How would congress proceed to impeach one or more Supreme Court Justices?

The House of Representatives must vote for impeachment. It takes a simple majority (50% + 1). Then the Senate holds a trial, and conviction requires a two-thirds majority.

This is a good time to learn about the process. A federal judge was impeached this year. The Senate trial is underway.

The federal impeachment procedure

Federal Judge Impeached By House Goes to Trial

@jaytkay thanks, I didn’t know about the pending impeachment.

Those things about which you are upset aren’t impeachable offenses, but can properly be characterized as functions of SCOTUS. Dems will typically scream and hollar if the Court decides against them, as will Repubs. The Court is designed to be impartial, and almost always is.

First, there would have to be will in the Congress for impeachment, and I have seen no sign of any.

As @CaptainHarley points out, all that the Court has really done is its job – it’s interpreting the constitutionality of the various cases before it. Corporate law is, in general, a completely state-based animal. Corporate law throughout its history has been based on the corporation having legal personality, which is necessary for it to do business. This entails certain rights and have expanded based on state law. Considering the interests possessed by these legal entities, the Supreme Court found that the restrictions on their free speech was a violation of their free speech.

I agree with you that the rights of corporations as persons have been expanded far, far too much. But this expansion is because of legislation, mostly in the states, and the courts are limited by the laws that they are required to interpret. If you can point out where the legal reasoning is so biased and flawed that it would require there be impeachment, I’d actually love to see it (anything to reduce their influence, I’m for it).

@iamthemob I’ve read some articles concerning our founding father’s attitude toward corporations. Their “legal personality’ was reluctantly granted to facilitate business. The fact that states granted corporations rights beyond their traditional business function is a problem for state law to correct. The supreme court shirked it responsibilities by allowing state law to supersede federal statutes. I believe they did it for political and personal reasons that had nothing to do with the constitution and everything to do with their own personal profit and right wing leanings. That ruling coupled with previous that made the contribution of money a part of free speech did more to corrupt the election process than any party machine ever has.

We have just proved that, given the proper injection of cash and psychological manipulation that vast portions of our population can be made to believe outright lies and vote against their own best interests. The supreme court removed the last protections against that sort of manipulation. Now K street and Wall street have free rein to force their goals and desires on the rest of us. Look for further erosion of our freedom and rights willing supported by a brainwashed majority. If this isn’t treason, nothing is!

@CaptainHarley I don’t think that the corporate free for all was in any way impartial. If they really considered the thinking of the constitution’s framers they would realize that the revolution was more against an international corporation than against the British Empire. There is no coincidence that the powers granted to the East India Company came from King George who was a major stockholder in the company. England already had a government based on riches and inheritance, they didn’t want that in their own country. How can it be constitutional to grant the rights of citizenship to a corporation that, for instance, is a business of the Red Army in China or a contributor for terrorism in Saudi Arabia. I can’t think of a more anti-American decision. They were in no way fair and impartial, in fact, they regressed to pre-revolutionary times. No doubt they would have found Washington a war criminal.

@Ron_C I totally agree with you about the disastrous impact of the Cupreme Court’s Citizens United ruling. I sadly have to agree with @iamthemob that there is nothing in that action that would lead to any hope of impeaching any of the Conservative 2 justices, though. There is no way you would ever get a ⅔rds majority to convict in the senate unless a justice was found to have been accepting bribes or involved in somethig actually criminal.

@Ron_C – state law hasn’t superseded federal statutes, though. Although federal law can regulate interstate commerce, the law of corporations was left to the states by the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution. Regardless of the intent of the founding fathers, the Constitution was written in a manner to limit much of the federal regulation of areas traditionally governed by state law.

The Supreme Court didn’t shirk it’s responsibility. Regardless of how much I agree with you, corporations under their charter are given wide latitude to take actions that will be in furtherance of the business. Investing in political candidates that will enable them to profit to a greater degree is well within that goal, and within the goal of the individual shareholders. It’s an unfortunate outgrowth of a corporations legal personality…but the Supreme Court can’t allow limits on speech without good reason, and found none here.

If it had, it really would have been “legislating from the bench,” as people sometimes accuse it of. The responsibility is, really, on us as consumers to make ourselves aware of what corporations are doing, and hold them responsible as we do our representatives.

@ETpro and @iamthemob are you guys saying that there is no federal law to regulate corporations? If so, I still see that the interstate regulations should prevent undue corporate influence on federal elections. Of course my personal opinion that all elections should be federally or state financed. Further, licensed stations should be required to fulfill their public duty (as stated in their license) to show political adds without charge and without bias for or against a particular candidate. It is absolutely wrong for companies with FCC privileges to profit from political advertising during a campaign period.

@Ron_C There are numerous federal laws that regulate corporations where they engage in interstate commerce. When corporations were first formed, they were chartered by a state to do business only within that state. The idea of doing business across state lines came about in the mid 1800s. Since all the corporations pushing the USA toward corporatocracy do business across state lines, Congress has the power under the constitution to make laws governing them. But it’s difficult to see how they can do much against the claim the Supreme Court has asserted, that corporations have 1st Amendment rights to freedom of speech equal to those of individual citizens. This may sound only fair on first hearing, but realistically, since the free speech we are talking about is television and radio advertising, there are only a handful of individual citizens in the USA who could come anywhere close to speaking as loudly as even a modest multinational corporation can now do.

What Congress may be able to do is require disclosure. It would at least help if we were able to know who is paying for a political message, and what they might stand to gain if it is accepted.

As we saw with the Clinton impeachment, it is a dirty and rotten bit of business. Before approaching it, I would suggest you make damn sure the crimes meet the standard required.
As much as I hated both decisions you mentioned, they don’t.

As @ETpro stated, the federal law regulating corporations covers activity that crosses state lines – that’s it. Many of the federal laws doing so are, by many, viewed as only borderline Constitutional as they stand – for instance, the EEOC, responsible for discrimination claims, can investigate protected class discrimination charges based on individuals 14th Amendment protections – but the 14th Amendment was written to cover state discrimination (states shall make no laws allowing discrimination and so forth). The fact that private companies could be sued for racist hiring practices was viewed as a feat of Constitutional maneuvering by the Congress and the Supreme Court using the Commerce Clause of the Constitution as support to apply the 14th Amendment to corporations.

What needs to be pointed out is that, technically, the corporation is owned by the many, many shareholders. Using the money of the corporation to support candidates is, in essence, those many individual shareholder citizens using their money to support candidates that will help them, through the corporation, make more money. It seems perfectly reasonable that they shouldn’t be subject to 1st Amendment limitations other citizens are not, in that sense. As @ETpro points out also, this has the practical effect of inequality of voice in many cases – but when free speech is universal and equal legally, that practical effect is, unfortunately, an unavoidable consequence.

@iamthemob
“It seems perfectly reasonable that they shouldn’t’t be subject to 1st Amendment limitations other citizens are not, in that sense” Real people die, they can think for themselves, they do not have the financial and legal resources of a corporation. They don’t takeover other corporations to form monopolies. If corporations are not legally hobbled they become a superhuman force that control the lives of real citizens. Sure they may be owned by a number of shareholders but as a shareholder in a number of companies I can tell you that my voice is not heard. Sure, if I bought a large number of shares my voice would be louder but I cannot afford to do that.

Since when is democracy one dollar, one vote? Corporations, within themselves are inherently undemocratic so how can a despot that almost never dies have an equal vote with a free citizen. It makes absolutely no sense, legally, morally, or rationally.

@Ron_C – Nobody is saying you’re wrong. What we’re saying is that the limitations need to be legislated, and if they are not, the courts have to rule on the laws in existence. That’s all the Supreme Court did. The rich have always had more say than the poor. Therefore, the policies need to address power differentials, rather than civil rights which should be equal.

The problem is obvious…the solution is not in the Court, it’s with citizens (and whether they purchase from corporations) and the Congress (in the laws that they right to allow for even participation in a practical sense).

@iamthemob You are right. What I was hoping that there would be an outcry (that happened) and a spat of legislation to correct the problems (not even started by congress). The tea party people are right that there are a bunch of idiots and crooks in both houses that need to be replaced. Unfortunately they voted in people that even worse and dumber than the ones in place. I guess that congress should impeach itself. Since that is unlikely we need to seek real people with real ideas and get rid of probably all of the Republican and a substantial majority of Democrats. I feel like this is all a shell game and the suckers are us.

I have to say that I have been involved in politics (as a voter and activist) since the Regan disaster and the quality and honesty of congress has never been worse.

Agree with pretty much everything @Ron_C said. There’s definitely a problem in Congress, but the current Tea Partiers aren’t the solution.

@Dr_Dredd you know, many people seem to recognize our statements as fact but I can’t find anyone or a group that actually wants to do something about it. The one encouraging fact is that the “Blue Dog” democrats didn’t do well. The liberal Democrats did pretty well except for Alan Grayson.

I don’t know whether I am a progressive, liberal, libertarian (mild form) or a socialist. I do know that the government cannot be sustained in its present form. This is worse than a decline, its a free-fall.

@Ron_C No argument there. It’s in free fall, as are lots of places around the world. One by one people are waking up to it. Like the Tea Party, not many have come to realize what the real problem is. If the Tea Party got their agenda enacted, they would make a very bad situation very much worse.

One thing is for certain. When a situation is unsustainable and those running it are determined to stay the course, it will end up changing. I just hope it can happen without a great, violent upheaval.

@ETpro I think that there may well be a violent upheaval or even a civil war. Look at the distribution of red and blue states. It’s pretty close to what we had during the civil war and again the south is fighting for slavery. In this case, their own. I truly believe that some of the corporatists believe that it is the right of the rich to “own” the poor.

@Ron_C Sad but true. I had a right-winger on Sodahead.com vehemently argue, openly, that we need to get rid of the middle class. There should be no such thing, he insisted. And just guess what class he is in. If you said lower middle, give yourself 100 points.

@ETpro that right-winger was wrong about “getting rid of” the middle class, but, unfortunatly, the middle class is dissolving. The dichotomy between upper and lower classes is widening daily.

@GracieT Yes, I have watched the gap slowly widen over the past 30 years. Seems the right wing is determined to crank up the acceleration rate on transfer of wealth to the top 1%, The programs they are supporting are designed to do that.

@ETpro & @GracieT It looks like the right is not only attacking unions that create middle class jobs, it attacking the safety structure that reduces poverty in their advanced years.

Ironically, I just had a talk with one of our mechanics that says unions are bad for working people and doesn’t think that young people should be added to the social security program. This sounds like people are becoming completely brainwashed. It is very frightening. They don’t see the difference between the right and left, they believe that all politicians are corrupt, and that teachers are paid too much and public education is a waste of money.

We are definitely heading towards a feudal system and the young people are ignorant enough to lead us there.

@Ron_C , Unfortunately, I have several friends who believe that teachers are paid to much, and that we should never send kids to public school. I just stared in disbelief at the person who said that teachers are overpaid, especially because they also added that socialized medicine would be wrong for the US. Another one of my friends that is moving her son to private school is doing so because he was jumped by a gang while walking home from school. I’m not really sure how I feel about that. Our part of the city is becoming less and less safe. I agree with her, but for others of my friends public school is where their kids are and will stay. The public schools in her area are still safe, the gangs aren’t in her area yet.

@GracieT We have had similar discussions about teacher pay and the failure of communities to properly support public schools. Ironically one of my daughters is working to bring some sense to her local school board while supporting the idea that providing vouchers (from the school budget) to subsidize the education of children in private schools. My son-in-law is a teacher and qualified to be a principle but is laid off. Not because there isn’t a local need for teachers but because he lives in the within 5 blocks of John Boehner (future speaker of the House) and the voters supported increased support for the elderly and rejected all increased support for public schools.

It seems that the conservatives don’t think public education important and seniors, even affluent ones need as much support as possible.

My personal belief is that the teachers of future engineers (I admit an engineering prejudice) should be paid as much as engineers. On the other hand I think that the teachers should make up their minds, unions or tenure, not both. I also think teachers pay should be based on merit and that federally mandated excess state testing needs to be curtailed. I don’t want schools to teach kids how to take tests. They need to teach kid how to think.

@Ron_C The right today is led about by the uber wealthy, who fund high-flying think tanks and pr firms to figure out the psychology needed to get middle class and lowbrow voters to believe in and vote for a return to feudalism. The less educated those voters are, the easier the job of deceiving them gets. And the more the voters favor a return to feudalism, the more the Lord of the Manor takes in each year.

Naturally, the new right is against public schools. The drive for vouchers to support private schools is aimed at slowly defunding and demolishing all public schools. Once that is done, an emergency will occur and we will obviously have to redirect all that public money away from vouchers. Then things will be like they were when there was some order in the world. Only the Lord of the Manor will send his kids to school. The rest of the riffraff will all know their place, and stay there.

@ETpro “Only the Lord of the Manor will send his kids to school. The rest of the riffraff will all know their place, and stay there.” Right there in a nutshell is what I have been trying to tell my right wing friends for years. I just don’t understand why they persist in their beliefs. They insist that a return to the feudal system or an aristocracy is impossible in the U.S.

It is as if they are insisting blindness is a good thing an that those of use that “believe” we can see are just deluded. I suppose that the replacement for public education will be re-education camps where progressives and free thinkers will be permanently blinded.

@Ron_C Oligarchy is not only possible, but well on its way now. The primary difference between what we are heading for and the system of Feudalism is that the oligarchs of tomorrow will be determined by great wealth, not nobility.

@ETpro it isn’t a stretch for some of the richest families to declare themselves royalty. We already have families like the Bush, Kennedy, Rockefellers, and Melons that consider themselves entitled to lead. Indeed, many voters feel the same way.

@Ron_C Can’t argue that.