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Bush Impeachment – The Illinois State Legislature is Preparing to Drop a Bombshell
Utilizing a Little Known Rule of the US House to Bring Impeachment Charges
STEVEN LESER
April 22, 2006
The Illinois General Assembly is about to rock the nation. Members of state legislatures are normally not considered as having the ability to decide issues with a massive impact to the nation as a whole. Representative Karen A. Yarbrough of Illinois' 7th District is about to shatter that perception forever. Representative Yarbrough stumbled on a little known and never utlitized rule of the US House of Representatives, Section 603 of Jefferson's Manual of the Rules of the United States House of Representatives, which allows federal impeachment proceedings to be initiated by joint resolution of a state legislature. From there, Illinois House Joint Resolution 125 (hereafter to be referred to as HJR0125) was born.
Detailing five specific charges against President Bush, including one that is specified to be a felony, the complete text of HJR0125 is copied below at the end of this article. One of the interesting points is that one of the items, the one specified as a felony, that the NSA was directed by the President to spy on American citizens without warrant, is not in dispute. That fact should prove an interesting dilemma for a Republican-controlled US House that clearly is not only loathe to initiate impeachment proceedings, but does not even want to thoroughly investigate any of the five items brought up by the Illinois Assembly as high crimes and/or misdemeanors. Should HJR0125 be passed by the Illinois General Assembly, the US House will be forced by House Rules to take up the issue of impeachment as a privileged bill, meaning it will take precedence over other House business.
The Illinois General Assembly joins a growing chorus of voices calling for censure or impeachment of President Bush including Democratic state committees in Vermont, Wisconsin, New Mexico, Nevada and North Carolina as well as the residents themselves of seven towns in Vermont, seventy Vermont state legislators, and Congressman John Conyers [1].
The call for impeachment is starting to grow well beyond what could be considered a fringe movement. An ABC News/Washington Post poll conducted April 6-9 showed that 33% of Americans currently support impeaching President Bush. Coincidentally, only a similar amount supported impeaching Nixon at the start of the Watergate investigation. If and when Illinois HJR0125 hits the capitol and the individual charges are publicly investigated, that number is likely to grow rapidly. Combined with the very real likelihood that Rove is about to be indicted in the LeakGate investigation, Bush is in real trouble beyond his plummeting poll numbers. His cronies in the Republican-dominated Congress will probably save him from the embarassment of an impeachment conviction for now, but his Presidency will be all but finished.
HJ0125 LRB094 20306 RLC 58347 r
HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION
WHEREAS, Section 603 of Jefferson's Manual of the Rules of
the United States House of Representatives allows federal
impeachment proceedings to be initiated by joint resolution of
a state legislature; and
WHEREAS, President Bush has publicly admitted to ordering
the National Security Agency to violate provisions of the 1978
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, a felony, specifically
authorizing the Agency to spy on American citizens without
warrant; and
WHEREAS, Evidence suggests that President Bush authorized
violation of the Torture Convention of the Geneva Conventions,
a treaty regarded a supreme law by the United States
Constitution; and
WHEREAS, The Bush Administration has held American
citizens and citizens of other nations as prisoners of war
without charge or trial; and
WHEREAS, Evidence suggests that the Bush Administration
has manipulated intelligence for the purpose of initiating a
war against the sovereign nation of Iraq, resulting in the
deaths of large numbers of Iraqi civilians and causing the
United States to incur loss of life, diminished security and
billions of dollars in unnecessary expenses; and
WHEREAS, The Bush Administration leaked classified
national secrets to further a political agenda, exposing an
unknown number of covert U. S. intelligence agents to potential
harm and retribution while simultaneously refusing to
investigate the matter; and
WHEREAS, The Republican-controlled Congress has declined
to fully investigate these charges to date; therefore, be it
RESOLVED, BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE
NINETY-FOURTH GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS,
THE SENATE CONCURRING HEREIN, that the General Assembly of the
State of Illinois has good cause to submit charges to the U. S.
House of Representatives under Section 603 that the President
of the United States has willfully violated his Oath of Office
to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United
States; and be it further
RESOLVED, That George W. Bush, if found guilty of the
charges contained herein, should be removed from office and
disqualified to hold any other office in the United States.
Copyright 2006, OpEdNews
From: OpEdNews.com, April 22, 2006 . Original Article at: http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_steven_l_060422_bush_impeachment___t.htm, accessed 05/03/06. Reprinted in accordance with the "fair use" provision of Title 17 U.S.C. § 107 for a non-profit educational purpose. Hyperlinks present in the original are not preserved.
Bibliography and Notes
- Congressman John Conyers (Rep. Michigan - D) has called for "the creation of a special committee to investigate administration abuses of power and make recommendations regarding grounds for possible impeachment," and he has made available to the public the investigative status report of the House Judiciary Committee Democratic Staff, The Constitution in Crisis. See: http://johnconyers.com, accessed 05/08/06.
- Steven Leser, "Bush Impeachment First Follow Up – People go Rushing for a Copy of Jefferson's Manual; Does the Idea of a State Legislature Initiating Impeachment Proceedings Make sense?" OpEdNews.com, April 29, 2006, http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_steven_l_060429_bush_impeachment_fir.htm, accessed 05/03/06.
- David Swanson, "California Becomes Second State to Introduce Bush Impeachment," OpEdNews.com, April 24, 2006, http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_david_sw_060424_california_becomes_s.htm, accessed 05/03/06.
- Shay Totten, "Vermont Lawmakers to Call for Bush Impeachment," OpEdNews.com, April 25, 2006, http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_shay_tot_060425_vermont_lawmakers_to.htm, accessed 05/03/06. See also: Shay Totten, "Vermonters deliver impeachment resolutions to Congress," Vermont Guardian, May 1, 2006, http://www.vermontguardian.com/local/052006/ImpeachmentPetitions.shtml, accessed 05/03/06.
- On June 9, 2008, Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich introduced Articles of Impeachment [PDF] to the U.S. House of Representatives. See: David Swanson, "Congressman Dennis Kucinich Introduced 35 Articles of Impeachment Against President Bush on Monday Night," OpEdNews.com, June 10, 2008, http://www.opednews.com/articles/Full-Text-of-Articles-of-I-by-David-Swanson-080610-895.html, accessed 06/10/08.
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