THE ROLL CALL
The Roll Call ON MEN AND MEASURES A Guilty Judge ON JANUARY 13 the United States Senate, sitting as a court of impeach-ment, voted upon this question: Did Judge Robert W. Archbald of the Commerce...
...This article was in the nature of a general charge covering several of the specific charges brought in other articles...
...his code, the System code...
...Article 5 charged that he influenced officials of the Philadelphia & Reacting Culm and Iron Company, owned by...
...Commerce Court before which the Erie Railroad Company was "a party litigant in certain suits...
...If Archbald had been voted "not guilty" on all the other twelve counts against him, this first vote would still have sufficed to oust him from the bench, dishonored...
...the Reading Railroad, to grant a lease on a coal property to Frederick Warnke, for which service Warnke gave him a note for $500...
...and that he had unlawfully influenced railroad officials...
...This vote removed Archbald from office...
...The trial began December 2. Judge Archbald admitted practically all the facts as to his negotiation for culm properties, but in each case declared that the business negotiations were innocent in themselves, and that he had not misused his judicial power or rendered himself subject to impeachment or indictment under the law...
...Not until then will the money changers be driven from this temple...
...It was only one—the first—of thirteen roll calls taken in his impeachment trial...
...Article 3 charged that he attempted to influ-ence the Lehigh Valley Railroad Company to give up a lease on "Packer Number Three" near Shenandoah, Pennsylvania, so that he might lease it on favorable terms from the Girard estate of Philadelphia...
...52 to 20...
...The House voted to impeach Archbald, July 7, and the impeachment was laid before the Senate July 15...
...His ideals are System ideals...
...Here is the roll call: GUILTY Ashurst, Bankhead, Borah, Bourne, Brande-gee, Bristow, Brown, Bryan, Burton, Chamberlain, Clapp, Clarke (Wyoming), Clarke (Arkansas), Crane, Crawford, Culberson, Cullom, Cum-mins, Curtis, Dixon, du Pont, Fletcher, Foster, Gallinger, Gore, Gronna, Hitchcock, Johnson, Jones, Kenyan, La Follette, Lippitt, Lodge, Mc-Cumber, McLean, Martin, Martine, Myers, Nelson, Newlands, O'Gorman, Owen, Perkins, Perky, Poindexter, Pomerene, Beed, Richardson, Root, Sanders, Shively, Simmons, Smith (Arizona), Smith (Georgia), Smith (Maryland), Smoot, Stephenson, Stone, Swanson, Thornton, Tillman, Townsend, Warren, Wetmore, Williams, Works, Page and Sutherland...
...Article 4 charged that he obtained from Attorney Helm Bruce of the Louisville and Nashville railroad, private letters and arguments to sustain an opinion in favor of the railroad in a suit before the Commerce Court...
...NOT GUILTY Burnham, New Hampshire...
...WOODROW WILSON says, "I don't care how big a business grows provided it grows big in contact with keen competition...
...The Senate voted him guilty, 66 to 6. Article 13 charged that Archbald had sought to obtain Credit from and through persons interested in suits in his courts...
...Oliver, Pennsylvania...
...Roosevelt, "is freedom to do anything within the law...
...There are other places in our judiciary occupied by judges as faithful to the special interests as was Archbald...
...We must not stop until our tribunals of justice are made responsive to the public need, responsible to the public will, and cleansed of all contact with Privilege...
...Guilty on Five Counts UPON FIVE out of the thirteen articles of impeachment brought by the House against Archbald, the Senate convicted him of guilt...
...A High Crime and Misdemeanor THE CHARGE contained in this first article of impeachment which resulted so decisively in Archbald's conviction is that while a judge of the United States Commerce Court, Arch-bald "entered into an agreement with one Edward J. Williams whereby the said Robert W. Archbald and the said Edward J. Williams agreed to become partners in the purchase of a certain culm dump, commonly known as the Katydid culm dump, near Moosic, Pennsylvania, owned by the Hillside Coal and Iron Company, a corporation, and one John M. Robertson, for the purpose of disposing of the said property at a profit...
...Senator Jackson of Maryland was excused from voting because he was not in the Senate when the trial began...
...IN HIS SPEECH to the business men of Chicago—big ones—President-elect Wilson said, "We must see to it that the business of the United States is set free absolutely of every feature of monopoly...
...Wherefore the said Robert W. Archbald was and is guilty of misbehavior as such judge and of a high crime and misde-meanor in office...
...that he "did un-dortake to carry on a general business for specu-ation and profit in the purchase and sale of culm dumps, coal lands and other coal properties and for a valuable consideration to compromise litigation pending before the Interstate Commerce Commission" and in furtherance of these transactions he "corruptly" used his influence as a judge of the Commerce Court...
...He was convicted...
...As the Constitution Requires THE IMPEACHMENT proceedings against Judge Archbald were started early in 1912, when complaint was made to the Interstate Commerce Commission, and later to Attorney General Wickersham and President Taft, that Judge Archbald had been concerned in influencing railroads to grant him certain favors in connection with coal land deals, and the settlements of cases involving coal properties...
...ARCHBALD'S impeachment and conviction removes one conspicuous judge among those whose conduct on the bench has served to bring our courts and our administration of justice into popular disrepute...
...Scores of witnesses testified before the committee, most of whom again gave their testimony before the Senate in the trial...
...He was convicted, 60 to 11...
...When He was President "Liberty" said Mr...
...While engaged in these "negotiations and transactions leading up to the aforesaid agreement" Archbald was acting.as-judge in the...
...Why," said his Questioner, "the people Russia have that kind of Liberty...
...Archbald was a System judge...
...but it does not shake the System...
...He is a product of the System...
...We must continue our scrutiny of the courts...
...I am somewhat disappointed, because unless you feel that way the thing is not going to happen except by duress...
...Penrose, Pennsylvania...
...The Roll Call ON MEN AND MEASURES A Guilty Judge ON JANUARY 13 the United States Senate, sitting as a court of impeach-ment, voted upon this question: Did Judge Robert W. Archbald of the Commerce Court, misuse his high office and great power for personal gain, "thereby committing a high crime and misdemeanor in office...
...Archbald "did undertake by correspondence, by personal conferences, and other wise, to induce and influence, and did induce and influence, the officers of the said Hillside Coal and Iron Company and of the Erie Railroad Company, a corporation, which owned all of the stock of the said coal company, to enter into an agreement with the said Robert W. Archbald and the said Edward J. Williams to sell the interest of the said Hillside Coal and Iron Company in the Katydid culm dump for a consideration of $4,500...
...Drive the Changers from This Temple...
...The administration of justice in this individual instance neither "points the moral" nor "adorns the tale"—as the reactionary newspapers and politicians have hastened to assert...
...Archbald was voted guilty, 42 to 20...
...Catron, New Mexico...
...Only five Senators voted "not guilty...
...His disgrace falls heavily upon himself - and his family...
...Paynter, Kentucky...
...Then he paused, looked about the banquet room and added: "I notice you do not applaud that...
...Senators Kern of Indiana, Dillingham of Vermont, and Bradley of Kentucky, were excused from voting because they had not been present throughout the trial...
...Sixty-eight Senators voted "guilty...
...Judge Archbald, "well knowing these facts, willfully, unlawfully and corruptly took advantage of his official position as such judge to induce and influence the Officials of the said Erie Railroad Company" * * * to enter into a contract with him and Williams for profit to themselves "and that the said Robert W. Archbald, then and there, through the influence exerted by reason of his position as such judge, willfully, unlawfully and corruptly did induce the officers" of the railroad company and the coal company to enter into this contract with him...
...The House of Representatives in, May, 1912, began an investigation, through the judiciary committee, which ended in the recommendation that Judge Archbald be impeached...
Vol. 5 • January 1913 • No. 4
