Today in Supreme Court History: May 9, 1974

5/9/1974: Resolution to impeach President Nixon introduced in the House of Representatives. On 7/24/1974, the Supreme Court would decide U.S. v. Nixon.

President Richard Nixon

Comments

[not guilty]

Fifty years ago there were still some Republicans who had some integrity, including those who persuaded Prick Nixon to resign rather than fight impeachment. Senators Hugh Scott and Barry Goldwater and Rep. John Rhodes, IIRC.

Where are the modern day equivalents?

[Frank Drackman]

Trying to remember the DemoKKKrats who did the same for William Juffuhson

[Stupid Government Tricks]

Same place as all those Democrats who had the integrity to impeach FDR for destroying economic freedom or at least tell him two terms was enough, Wilson for being a racist warmonger, and Clinton for rape.

[A Woman of No Importance]

In other words, Democrats then acted like Republicans now. Funny how Republicans who are so quick to criticize Democrats for stuff that happened 50 or a hundred years ago seem completely oblivious to the fact that that's now what their own guys are doing.

[Stupid Government Tricks]

Ah, perhaps you didn't notice that my handle is Stupid Government Tricks, not Stupid Democrat Tricks or Stupid Republican Tricks.

[A Woman of No Importance]

Except that I've noticed that your criticisms are mostly directed to liberals. I don't have a photographic memory of everything you've ever posted, so perhaps I've missed it, but have you in fact criticized Republicans who think Trump should run for a third term (your criticism of Roosevelt), or who are now welcoming into the party racists who are no longer even bothering to hide it, or the Trump tariffs which have done more to destroy economic freedom than anything else in my memory? Or the neocons who repeatedly took us to war?

If you've criticized all of them too, then I'll take your point that you're non-partisan.

[SRG2]

He's a conservative (and as his handle indicates is generally sceptical of government regardless of wing) so he is naturally more likely to criticise the left than the right, but I have definitely seen him criticise Trump et al, and he is no cultist. But not being pro-Trump is a broad church. 🙂

[A Woman of No Importance]

I'll take your word for it on his politics, though with Trump in power, those skeptical of government should at this point in time be harshly critical of the GOP. That hasn't been true at all times and places but it's definitely true now.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

" conservative (and as his handle indicates is generally sceptical of government regardless of wing)"

A conservative is not someone "generally sceptical of government," which would be a libertarian.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican candidate for president, was the sole person (and only on one count) from his party who voted to convict Trump in the Ukraine Extortion Racket Case.

A few were willing to impeach and convict the second time around, though many of them became pariahs or decided to support Trump's re-election. Now, people like Senator Murkowski talk about being scared to fight too strenuously.

[Stupid Government Tricks]

And perhaps you didn't notice that Trump's first impeachment was for using foreign aid to bribe / extort the Ukrainian government to re-open the investigation into Hunter Biden's corrupt oil management deal which Joe Biden had used foreign aid to bribe / extort the Ukrainian government into shutting down.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

I often do not notice things that didn't happen.

[Frank Drackman]

Ironic (dontcha think) that one of the Judiciary Committee Representatives sitting in Judgement of Tricky Dick was a Rape-ist (No, not a certain Senator from Massachusetts, he was a Murderer, not a Rape-ist)

Frank

[not guilty]

Which Judiciary Committee member do you refer to, Frank?

[Frank Drackman]

you're right, I didn't really narrow it down did I? Ask Emily Yoffe

[not guilty]

I have no idea what you are referring to.

If your allusion to Ted Kennedy, who never served in the House of Representatives, let alone on the Judiciary Committee that considered the Nixon article of impeachment, is any indication, neither do you have any idea.

[Frank Drackman]

Emily Yoffe sure did, or do you not “believe the woman”?

[A Woman of No Importance]

If Trump had Nixon's Congress he would have been gone already. And if Nixon had had Trump's Congress, he'd have finished out his second term.

[Frank Drackman]

and if JFK had better reflexes......

[A Woman of No Importance]

It wouldn't have made a bit of difference. The velocity of a bullet is much faster than the human brain's ability to respond. I would have expected someone who claims to be a doctor to have known that.

[Frank Drackman]

Do you have the Ass-burgers too? I was being sarcastic

[A Woman of No Importance]

The problem with your comments is that most of them are so stupid it's hard to tell when you're being sarcastic and when you're being serious. I sometimes wonder if anything you say is serious just because it's so ridiculous I have a hard time believing that anyone actually thinks that.

[Frank Drackman]

So you're telling me there's a chance......

[SRG2]

If Nixon had Trump's SC, would they have ruled the same way?

[Stupid Government Tricks]

If Clinton had today's woke DNC, would he still be President?

[Frank Drackman]

Probably, they didn't mind Cums-a-lot's girlfriend-slapping "Second Gentleman" (does that not describe today's DemoKKKrat's to a T, he slapped his Girlfriend, not at a Strip Club, not at Home, at the friggin Cannes Film Festival)

[Stupid Government Tricks]

Ah, trick question. No, his two terms were up long ago.

[not guilty]

The Democratic National Committee is primarily a fundraising organization, with no input as to who serves as president.

OTOH, what if Bill Clinton had held out for a girlfriend who swallowed?

[Brett Bellmore]

On this day in Supreme court history...

Former Justice David Souter died.

[Frank Drackman]

How could they tell?

[JoeFromtheBronx]

Nixon's resignation was the result of many moving parts.

The executive branch was tainted, but it had many ethical and principled people. Rachel Maddow's book, for instance, discusses the investigation of the vice president.

The Attorney General was willing to resign instead of firing the special prosecutor after promising Congress not to do so except for cause. Nixon himself only went so far in various cases, including ultimately agreeing to resign.

(Multiple top people went to prison, and a president + vice president resigned. Imagine that!)

Congress had extended hearings, including providing national coverage before C-SPAN. A lot of ground was covered. It took some time for Congress to hold limited Trump impeachment hearings and later the special January 6th committee.

Some Republicans back then also took a principled position, and ultimately, some told Nixon he had to go. In today's reality, Republicans could not manage to agree to a 1/6 Committee unless those involved in the plot were allowed on it. Multiple Republicans who showed some principle became pariahs.

The Supreme Court was willing to have accelerated oral arguments (including earlier in the Pentagon Papers Case). The Roberts Court repeatedly, including during Trump's first term when the House asked it to speed along the financial cases, helped Trump delay and run out the clock. And, the Court that decided Trump v. U.S. easily could have decided U.S. v. Nixon differently.

This includes no desire to take the emolument clause cases, which just ran out of time. Now, there is so much going on, the financial corruption stuff is getting limited attention while other things crowd it out. https://thinkbigpicture.substack.com/p/trump-constitution-violations

The public was also more shocked, losing their innocence. Now, we are supposed to not be surprised, "you knew how Trump was." Media coverage was different as well. It was also before Fox News.

People like to try to find scapegoats, including Merrick Garland, but many are responsible for a civic failure of this magnitude. We need to understand that, including the voting public, if we wish to address the matter long term.

[Dan Schiavetta]

+1

[Brett Bellmore]

"The executive branch was tainted, but it had many ethical and principled people."

I've occasionally noted that, if the Nixon administration had been as corrupt as the Clinton administration, Nixon could have survived. It wasn't stonewalling that ended his presidency, it was stopping stonewalling.

Clinton didn't survive because his crimes were minor, he survived because his administration was comprehensively corrupt, not just "tainted". No James Dean to be found, evidence was destroyed, not handed over, blackmail files were accumulated and deployed.

They had the example of Nixon before them, and their takeaway wasn't, "Don't act criminally", it was "Never stop stonewalling".

[JoeFromtheBronx]

Justice David Souter died. RIP. You were one of the good ones.

[Frank Drackman]

Yeah right, voted to let Corporations take peoples property to make a profit, like the Judges who voted for "Roe" he'll be "looking up"

Frank

[Mr. Bumble]

Good for nothing.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

The Washington Post has a good obit.

https://archive.ph/ntUHo

[Syd Henderson]

I hate to say it, since he seems to have been a good justice, that I often had a hard time remembering he was on the court. Breyer, too. I just didn't have strong impressions of them.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

One person flagged an amusing bit that people kept on confusing Breyer and Souter. Souter once let someone believe he was Breyer & told them his favorite thing about being a justice was serving with that charming man, David Souter.

Breyer was more loquacious and always had those silly hypos during oral argument. He also wrote a bunch of books.

[SMP0328]

Dan, is it okay if copy/paste your list of SCOTUS cases for today?

[Dan Schiavetta]

Yes, but please attribute the source to captcrisis.com. You can do this in the future too.

Be careful to preserve the italics because they don't transfer. The code for this is less-than sign, then "i", then greater-than sign, and to shut it off it's less-than sign, then "/", then "i", then greater-than sign, with no spaces in between.

[Syd Henderson]

I was wondering how to do that. It's odd since I use Dreamweaver and it has all the html codes.

[A Japanese Student]

Theft Case (Second Petty Bench, decided May 9, 1958): Appellate court must appoint counsel sua sponte in mandatory-representation cases (statutory maximum above 3 years) if the defendant is unrepresented (implicitly abrogating February 23, 1955 decision) (the statutory maximum for theft is 10 years, whether it be burglary netting millions of dollars or shoplifting a can of tuna)

Special Kokoku-Appeal of Change of Trial Date (Third Petty Bench, decided May 9, 1961): Article 411 of Code of Criminal Procedure applies to appeal of orders other than final judgment ("special kokoku-appeal", which is ordinarily limited to constitutional errors; §411 allows the Court to rule on cases otherwise lacking jurisdiction) (after acquitting two of the co-defendants in an opinion suggesting the other defendant's guilt, the judge abruptly postponed proceeding for more than ten months, citing "likelihood of harsh consequence to the defendant due to certain circumstances"; you can guess what it is)

Charnel House Licensing Case (Third Petty Bench, decided May 9, 2023): Remember the Graveyard Licensing Case (March 17)? This is the sequel. Copying the March 17 post - The disputes themselves are simple: a resident sues to revoke a license for something NIMBY, and the defendant disputes standing. They arise from the same statute (Graveyards and Burials Act), and the implementing local regulations are quite similar as they prohibit construction of graveyards within 300m radius of a dwelling. Yet in 2000 case the Court rejected standing, while in 2023 case they accepted - even though 2023 majority did not overrule this case. So, what happened? The 2000 case involved Osaka Prefectural ordinance, which barred construction near all sorts of buildings and allowed the Governor to grant exemptions after finding "that it will not impair public health or welfare". The Court found that the ordinance did not intend to protect individual residents' interests. On the other hand, the 2023 case involved Osaka City regulation, which barred construction near schools, hospitals, or dwellings and allowed the Mayor to grant exemptions after finding that "it will not significantly impair residential environment". The Court found that this regulation did intend to protect individual residents' interests. (There is one development lurking behind the difference, as shown in Justice Hayashi's 2023 concurrence - 2004 amendment to Administrative Case Litigation Act, which added §9(2) concerning third parties' standing to seek revocation of Governmental actions. https://www.japaneselawtranslation.go.jp/en/laws/view/3781#je_ch2sc1at2)

[SMP0328]

From captcrisis.com

Andersen v. United States, 170 U.S. 481 (decided May 9, 1898): Upholding conviction of sailor for shooting crewmember and pushing him overboard. Technical defects in indictment (unclear whether death due to shooting or drowning, does not mention location) held to be harmless error.

Bell v. United States, 349 U.S. 81 (decided May 9, 1955): sentence for Mann Act offense should not be doubled for transporting two women instead of one, due to ambiguity in statute

Havnor v. New York, 170 U.S. 408 (decided May 9, 1898): Court could not review conviction under New York law (for practicing “barbering” on Sunday) because Writ of Error was signed by an Associate Judge of New York’s highest court instead of the Chief Judge as required by federal jurisdictional statute.

Gacy v. Page, 511 U.S. 1079 (decided May 9, 1994): denying stay of execution of John Wayne Gacy; dissent by Blackmun restating belief that death penalty is always unconstitutional

Rice v. Sioux City Memorial Park Cemetery, 349 U.S. 70 (decided May 9, 1955): Earlier grant of certiorari, and decision on the merits, 348 U.S. 880 (1954) (as to mental distress to widow due to refusal to bury husband in Native American cemetery) vacated because Court belatedly alerted to existing statute which mooted the issue presented. We’re not told more about this, but note the Court’s casual handwave as to the carelessness of both itself and the attorneys: “Though the statute was in existence at the time the case first came here, it was then not seen in proper focus because it was blanketed by the issues of state action and constitutional power for which our interest was enlisted.” IOW, the lazy attorney’s “I didn’t focus in on that” excuse.

United States ex rel. Johnson v. Shaughnessy, 336 U.S. 806 (decided May 9, 1949): order denying admission of immigrant as “mental defective” vacated and remanded; medical appeal board did not conduct its own examination as required by regulation

Culley v. Marshall, 601 U.S. 377 (decided May 9, 2024): Due Process requires hearing on whether car can be forfeited after crime but not preliminary hearing to determine whether police can hold onto vehicle in the meantime (Ms. Culley’s car was seized after she lent it to her son who transported marijuana)