The Founders Would Have Been Appalled at the January 6 Committee

Democrats violated the prohibition on attainder to try to force a prosecution of President Trump.

AP/J. Scott Applewhite
Representative Elizabeth Cheney speaks as the House select committee investigating the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol holds a hearing July 12, 2022. AP/J. Scott Applewhite

The final act of the January 6 committee, voted on in broad daylight, represents, to us, the final act in a process that the Founders of America had tried to prohibit — a process of attainder, meaning a trial on criminal charges by the legislature. It is prohibited to the Congress in Article I, Section 9. And by our lights, referring President Trump and his colleagues for criminal prosecution is an evasion by the Congress.

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