal attorney Giuliani, and the Oversight and Reform Committee would investigate whether White House classification systems were used to secure potentially damaging records of phone calls between the president and other world leaders.
Requests for evidence and White House refusal
Letter from White House Counsel to the Speaker and committee chairs stating that the Trump administration will not participate in the House's "partisan and unconstitutional" inquiry
On September 27, 2019, a subpoena was issued by the House to obtain documents Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had refused to release earlier. Said documents include several interactions between Trump, Giuliani, and Ukrainian government officials. The documents were requested to be filed with the involved committees probing the issue; the failure to do so "shall constitute evidence of obstruction of the House's impeachment inquiry", as stated in a letter written to Pompeo. The subpoena came after several requests by the House to receive the documents from the Secretary which he did not fulfill. Several members of the House involved with the impeachment inquiry sent him subsequent letters stating that they will be meeting with members of the State Department who may provide further information. The following week, a subpoena was also issued to Giuliani for production of documents.
On October 4, 2019, the House Intelligence Committee issued subpoenas both to the White House and to Vice President Mike Pence for documents related to the whistleblower complaint. The White House documents requested include audio tapes, transcripts, notes, and other White House documents related to the whistleblower controversy.
On October 8, 2019, in a letter from White House Counsel Pat Cipollone to Speaker Pelosi and the three committee chairmen conducting the impeachment investigation, the White House announced that it would not cooperate with the investigation. In the letter Cipollone said the investigation "violates the Constitution, the rule of law, and every past precedent" and that "The President cannot allow your constitutionally illegitimate proceedings to distract him and those in the Executive Branch." The letter went on to say "[the investigation's] unprecedented actions have left the President with no choice. In order to fulfill his duties to the American people, the Constitution, the Executive Branch, and all future occupants of the Office of the Presidency, President Trump and his Administration cannot participate in your partisan and unconstitutional inquiry under these circumstances." House Speaker Nancy Pelosi responded to the letter saying "The White House should be warned that continued efforts to hide the truth of the president's abuse of power from the American people will be regarded as further evidence of obstruction." House Democrats have suggested that defiance of their investigation could provide evidence for a separate article of impeachment on obstruction. In past impeachment probes, Congress has treated obstruction of DOJ and Congressional investigations as an article of impeachment, either along with other alleged offenses (Johnson, Nixon), or even as its own sole basis for articles of impeachment (Clinton).
Giuliani's attorney, Jim A. Sale, sent a letter to the House Intelligence Committee on October 15, 2019, stating that Giuliani would not provide documents subpoenaed by the committee. Citing attorney–client and executive privilege, the letter characterized the subpoena as "beyond the scope of legitimate inquiry".
~ President Donald Trump ~
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