The following from Wikipedia
Clause 5: Speaker and other officers; Impeachment[edit]
The House of Representatives shall choose their Speaker and other Officers; and shall have the sole Power of Impeachment.
Section Two further provides that the House of Representatives may choose its Speaker and its other officers. Though the Constitution does not mandate it, every Speaker has been a member of the House of Representatives.
[33] The Speaker rarely presides over routine House sessions, choosing instead to deputize a junior member to accomplish the task.
Finally, Section Two grants to the House of Representatives the sole power of impeachment. Although the Supreme Court has not had an occasion to interpret this specific provision, the Court has suggested that the grant to the House of the "
sole" power of impeachment makes the House the exclusive interpreter of what constitutes an impeachable offense.
[34]
This power, which is analogous to the bringing of criminal charges by a
grand jury, has been used only rarely.
[35] The House has begun impeachment proceedings 62 times since 1789, and nineteen federal officials have been formally impeached as a result, including: two
Presidents (
Andrew Johnson and
Bill Clinton), one
Cabinet Secretary (
William W. Belknap), one
Senator (
William Blount), one
Supreme Court Associate Justice (
Samuel Chase), and fourteen
federal judges. Also, notably,
impeachment proceedings compelled the resignation of President
Richard Nixon.
The Constitution does not specify how impeachment proceedings are to be initiated. Until the early 20th century, a House member could rise and propose an impeachment, which would then be assigned to a committee for investigation. Presently, it is the
House Judiciary Committee that initiates the process and then, after investigating the allegations, prepares recommendations for the whole House's consideration. If the House votes to adopt an impeachment resolution, the Chairman of the Judiciary Committee recommends a slate of "managers," whom the House subsequently approves by resolution. These Representatives subsequently become the prosecution team in the impeachment trial in the Senate (see Section 3, Clause 6 below).
[35]
