During Reconstruction, President Ulysses S. Grant’s Secretary of War was impeached by the House of Representatives and tried by the Senate AFTER he had resigned his office. William W. Belknap’s wife Carrie became involved in a scheme to kickback money to herself and her husband for help in securing a position as post traders at Fort Sill in 1870. The total payments continued over more than half-a-decade and in modern dollars was worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. It went on for so long, that by the time the corruption was revealed, Carrie had died and Belknap had married her sister Amanda who lived lavishly on the ill gotten booty.
When Democratic newspapers published revelations about the scheme in 1876, On March 2, 1876, knowing that the House Democrats were ready to take the first step towards impeaching him, Belknap went to Grant and resigned. Grant accepted the resignation. Some of Grant’s own allies questioned whether Grant had acted properly in accepting the resignation. If the only purpose of the resignation was to evade a trial for impeachment, that might be construes as obstructing justice,
The House decided to impeach Belknap anyway and the Senate voted to allow an impeachment trial to go forward. Thirty-seven Senators voted for conviction and twenty-five voted against. This was five votes short of the two-thirds needed to convict. Most of the minority said they voted against impeachment because they did not believe a person could be tried for impeachment after leaving office. So, while the case established the precedent for impeachment after leaving office, enough Senators disagreed with the ruling to defeat Belknap’s conviction.
Hear are the Senate Proceedings.
The feature illustration shows Belknap resigning in tears. It is from Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper March 18, 1876.
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