Ford pardoned Nixon for "any crimes that he might have committed against the United States as

[yellowcanine]

president." So how did Ford know that Nixon had not sold secrets to the Soviet Union? Answer, he didn't. And therein lies the problem with blanket pardons for uncharged and unknown crimes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pardon_of_Richard_Nixon


If in fact Trump grants such a pardon to Giuliani, Junior, Jared, Eric, or Ivanka or anyone else, it should be challenged in court.

[onenote]

1. question: who has standing to challenge the pardon?

At most, a prosecutor would have to bring specific charges based on some action covered by the terms of the pardon and argue that the pardon isn't valid, which almost certainly will fail in court.

[yellowcanine]

4. Any United States prosecutor or the AG of the United States.

Not clear it would fail if the crimes were not specified in the pardon. It is a SCOTUS case for sure. And I don't think it would necessarily fall along traditional conservative/liberal lines.

[onenote]

5. Only if they have a specific charge that they are prepared to bring.

it can't be challenged in the abstract.

[Pantagruel]

8. Remember this argument the next time the Constitution

is referred to as a perfect document, inviolable to change.The reverential tone to the document has always annoyed me.

[yellowcanine]

9. Oh absolutely. No reason to challenge it in the abstract. In Nixon's case there were plenty of

charges which could have been brought. He tampered with witnesses, for Christ's sake.

[SCantiGOP]

2. The Constitution is the final arbiter

And it gives the President complete power to pardon. I don’t see any way it could be stopped in court.

[Thomas Hurt]

3. Even if they were granted in return for cash? That might be the only exception.

probably not easy to prove as well.

[onenote]

10. It has to be for acts committed before the pardon is granted.

[unblock]

14. true, but a president can promise he will pardon people on his last day in office.

i suppose he could even sign an undated pardon, leaving the pardonee to fill in the date.

a completely criminal president could make this promise to a gang of thugs who then kidnap some members of congress and their kids and threaten to kill them unless they pass certain laws, etc....

[onenote]

16. Can't do that. It's an official document. It's not written on the back of an envelope.

[unblock]

19. well they can certainly make the promise, anyway.

[Alex4Martinez]

7. It leaves wide open state or municipal crimes, correct?

I think there's plenty of crime at various levels from International to local.
The president can only pardon federal crimes, I think.

[andym]

11. Impeachment is the exception

A former President can be impeached as well--the Constitution states only impeachment (not conviction) is needed AFAIK. Then, the pardon would not be constitutional and not valid.

“The President … shall have power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, except in cases of impeachment.”

[unblock]

15. meaning the president can't void an impeachment.

but the president can pardon in impeached officer for the underlying federal crimes he was impeached for.

he can keep the guy out of prison, but he can't get him his job back.

[Mr. Ected]

13. An exceptional Supreme Court would rule that, though the Constitution is silent on limits on pardon

power, it's also silent on abortion rights, but that doesn't mean we can't extrapolate from other laws and caselaw general parameters that can be applied to any particular conflict. Obviously the founders did not want all power to rest with the head of the executive branch, there was to be a distinct separation of powers such that checks and balances could be applied in all instances. A "get out of jail free card" in the form of a pardon seems to be violative of all the other principles espoused by the founders. Truth is, it would be ludicrous to argue otherwise.

Unfortunately, we do not have an exceptional Supreme Court, so who knows how justice may be maligned in the pursuit of neofascism.

[onenote]

17. The Constitution isn't silent on pardons.

It gives the power to the President. The absence of limitations strongly supports the conclusion no limitations exist, beyond the checks and balances provided by the impeachment power.

[unblock]

18. yes. the constitution is full of seeming absolutes, but they're balanced against each other.

the first amendment would appear to prevent any limitations on free speech, yet there are plenty of restrictions that have passed constitutional muster. defamation, sedition, incitement to riot, fraud, etc.

so it's certainly possible that a supreme court (as you note, not likely this one) might find a pardon is limited, for instance, by congress's right to legislate. if the president can pardon himself and his entire administration, then that effectively removes congress's right to legislate over them.


what would be really entertaining would be reading the opinions of the right-wing "originalist" while they grapple with the reality that the founders never in a million years intended to create the kind of tyrant that unlimited pardon power could produce.

as i noted above, a president could use the promise of pardon to have members of congress and/or their families kidnapped and held until congress passed the laws he wanted. surely an honest "originalist" would conclude that the they never intended for pardons to cover that sort of thing. yet conceptually, it's hard to reject that while approving donnie's pardons of criminal cronies.