Who knew that the late Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, leader of the conservative counter revolution against the legacy of the Warren Court, wrote so well?
You would not guess that from his opinions penned over a generation. His court writing is exact but dry, a great contrast to the colorful rhetoric of his conservative colleague, Antonin Scalia.
But in "Grand Inquests," a telling of the impeachment trials of Supreme Court Justice Samuel Chase and President Andrew Johnson, Rehnquist demonstrates a compelling narrative style and the novelist's keen eye for detail. Rehnquist also demonstrates the good novelist's ability to describe the important details at considerable length while limiting the lesser facts in length.
The important details of these two impeachments surround the personalities of the major players that brought about the impeachment instead of ascribing the trials to historical circumstances, as if the impeachments were forced by mysterious forces instead of angry human beings. Rehnquist paints vivid portraits of Andrew Johnson, a one-time tailor and self-made politician, the ambitious and independent Edwin Stanton, whose refusal to give up his post as Secretary of War set the impeachment proceedings in motion, and the Radical Republicans who were furious with Johnson for obstructing Reconstruction, Thaddeus Stevens, Ben Wade, George Boutwell, Charles Sumner, and Ben Butler.
Rehnquist makes a convincing argument that men make their own destiny by their choices when he implies, quite correctly in my view, that Justice Chase would not have been impeached if he were not abrasive and heavy handed in court, and President Johnson would not have been impeached if he had been more even tempered in his disagreement about Reconstruction and presidential appointment power with the opposition Republicans. Johnson, for example, referred to Radical Republican leaders Thaddeus Stevens and Charles Sumner as "traitors."
Both impeachment proceedings occurred in the wake of highly charged political times, Rehnquist observes. Chase was impeached shortly after President John Adams had packed the federal government with appointees of his Federalist Party in the final hours of his presidency. And Adams had also tried to stifle dissent by his political opponents, incited by his idelogical adversary, Thomas Jefferson, with the repressive alien and sedition acts. Johnson faced impeachment during the difficult aftermath of the Civil War. Brave Senators such as Bradley of Vermont and Gaillard of South Carolina risked their political careers to acquit Chase. Likewise, Senators Edmund Ross of Kansas and Lyman Trumbull of Illinois defied the public hysteria against Johnson.
Rehnquist brilliantly cuts through the emotions of the times to show that Chase basically faced impeachment because of biased instructions to a grand jury and questionable instructions to a jury in a criminal trial involving sedition. Johnson was impeached for opposing Reconstruction and firing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton.In firing Stanton, Johnson's political enemies asserted that he was in violation of a congressional act, The Tenure of Office Act, which called for Senate approval of presidential firings. Clinton, of course, whose trial Rehnquist presided over, was impeached for engaging in oral sex in a bathroom near the Oval Office.
Presidential powers became more firmly defined by Supreme Court decisions in the 20th century, Rehnquist notes. A President's sole authority to hire and fire executive department political appointees was not as clear in 1866 as it is in 2006. Indeed the rule of law on presidential power to fire at will political appointees was not decided until "Humphrey's Executor v. United States" in 1935. The Court then held that President Franklin D. Roosevelt had the power to fire Federal Trade Commissioner William E. Humphrey on political grounds. Today we would laugh at the idea that a President would have to seek permission from Congress to fire an executive branch official who was not a career public employee.
Rehnquist has written the best book on impeachment. Read it and enjoy it.
[Hansen Alexander is an attorney who lives and works in New York City. He is the author, most recently, of the introductory legal text "A Tort is Not a Pastry."]
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President Jefferson helped start the First Impeachment
This book demonstrates that the USA has had its share of troubled leaders. Justice Samuel Chase was opinionated about Republicans and President Andrew Johnson (a Democrat) wanted to replace Lincoln's Secretary of War. Both had lots of trouble with the impeachment phase, but both were acquitted by the Senate. From the early years after George Washington's death in 1799 until the mid to late 1860s, the impeachment process was a relief valve for lots of anguish.This is a good book to read in 2020 to compare how the parties and personalities are doing today compared to the early years of the USA.
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Reviewed in the United States on December 14, 2006
Reviewed in the United States on January 24, 2020
President Jefferson helped start the First Impeachment
Reviewed in the United States on January 24, 2020
This book demonstrates that the USA has had its share of troubled leaders. Justice Samuel Chase was opinionated about Republicans and President Andrew Johnson (a Democrat) wanted to replace Lincoln's Secretary of War. Both had lots of trouble with the impeachment phase, but both were acquitted by the Senate. From the early years after George Washington's death in 1799 until the mid to late 1860s, the impeachment process was a relief valve for lots of anguish.This is a good book to read in 2020 to compare how the parties and personalities are doing today compared to the early years of the USA.
Reviewed in the United States on January 24, 2020
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