The Impeachment Power: House Majority, Senate Two-Thirds

The impeachment power is Congress’s exclusive authority to remove the President, the Vice President, federal judges and other officers of the United States for treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanours. It operates in two stages with two different vote thresholds, and the single most common error is to treat those stages as one.

This guide sets out the mechanics, explains why the grounds are broader than the criminal law, shows why no court will review either stage, and separates impeachment from the doctrines it is most often confused with.

Diagram of the impeachment power showing the House majority to impeach and the Senate two-thirds vote to remove. — Two stages, two thresholds: accusation in the House, trial and removal in the Senate.

The two stages

The House of Representatives impeaches by simple majority. That vote is an accusation and nothing more; it is the constitutional analogue of an indictment. The officer remains in office and retains every power of the office.

The Senate then sits as a court of impeachment and may convict only by a vote of two-thirds of the members present and voting. Conviction carries removal automatically, and the Senate may additionally disqualify the person from holding future federal office. Where the President is on trial, the Chief Justice presides.

Exam tip: impeached and removed are not the same word. If the facts give you a Senate vote below two-thirds, the officer stays.

The grounds are political, not criminal

Treason and bribery are defined offences. The phrase that carries the weight is other high crimes and misdemeanours, and it has never been read as a list of statutory crimes. Congress decides what conduct rises to that level, which means an officer may be impeached for abuse of office, for obstruction of a congressional inquiry, or for conduct that no prosecutor could charge.

The corollary matters just as much. Because impeachment is not a criminal proceeding, an acquittal in the Senate is no bar to a later criminal prosecution for the same conduct, and a criminal pardon does not immunise an officer against impeachment.

Neither stage is reviewable

Impeachment is the textbook illustration of the political question doctrine. In Nixon v. United States the Court held that the Senate’s procedures for trying an impeachment are committed to the Senate alone, so a challenge to the way the trial was conducted presents no justiciable question.

The practical consequence is that a party cannot go to court to argue that the evidence was thin, that the grounds were inadequate, or that the process was unfair. If a fact pattern has an impeached officer filing suit, the answer almost always begins and ends with non-justiciability.

Scenario	Result	Reason
House votes 230 to 205 to impeach	Impeached, not removed	Simple majority is the accusation stage only
Senate votes 62 to 38 to convict	Acquitted	Two-thirds of those present is not reached
Impeachment for non-criminal abuse of office	Permissible	Grounds are defined by Congress, not by the penal code
Officer sues over Senate trial procedure	Dismissed	Political question under Nixon v. United States
President pardons himself for the underlying crime	Impeachment still available	The pardon power does not reach impeachment
Senate convicts and bars future federal office	Permissible	Disqualification is an available additional judgment

Vote counting and justiciability decide most impeachment questions.

Worked example: the vote that falls short

A President is impeached by the House for misleading Congress about a military operation. The Senate votes 62 to 38 to convict. The President argues the conviction is void for want of a two-thirds majority. The issue is whether he has been removed. The rule is that conviction requires two-thirds of the senators present and voting. Applying it, 62 of 100 is a clear majority but well short of 67, so the constitutional threshold fails. The conclusion is that he is acquitted and remains in office.

Now change the facts. Suppose the Senate had convicted, and the President then sued on the ground that misleading Congress is not a high crime or misdemeanour. That suit fails as well, because whether conduct meets the constitutional standard is committed to Congress and is not a question for the courts.

What impeachment is not

Not presidential immunity. Immunity doctrine governs civil and criminal liability for official acts. Impeachment governs tenure in office. A President may be impeached for conduct that could never generate liability.
Not the removal power. Congress impeaches. The President removes subordinate executive officers. The two doctrines answer different questions and are frequently swapped in answers.
Not a criminal trial. No jury, no rules of evidence, no double jeopardy consequences.

Impeachment also sits alongside the other exclusively legislative prerogatives that courts will not police, most obviously the Speech or Debate Clause.

Succession after removal

If the President is removed, dies or resigns, the Twenty-Fifth Amendment makes the Vice President the President. A resulting vacancy in the vice presidency is filled by presidential nomination confirmed by a majority vote of both Houses, which is why the office has twice been filled without a national election.

Common mistakes that cost points

Writing that impeachment removes an officer. It accuses; the Senate removes.
Using a simple Senate majority. Conviction needs two-thirds of those present and voting.
Insisting the conduct must be a crime. It need not be.
Letting a court review the grounds or the procedure.
Thinking a pardon can undo an impeachment or block one.
Treating Senate acquittal as double jeopardy protection against prosecution.
Confusing impeachment with the President’s power to remove his own officers.
Forgetting that impeachment, like the declaration of war, can never be delegated.

Frequently asked questions

Can a former officer be impeached?

The question is contested and has never been settled by a court. The strongest textual argument for it rests on the disqualification judgment, which retains practical effect after a person has left office.

Are federal judges impeached on the same standard?

Yes, the same grounds and thresholds apply, and in practice judges account for most completed removals, since they hold office during good behaviour rather than for a fixed term.

Does the Chief Justice always preside?

Only for the trial of the President. For other officers the Senate presides through its own officers.

Impeachment, recall and accusation in California, 2026

California has an impeachment power that it almost never uses. Article IV of the California Constitution gives the Assembly the power to impeach state officers and the Senate the power to try them, with conviction requiring two thirds, mirroring the federal structure. In practice the state has removed officials this way only a handful of times in its history, because two more convenient mechanisms exist.

The first is recall, available against any elected officer without any allegation of misconduct. The second is far less well known and is specific to local government: sections 3060 and following of the California Government Code allow a county grand jury to present an accusation against a county officer for wilful or corrupt misconduct in office. The accusation is then tried in the Los Angeles Superior Court before a jury, and conviction results in removal from office. It is a judicial rather than legislative removal procedure, and it applies to officials such as the Sheriff, the District Attorney and members of the Board of Supervisors.

Comparing the three routes:

Impeachment reaches state officers only. County officials are outside it, which is why the accusation procedure exists.
Recall requires no wrongdoing. It is a political remedy decided by voters, and signature thresholds are the practical obstacle.
Accusation requires misconduct in office. Personal misconduct unconnected to official duties will not support it.
The grand jury has a civil watchdog role. Los Angeles County’s civil grand jury investigates county government and can initiate the accusation process.
Judicial discipline is separate again. The Commission on Judicial Performance handles judges.
Criminal prosecution is independent. Removal proceedings do not preclude prosecution, and acquittal in one does not bar the other.

In 2026, match the office to the mechanism, because using the wrong procedure is fatal. Read with the removal power, legislative immunity and procedural due process.

Next steps

Read this with the doctrines it borders. Start with Political Question Doctrine: What Courts Will Not Decide, then The Youngstown Framework: Presidential Power in 3 Zones and Congressional War Powers: Declare, Fund and Command.

For primary sources, read Nixon v. United States at Justia, the annotations to Article II, section 4 at Cornell LII, and the examination scope published by the State Bar of California.