Federalist No. 66, authored by Alexander Hamilton under the pen name Publius, is the sixty sixth of 85 essays. Titled "Objections to the Power of the Senate To Set as a Court for Impeachments Further Considered", Hamilton continues the discussion started in Federalist 65 on the issue of presidential impeachment.
It was published on March 8, 1788.
Objections[edit]
Hamilton responds to four objections made by the Anti-Federalists about the Senate:
- That the provision in question confounds legislative and judiciary authorities in the same body, in violation of that important and well established maxim which requires a separation between the different departments of power.
- That the Senate as a court of impeachments contributes to an undue accumulation of power in that body, tending to give to the government a countenance too aristocratic.
- That the Senate as a court of impeachments is drawn from the agency they are to have in the appointments to office.
- That the Senate in the capacity of a court of impeachments, is derived from its union with the Executive in the power of making treaties. This would constitute the senators their own judges in every case of a corrupt or perfidious execution of that trust.
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