Last week, the Vermont House approved a resolution to form a committee to investigate whether to impeach two Franklin County officials. Impeachment is a rare occurrence in Vermont. The Constitutional procedure has not been used in decades.
H.R. 11 established a Special Committee on Impeachment Inquiry. It will investigate allegations that Franklin County State’s Attorney John Lavoie “has engaged in a pattern of harassment and discriminatory conduct toward his employees and others.” The committee must also assess whether to impeach Franklin County Sheriff John Grismore “who was previously captured on video while a captain in the Franklin County Sheriff’s Department kicking a handcuffed prisoner.”
The special committee must report back to the House recommendations as to whether the men should be impeached or if other or no actions should be taken. They have resisted calls to resign.
Vermont Law School Professor Peter Teachout says there are two provisions in the state Constitution that provide for impeachment.
“It does not specify at all the grounds for impeachment whether they be serious crimes and serious misdemeanors or maladministration in office. It’s a very simple sentence: The House of Representatives shall have the power to order impeachments by two-thirds of its members. And once it has done so then it provides: the Senate shall have the sole power of trying and deciding upon all impeachments. So that basically is the Vermont Constitution. Very bare bones.”
Clerk of the House BetsyAnn Wrask previously served in the office of Legislative Counsel and now as Clerk her focus is state legislative and constitutional procedure. She provided an overview of the impeachment procedure to members of the House Committee on Government Operations and Military Affairs on impeachment procedures as it held its first meeting to form the impeachment investigatory committee.
“Because the Constitution provides an executive, judicial or Constitutional officer with a defined term of office, therefore the Constitution is the only method of describing how such an officer can be removed from office and impeachment in our Vermont Constitution is that sole constitutional procedure. Impeachment is the only way to remove a constitutional officer who otherwise has a constitutionally defined term of office.”
Professor Teachout notes that the impeachment provision has been rarely used.
“It has not been used barely at all since the start of the 19th century and the most recent case was a case involving a sheriff who was engaged in several kinds of problematic activities. And I really don’t think there’s been another case involving impeachment in Vermont since the beginning of the 1900’s up to the present except for the Mayo case.”
Wrask noted that the Constitution does not define specific crimes under its impeachment provisions.
“Impeachment is for executive, or judicial state criminals. We don’t have a definition of what constitutes a state criminal. So we don’t know for certain what that means. It likely includes statutory crimes. But because the General Assembly has the exclusive Constitutional authority to impeach and because the Constitution does not define ‘state criminal’ it also seems possible that a constitutional officer can be impeached for conduct found by the General Assembly to violate the public trust or to undermine operation of government even though that conduct is not specifically covered by criminal law.”
If impeachment proceedings reach the House, Wrask explained what would then occur.
“At least 100 members of the House will need to vote in favor of impeachment. Once impeachment is ordered by the House the proceedings then move to the Senate which requires quote: ‘the concurrence of two-thirds of the members present.’ Members present means that they have at least a quorum to convict. But assuming all 30 senators were there, that would mean at least 20 senators would be required to convict.”
Vermont officials have been impeached four times, all in the 1700’s. Four other times impeachments have been requested but dismissed, another four cases were suspended or no action was taken and in 1976 former Washington County sheriff Malcom Mayo was impeached, tried and acquitted.
