The United States is a democratic republic. It is a compromise that means some elasticities in the configured government will be confusing and will appear to be at crossed purposes.
This republic has three branches of government. One of these branches, the legislative, had found reason to be skeptical of another branch, the executive, resulting in a consultation within the full legislative body. This full-body consultation is what we call “impeachment of the executive.”
The legislature is bicameral and thus instantiates two types of representation. One representation is the people’s own: the Congress. This is the “democratic” representation among the descriptive nomenclature “democratic republic.” The Congress, for what it is worth, is a near-direct form of representation. The number of citizens represented by each apportioned district is calculated by taking the minimum representation of one representative from each state from the currently allocated limit of 435. This leaves 385 representative seats to divide among the population according to census results every 10 years.
The other representation, the Senate, is that which represents the “republic.” These representatives are there to represent the interests of the members of the republic, inasmuch as the republic consists of states within which citizens reside. The number of representatives is set at two per state, resulting in 100 representatives for our current republic of 50 states.
The particular branch seeking resolution through impeachment is the House of Representatives, the one that represents the people within the bicameral body of the legislature. The impeachment process is not a legal proceeding. It is a process that seeks to determine if the voice of the people can be echoed by the voice of the republic. In that way, the “democratic republic” achieves both of its goals: to give the people a voice and to form a union.
Any human-designed process that is ugly and disliked is precisely that way because it is meant to be repugnant and dissatisfactory, so we will not engage it often. If there is objection to the loose nature of the “rules,” it is probably because nobody has determined to make those rules hard and fast. Many times, organizations will specifically avoid binding their actions by prescriptive rules for behavior because there is little to be gained from regulated behavior and a perception of much greater potential loss. Suffice it to say that our elected representatives are aware of the wisdom of a flexible nonprescriptive system.
We as citizens could be happy that this process does in fact bolster the objectives of democracy and the formation of a union of states into a republic. If some serious breach of the executive did threaten the republic, it is hoped that the representatives in the legislature truly set aside partisanship for the benefit of the union and the benefit of the citizens and the nation. Should representatives lose allegiance to the oaths they have taken and their unique roles, we may suffer as a nation. The democratic experiment could end, but maybe it would give way to something better. Who knows?
With any luck this briefly explains the system and the rationale for the impeachment process, free from “spin.” To be fair, however, note that there were more than three personal innuendos and direct politically charged assessments made which were spinworthy within the appeal by Mr. Dick Cesaroni for an explanation (Jan. 19).
To appeal for fairness and “freedom from spin” and then to use spin to advocate a favored political view is what is called “duplicity.” Such duplicity is the product of either genius or madness, nobody knows which — let alone one with a mere iota of brain explaining the situation.
Christopher Lucero
Saugus
