Posted on 03/30/2014 8:54:52 AM PDT by sgtyork
This may come as a shock to Lois Lerner, but the House of Representatives has the authority to jail her unless she changes her mind about refusing to answer questions about her role in the IRS scandal. Essentially, what is required for that to happen is for a House majority to vote for a motion holding her in contempt and House Speaker John Boehner to then direct the House sergeant at arms to arrest and confine her. Under the Constitution, the House can do that under its “inherent contempt” authority, which was initially exercised in 1795 during the First Congress and on multiple occasions thereafter. Lerner could be held until January 2015 when a new Congress is seated, which could issue another subpoena and throw her in the clink again if she still balks at testifying.
According to a 2012 Congressional Research Service report, inherent contempt has the unique advantage that it doesn’t require “the cooperation or assistance of either the executive or judicial branches. The House or Senate can, on its own, conduct summary proceedings and cite the offender for contempt.” The prospect of an eight or nine month stretch in the congressional slammer might have a sobering effect on Lerner. On the other hand, neither the House nor the Senate has used this authority since 1935, according to the CRS report, because the process can be “unseemly” and time-consuming.
The prospect of an eight or nine month stretch in the congressional slammer might have a sobering effect on Lerner.
Plus, Lerner may be on solid ground in thinking Boehner and other House Republicans don't have the political spine to jail her. But just as the South's “massive resistance” in the 1950s to racial integration was doomed to fail because it could not be sustained over time, the Obama administration's comprehensive refusal since November 2010 to cooperate with legitimate congressional oversight by House committees may be sowing seeds of frustration that eventually undercut Lerner's calculation of how long she can keep silent. Chairman Darrell Issa of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and Rep. Jim Jordan, who heads that panel's oversight subcommittee, are patient individuals but perhaps not that patient.
Something else is also clear: House leaders have effectively laid the legal predicate for a contempt vote. Earlier this week, the Office of General Counsel for the House delivered its opinion that Issa's committee has satisfied all legal requirements in its dealings with Lerner and her Fifth Amendment claim, so “there is no constitutional impediment to … the committee approving a resolution recommending that the full House hold Ms. Lerner in contempt of Congress …”
Contempt citations aren't common but neither are they a thing of the past. Among those cited for contempt just since 1980 are such notables as Attorney General Eric Holder, then-White House Chief of Staff Joshua Bolten and then-White House General Counsel Harriet Miers, then-Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Anne Gorsuch Burford and then-EPA Assistant Administrator Rita Lavelle.
?
You don’t have to give up your rights to hold political office or be a political appointee.
Even though this administration is cavalier with other peoples rights, it’s nonsense.
what is required for that to happen is for a House majority to vote for a motion holding her in contempt and House Speaker John Boehner to then direct the House sergeant at arms to arrest and confine herDream on. Boehner and Lerner are of like minds when it comes to destroying the TEA Party
Boehner (and GOP E) worship the ground she walks on for what she's done/doing to the TEA Party folks.
The woman who refused to testify against the Clintons in the S&L shananigans was jailed for a long time.
You are 100% correct- that is why they should prosecute her with testimony from her co-workers
Then she has incentive to squeal
I was being kind, I suppose ... You can’t have it both ways if you hold public office, and the House has every right under its authority to pursue contempt charges (if they have the stones to do it).
LL can keep quiet all she wants, just be ready to face the consequences.
“Lois Lerner could go to jail”.
Crappola.
This group of neutered babosos aren’t gonna do squat cept make noise
Your problem is that you don’t do anything useful. You’re a complete waste of space.
If this Jailing was going to happen then it should of happened to Holder. Believe me it will never happen unless a democrat has a chance to do it to a Republican.
Coulda, woulda, shoulda-—we know it won’t happen!
Hang. Them. All.
After which, Lerner might very well suffer a “heart attack” like the one that killed Jim McDougal, Clinton’s friend.
Does the House in fact have a jail?
It is abundantly clear that Lerner is a nasty dem bitch and as guilty as they come, but now she is probably in fear for her life should she rat out the 0bama regime.
The ELITE Lois Lerner will NEVER...EVER....NEVER go to jail...NEVER. First of all she’s doing Obama’s thing and she’s Jewish!! The ADL will NEVER...EVER.....let her go to jail.
Obama and the Democrats are LAW-Less because Republican “leaders” are BALL-LESS!!!
Obama and the Democrats are LAW-Less because Republican “leaders” are BALL-LESS!!!
The president is a jewish surrogate....... that’s the purpose of the civil rights movement
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