Page 176 to is an attempt to argue that Congress has a right to conduct witch hunts regardless of the evidence of any criminal wrong doing or obstruction.
c. Congress Has Power to Protect Congressional, Grand Jury, and Judicial Proceedings Against Corrupt Acts from Any Source
Where a law imposes a burden on the President's performance of Article II functions, separation-of -powers analysis considers whether the statutory measure "is justified by an overriding need to promote objectives within the constitutional authority of Congress." Administrator of General Services, 433 U.S. at 443. Here, Congress enacted the obstruction-of* justice statutes to protect, among other things, the integrity of its own proceedings, grand jury investigations, and federal criminal trials. Those objectives are within Congress's authority and serve strong governmental interests.
i. Congress has Article I authority to define generally applicable criminal law and apply it to all persons-including the President. Congress clearly has authority to protect its own legislative functions against corrupt efforts designed to impede legitimate fact-gathering and lawmaking efforts. See Watkins v. United States, 354 U.S. 178, 187, 206-207 (1957); Chapman v. United States, 5 App. D.C. 122, 130 (1895). Congress also has authority to establish a system of federal courts, which includes the power to protect the judiciary against obstructive acts. See U. S. CONST. ART. I, § 8, els. 9, 18 ("The Congress shall have Power ... To constitute Tribunals inferior to the supreme Court" and "To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing powers"). The long lineage of the obstruction-of-justice statutes, which can be traced to at least 1831, attests to the necessity for that protection. See An Act Declaratory of the Law Concerning Contempts of Court, 4 Stat. 487-488 § 2 (1831) (making it a crime if"any person or persons shall corruptly ... endeavor to influence, intimidate, or impede any juror, witness, or officer, in any court of the United States, in the discharge of his duty, or shall, corruptly ... obstruct, or impede, or endeavor to obstruct or impede, the due administration of justice therein" ).
ii. The Article ITT courts have an equally strong interest in being protected against obstructive acts, whatever their source. As the Supreme Court explained in United States v. Nixon, a "primary constitutional duty of the Judicial Branch" is "to do justice in criminal prosecutions." 418 U.S. at 707; accord Cheney v. United States District Court for the District of Columbia, 542
U.S. 367, 384 (2004). In Nixon, the Court rejected the President's claim of absolute executive privilege because "the allowance of the privilege to withhold evidence that is demonstrably relevant in a criminal trial would cut deeply into the guarantee of due process of law and gravely impair the basic function of the courts." 407 U.S. at 712. As Nixon illustrates, the need to safeguard judicial integrity is a compelling constitutional interest. See id. at 709 (noting that the denial of full disclosure of the facts surrounding relevant presidential communications threatens "[t]he very integrity of the judicial system and public confidence in the system" ).
iii. Finally, the grand jury cannot achieve its constitutional purpose absent protection from corrupt acts. Serious federal criminal charges generally reach the Article III courts based on an indictment issued by a grand jury. Cobbledick v. United States, 309 U.S. 323, 327 (1940) (" The Constitution itself makes the grand jury a part of the judicial process."). And the grand jury's function is enshrined in the Fifth Amendment. U.S. CONST. AMEND. V. (" [n] o person shall be held to answer" for a serious crime " un less on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury"). "[T]he whole theory of [the grand jury's] function is that it belongs to no branch of the institutional government, serving as a kind of buffer or referee between the Government and the people," United States v. Williams, 504 U.S. 36, 47 (1992), "pledged to indict no one because of prejudice and to free no one because of special favor." Costello v. United States, 350 U.S. 359, 362 (1956) . If the grand jury were not protected against corrupt interference from all persons, its function as an independent charging body would be thwarted. And an impartial grand jury investigation to determine whether probable cause exists to indict is vital to the criminal justice process.
* * *
The final step in the constitutional balancing process is to assess whether the separation* of-powers doctrine permits Congress to take action within its constitutional authority notwithstanding the potential impact on Article II functions. See Administrator of General Services, 433 U.S. at 443; see also Morrison, 487 U.S. at 691-693 , 695-696; United States v. Nixon,
418 U.S. at 711-712. In the case of the obstruction-of-justice statutes, our assessment of the weighing of interests leads us to conclude that Congress has the authority to impose the limited restrictions contained in those statutes on the President's official conduct to protect the integrity of important functions of other branches of government.
A general ban on corrupt action does not unduly intrude on the President's responsibility to "take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed." U.S. CONST. ART IT, §§ 3. 1090 To the contrary, the concept of "faithful execution" connotes the use of power in the interest of the pub!ic, not in the office holder' s personal interests. See 1 Samuel Johnson , A Dictionary of the English Language 763 (1755) ("faithfully" def. 3: "[w]ith strict adherence to duty and allegiance") . And immunizing the President from the generally applicable criminal prohibition against corrupt obstruction of official proceedings would seriously impair Congress's power to enact laws " to promote objectives within [its] constitutional authority," Administrator of General Services, 433
U.S. at 425- i.e., protecting the integrity of its own proceedings and the proceedings of Article TIT courts and grand juries.
Accordingly, based on the analysis above, we were not persuaded by the argument that the President has blanket constitutional immunity to engage in acts that would corruptly obstruct justice through the exercise of otherwise-valid Article TT powers. 1091
Translation; we don't care what the Presidents rights are under the Constitution or his arguments to the contrary.
