Even Nixon understood that the pardoning of Halderman, Ehrlichman, Mitchell, and the Watergate burglars was Presidential suicide. Even Nixon understood it left him vulnerable to being accused of using the pardon process as a means of obstructing justice to protect himself, and in essence, left him vulnerable to being accused of committing the crime of bribery if Congress concluded that he used the pardoning process to buy the silence of the conspirators or burglars.
Congress gets to interpret what a high crime and misdemeanor is. Had Nixon pardoned the Watergate conspirators and burglars, Congress certainly could have interpreted Nixon’s abuse of the pardoning process as an obstruction of justice for Nixon’s own personal purposes in order to buy their silence, and as a quid pro quo, which is essentially a bribe. Congress could have found Nixon’s pardoning of these individuals to be grounds for impeachment of Nixon himself.
So even Nixon understood that pardoning the Watergate burglars and conspirators was not an option. What Bush has done, even Nixon didn’t dare do, because Nixon was apparently afraid of being accused of abusing the pardon process to obstruct an investigation into Nixon’s role in Watergate.
Impeachment serves several purposes:
1. To remove the person from office and it is true that Libby is not part of the administration anymore, so this reason really does not apply.
2. To prevent the President from pardoning persons who might rat him out in exchange for a pardon. Libby should be impeached. Congress should impeach Libby so that Bush cannot use a pardon to buy Libby’s silence. That is also what the founding fathers made clear, hence the clause in the constitution which allows impeachment to nullify a Presidential pardon. The impeachment clause which nullifies a pardon, prevents the President from using a pardon to obstruct investigations into the President’s own wrongdoing. This prevents the President from granting a pardon in exchange for silence, in essence, a bribe. Abuse of the pardon process and using the abuse to obstruct an investigation into the President’s own wrongdoing, in exchange for the silence of the person who is pardoned, in in essence bribery, and bribery is a listed impeachable offense.
3. To prevent the impeached person from ever serving again. If Bush later pardons Libby, Libby will be able to serve in the government again. An impeachment of Libby will stop this. This is what should have happened to the Iran-Contra criminals who were pardoned by Bush, senior. A number of them were permitted to serve in the government again.
Constitutional Sources for these conclusions regarding the purposes of impeachment are as follows:
Text from Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution regarding impeachment itself (please note bribery is a listed basis for impeachment):
Section 4. 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.
Text of Article II, Section 2, the constitution regarding pardons and the effect of impeachment on pardons, (please note last 2 clauses):
Section 2. The President shall be commander in chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the militia of the several states, when called into the actual service of the United States; he may require the opinion, in writing, of the principal officer in each of the executive departments, upon any subject relating to the duties of their respective offices, and he shall have power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, except in cases of impeachment.
As mentioned above, when one looks at the text of Section 4, it is also quite clear that a pardon in exchange for silence could very well be a bribe, a listed impeachable offense. I believe Nixon must have understood this. So, it should be quite obvious that the Libby commutation deserves the scrutiny of Congress, especially the way Bush has used it, which gives Libby an excuse to remain silent until Bush leaves office or the Appellate Courts conclude Libby’s appeal.
Regarding the question of whether someone can be impeached when one is no longer in office, I must say that I can not speak with certainty on this, but the argument would be that if any person did not want to be impeached, he could avoid the penalty of “never again serving in office” by simply resigning before the impeachment process was complete. If Congress’ purpose of impeachment is to ensure that a certain person who has held office is never able to serve again, Congress must be allowed to go through with impeachment proceedings regardless of whether the person is in office or not.