table offence. This doctrine had very
large support in the legal profession, resting on remarks found in
Blackstone. On the other hand, Chancellor Kent, in his Commentaries,
had given support to the doctrine that a civil officer was liable to
impeachment who misdemeaned himself in office. The provision of the
Constitution is in these words:

"The President, Vice-President, and all Civil Officers of the United
States shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction
of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors."

The majority of the Judiciary Committee, in the controversy which
arose in the committee and in the House of Representatives, maintained
that the word "misdemeanors" was used in a political sense, and not in
the sense in which it is used in criminal law. In support of this
view attention was called to the fact that the party convicted was
liable only to removal from office, and therefore that the object of
the process of impeachment was the purification and preservation of the
civil service. In the opinion of the majority, it was the necessity of
the situation that the power of impeachment should extend to acts and
offences that were not indictable by statute nor at common law. The
report of the Judiciary Committee, made the twenty-fifth day of
November, was rejected by the House of Representatives.

The attempt of the President to remove Mr. Stanton from the office of
Secretary for the Department of War revived the question of
impeachment, and on Monday, the twenty-fourth day of February, 1868,
the House of Representatives "resolved to impeach Andrew Johnson,
President of the United States, of high crimes and misdemeanors." The
articles of impeachment were acted on by the House of Representatives
the second day of March, and on the fourth day of March they were
presented to the Senate through Mr. Bingham, chairman of the managers,
who was designated for that duty.

The articles were directed to the following points, namely: That the
President, by his speeches, had attempted "to set aside the rightful
authority and powers of Congress"; that he had attempted "to bring
into disgrace, ridicule, hatred, contempt, and reproach the Congress of
the United States and the several branches thereof"; and "that he had
attempted to incite the odium and resentment of all the good people of
the United States against Congress and the laws by them duly and
constitutionally enacted." Furt