1804, and had a bearing on Chase's
fate which at once became clear. The evidence against the New Hampshire
judge showed intoxication and profanity on the bench and entire
unfitness for office, but further evidence introduced in his behalf
proved the defendant's insanity; and so the question at once arose
whether an insane man can be guilty of "high crimes and misdemeanors?"
Greatly troubled by this new aspect of the case, the Senate none the
less voted Pickering guilty "as charged," by the required two-thirds
majority, though eight members refused to vote at all. But the exponents
of "judge-breaking" saw only the action of the Senate and were blind to
its hesitation. On the same day on which the Senate gave its verdict
on Dickering, the House by a strictly partisan vote decreed Chase's
impeachment.

The charges against Chase were finally elaborated in eight articles. The
substance of the first six was that he had been guilty of "oppressive
conduct" at the trials of John Fries and James Thompson Callender.
The seventh charged him with having attempted at some time in 1800 to
dragoon a grand jury at Newcastle, Delaware, into bringing forward
an accusation of sedition against a local paper. These seven articles
related therefore to transactions already four or five years old. The
eighth article alone was based on the address at Baltimore, which it
characterized as "an intemperate and inflammatory political harangue,"
delivered "with intent to excite the fears and resentment... of the
good people of Maryland against their State Government and
Constitution,... and against the Government of the United States."

But the charges framed against Chase revealed only imperfectly the
animus which was now coming more and more to control the impeachers.
Fortunately, however, there was one man among the President's advisers
who was ready to carry the whole antijudicial program as far as
possible. This uncompromising opponent was William Branch Giles, Senator
from Virginia, whose views on the subject of impeachment were taken down
by John Quincy Adams just as Chase's trial was about to open. Giles,
according to this record, "treated with the utmost contempt the idea
of an INDEPENDENT JUDICIARY--said there was not a word about their
independence in the Constitution.... The power of impeachment was given
without limitation to the House of Representatives; the power of trying
impeachment was given equally without limitation to the Senate