Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold (D) called former President Trump a “liar,” after he suggested a recent push to use the 14th Amendment to keep him off the ballot in the state was “electio…
Not that I like Trump, but the answer to your question is in text you quoted:
…shall have engaged insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.
As the Constitution is ultimately a legal document, it would stand to reason that you would need a legal determination that someone is an insurrectionist, namely being charged with and convicted of insurrection.
Not necessarily. Just like the constitution doesn’t specify when a fetus becomes a human (therefore fueling the whole dumb religious arguments), this doesn’t specify the requirements for someone to be labeled an insurrectionist. Requiring a conviction ascertains that being removed from the ballot is a criminal punishment, but it’s not been specified as a criminal punishment in any existing legal documents, and that’s where the grey area comes in.
I agree that it would make sense for it to require a conviction based on that language, and if it gets appealed SCOTUS will likely enact that requirement, but legal nonsense isn’t as nice and simple as “a implies b” so until something is explicitly stated in all permutations of the issue, what is and is not legal, in explicit terminology then technicalities will make a lot of stuff possible.
It was meant to preclude those who had served in the confederate army and government from holding elected federal office, so in practice, at the time at least, a prior conviction for insurrection was not required. That said, it’s not clear how it would apply to Trump.
It didn’t require a legal determination any other time in history. That said, Congress should vote on it and if Trump gets 2/3 votes in favor in both Houses he can run.
Not that I like Trump, but the answer to your question is in text you quoted:
As the Constitution is ultimately a legal document, it would stand to reason that you would need a legal determination that someone is an insurrectionist, namely being charged with and convicted of insurrection.
Not necessarily. Just like the constitution doesn’t specify when a fetus becomes a human (therefore fueling the whole dumb religious arguments), this doesn’t specify the requirements for someone to be labeled an insurrectionist. Requiring a conviction ascertains that being removed from the ballot is a criminal punishment, but it’s not been specified as a criminal punishment in any existing legal documents, and that’s where the grey area comes in.
I agree that it would make sense for it to require a conviction based on that language, and if it gets appealed SCOTUS will likely enact that requirement, but legal nonsense isn’t as nice and simple as “a implies b” so until something is explicitly stated in all permutations of the issue, what is and is not legal, in explicit terminology then technicalities will make a lot of stuff possible.
It was meant to preclude those who had served in the confederate army and government from holding elected federal office, so in practice, at the time at least, a prior conviction for insurrection was not required. That said, it’s not clear how it would apply to Trump.
It didn’t require a legal determination any other time in history. That said, Congress should vote on it and if Trump gets 2/3 votes in favor in both Houses he can run.