According to the constitution he does.
Today, the WH lawyers should make an appeal to SCOTUS to force the House to move on the articles of impeachment.
And give a hard date for compliance; and if Pelosi fails to comply she should be held in contempt—then face impeachment herself, for abuse of power and failing to uphold the constitution. And since there would be a hard date, McConnell can tell her and House Democrats to pound sand and ‘we’ll see you in the Senate’ on ____ 2020.
Then, ‘the essay’ should be graded exactly how it was turned in. That’s the way it works in the real world.
That should put an end to future faux impeachments.
Re: thread title, the answer is no. Read this.
To review, here's the text of the 6th Amendment:
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence."
The critical phrase, of course, is the first one, explicitly linking 6th Amendment protections to "the accused" in a "criminal prosecution." There is more than a century's worth of precedent construing that critical limitation on the Amendment's scope. A "criminal prosecution" begins, and the 6th Amendment attaches, at the "initiation of
adversary judicial criminal proceedings—whether by way of formal charge, preliminary hearing, indictment, information, or arraignment—because the initiation of such proceedings marks the commencement of the criminal prosecutions to which alone the explicit guarantees of the Sixth Amendment are applicable."
Moore v. Illinois, 434 US 22 (1977);
Texas v. Cobb, 532 U.S. 162 (2001). And to constitute a
criminal proceeding, there must be a threat of "actual imprisonment"—a substantial "deprivation of liberty."
Scott v. Illinois, 440 U.S. 367 (1979),
Rothgery v. Gillespie County, Tex., 128 S. Ct. 2578 (2008).
Thus, 6th Amendment protections do
not apply to:
- proceedings involving "petty" (as opposed to "serious") crimes, as measured by the length of the authorized prison term, Muniz v. Hoffman, 422 U.S. 454 (1975);
- to misdemeanors (unless accompanied by prison terms for violators), U.S. v. Nachtigal, 507 U.S. 1 (1993);
- prison disciplinary hearings, Minnesota v. Murphy, 465 U.S. 420 (1984);
- parental status termination hearings, Lassiter v. Department of Social Services of Durham County, 452 U.S. 18 (1981);
- juvenile delinquency proceedings, McKeiver v. Pennsylvania, 403 U.S. 528 (1971);
- probation hearings, U.S. v. Nachtigal, 507 U.S. 1 (1993), Frank v. U.S., 395 U.S. 147 (1969);
- summary courts-martial, Middendorf v. Henry, 425 U.S. 25 (1976);
- asset forfeiture proceedings, Libretti v. U.S., 516 U.S. 29 (1995);
- civil (as opposed to criminal) contempt proceedings, or civil proceedings generally, Turner v. Rogers, 564 U.S. 431 (2011)
because (and to the extent that) these are not criminal proceedings involving the prospect of imposing a punishment of "actual imprisonment" on the litigant.
The notion that the House's impeachment inquiry is, constitutionally-speaking, an "adversary judicial criminal proceeding" to which the 6th Amendment applies is, frankly, laughable and nothing short of ridiculous, the sort of mistake a 1L might make on a ConLaw 1 exam but not something one expects from an eminent law professor holding a position at a top law school. The impeachment inquiry is not an adversary judicial criminal proceeding because it is neither a "judicial" proceeding
nor a "criminal" proceeding; it is a Congressional proceeding, and whatever the outcome may be it will not, and cannot, result in Trump's imprisonment or any deprivation of his liberty, but only in his removal from office.
[Indeed, it would certainly be an obvious and egregious violation of the constitutional separation of powers were Congress to undertake a true
criminal proceeding, a function reserved to the Judiciary.]
Whatever constitutional rules or norms might apply to the procedures undertaken as part of the impeachment inquiry—which is a complicated question about which reasonable people might disagree—they are
not to be found in the Sixth Amendment, and Trump cannot invoke any of his "6th Amendment rights" (to demand a speedy and public trial or an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation, to confront with the witnesses against him, to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, or to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defense) in connection with that inquiry.
This is pretty elementary stuff—and it is inconceivable to me that someone as well-versed in constitutional law as Steve Calabresi would not recognize this as the constitutional nonsense that it so obviously is. What we have then, perhaps, is another illustration of
Trump Derangement Syndrome—an inability of otherwise sensible and thoughtful people to think clearly and logically about anything concerning this president. And while life is too short to try to correct all the nonsensical notions that law professors come up with, this is not just ordinary constitutional nonsense, it is particularly pernicious constitutional nonsense...
Law professors who want to contribute to the public debate and discussion about these matters surely have an obligation to get matters within their particular spheres of expertise—the laws and the Constitution—as right as they can, in order to assist the public in evaluating these questions and understanding these issues in the weeks and months ahead.
https://reason.com/2019/11/12/impeachment-and-the-sixth-amendment/
