Expelling Moore would put Senate in uncharted territory

http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/360393-expelling-moore-would-put-senate-in-uncharted-territory

Expelling Moore would put Senate in uncharted territory

By Ben Kamisar - 11/15/17 06:00 AM EST 2comments


Republican lawmakers’ push to expel Roy Moore if he wins Alabama’s Senate race next month could soon move the Senate into uncharted territory. The Constitution gives the Senate the authority to expel a member with a two-thirds majority, but that power hasn’t been used been in more than 150 years. The last senators removed from office were expelled for supporting the Confederacy during the Civil War. And no senator has seen the expulsion process through to the end since Americans began directly electing their senators, with lawmakers facing expulsion choosing to resign before they could be forced out.

Legal experts doubt that Moore would have an opening to argue that the Senate is denying the will of his state’s voters if they vote to kick him out. But it’s clear that any attempt to oust Moore would set up a brutal, high-profile fight for the Senate GOP.of the United States Senate” if he wins.

Washington Republicans started to abandon Moore’s campaign over the past week after a story in The Washington Post quoted a woman who said a 32-year-old Moore touched her sexually while she was 14 years old. While Moore has denied the allegations, the rush away from him continued on Monday after a different woman claimed Moore sexually assaulted her while she was a teenager.

Shortly after the latest allegation surfaced, Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.), the head of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, declared in a statement that “the Senate should vote to expel [Moore] because he does not meet the ethical and moral requirements
Gardner’s statement shows the tough choices the GOP faces as the December election approaches, since it’s too late for the party to remove his name from the ballot.
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But if Moore does win, the Senate can’t block him from taking his seat. That’s because of a 1969 Supreme Court ruling that bars Congress from blocking a “duly elected” member — someone who meets the minimum Constitutional requirements to be a senator and was elected fairly — from taking office.

The case centered on Rep. Adam Clayton Powell Jr. (D-N.Y.), who successfully ran for reelection after being removed from office amid accusations of financial impropriety. In the interim, the House passed a resolution that barred Powell specifically from taking his seat, but the Supreme Court ruled that unconstitutional.

Once Moore is seated, though, his new colleagues could try to oust him. “The Constitution gives the complete authority to each house to expel without any conditions put on it,” said Heritage Foundation legal expert Hans von Spakovsky. “Senators can basically do what they want.”
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