Can a lawyer type please clear up if one has to be convicted before being pardoned?
“please clear up if one has to be convicted before being pardoned?”
A president can pardon anyone he wants for any Federal crime regardless of whether any legal action has been taken. A president can issue a blanket preemptive pardon.
Is a decision by the US Supreme Court acceptable?
https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/71/333#writing-USSC_CR_0071_0333_ZO
...The Constitution provides that the President “shall have power to grant reprieves and pardons for offences against the United States, except in cases of impeachment.”
The power thus conferred is unlimited, with the exception stated.
It extends to every [federal] offence known to the law, and may be exercised at any time after its commission, either before legal proceedings are taken or during their pendency or after conviction and judgment.
This power of the President is not subject to legislative control...
The power of the pardon as defined in the Constitution is almost unlimited and has remained so for the last several hundred years because even the most cynical and corrupt of politicians have shied away from abusing it's awesome and unlimited power to forgive.
Until Bill Clinton, of course.
Bill Clinton abused the power of the Pardon so badly ( the roots of Clinton's Post Presidential white collar RICO crime organization has it's roots in the payoffs, favors, corruption and connections arising from his Pardon fiasco) that there were serious move to fight the pardons in court all the way up to then Supreme Court or change the law to restrict the pardon power of the President.
If Obama seriously abuses his Pardon Power to protect Clinton and her cronies who may be shown to have committed treason when all the facts finally come out could actually cause the cases to be litigated all the to the Supreme Court and may end up modifying the current scope power of the Presidential Pardon via Supreme Court decision.
It doesn't take a lawyer type to answer your question.
Just read the history of the President Gerald Ford pardon of President Richard Nixon and you will be able to answer it yourself.
Of course at the time of the Nixon pardon the country was aghast at Nixon's transgressions.
But that was then and this is an entirely different world where a high level of criminality among politicians is taken for granted..
Nixon's cover-up compared to Hillary's criminality, lies, duplicity and scamming is like comparing a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar to Joe Stalin.
Nevertheless, Nixon was pardoned without ever being formally charged or convicted of any crime.
For every lawyer who argues a position, there is another lawyer who will argue the opposite position.
Reminds me of the story of the small town that only had one lawyer who was starving until a second lawyer moved into the town.
BTW I am very proud to say I am not a lawyer.