506 U.S. 224 (1993)
Walter L. Nixon, Jr., served as Chief Judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi.1 A federal grand jury investigated reports that Nixon had accepted a gratuity from a Mississippi businessman in exchange for influencing a local prosecution.2 Nixon was convicted by a jury of two counts of making false statements before the grand jury and sentenced to prison.3 He refused to resign his judicial office and continued to receive his salary during his incarceration.4
On May 10, 1989, the House of Representatives adopted three articles of impeachment against Nixon.5 The first two articles charged him with giving false testimony before the grand jury, and the third charged him with bringing disrepute on the Federal Judiciary.6 The Senate then invoked its Impeachment Rule XI, which permits a committee of Senators to receive evidence and take testimony and report to the full Senate.7 The committee held four days of hearings at which ten witnesses, including Nixon, testified.8 It submitted a complete transcript and a report summarizing the evidence to the full Senate.9
Nixon and the House managers submitted briefs and presented oral arguments to the Senate.10 The Senate convicted Nixon on the first two articles by the required two-thirds majority and removed him from office.11 Nixon filed suit in federal district court seeking a declaratory judgment that his conviction was void and that his salary and privileges should be reinstated.12 The district court dismissed the action as nonjusticiable.13 The Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit affirmed the dismissal.14 The Supreme Court granted certiorari to review the case.15
Whether a claim that Senate Rule XI violates the Impeachment Trial Clause presents a justiciable controversy?16
A controversy is nonjusticiable where there is a textually demonstrable constitutional commitment of the issue to a coordinate political department or a lack of judicially discoverable and manageable standards for resolving it.17 The courts must in the first instance interpret the text in question and determine whether and to what extent the issue is textually committed.18 The Impeachment Trial Clause provides that the Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments.19
No. The text of the Impeachment Trial Clause demonstrates a commitment of the impeachment trial process to the Senate alone, and the term try does not supply a judicially manageable standard for reviewing the Senate's procedures.20 Applying the rule to the established facts, Nixon challenged Senate Rule XI's delegation of evidence hearing to a committee, but the Clause's use of the word sole reposes the authority in the Senate and nowhere else, and the full Senate ultimately received the committee's report, heard arguments, and voted by the required majority to convict.21 The three specific requirements in the Clause further indicate that the Framers did not intend additional limitations on the Senate's method of proceeding.22 The lack of judicially manageable standards is reinforced by the variety of meanings of the word try, which does not impose a precise requirement that the full Senate hear all evidence.23
In the facts of this case, the Senate's use of Rule XI was consistent with its constitutional authority because the committee reported back to the full body for the final decision.24 Judicial review would also lack finality and pose difficulties in fashioning relief, as seen in the potential disruption to the political system if impeachment convictions could be overturned years later.25
The claim that Senate Rule XI violates the Impeachment Trial Clause does not present a justiciable controversy.26
Related opinions on this issue
Justice Stevens viewed the debate about the strength of the inferences from the words sole and try as far less significant than the central fact that the Framers decided to assign the impeachment power to the Legislative Branch.27 The disposition of the impeachment of Samuel Chase in 1805 demonstrated that the Senate is fully conscious of the profound importance of that assignment.28 Nothing in the subsequent history of the Senate's exercise of this extraordinary power suggests otherwise.29
Respect for a coordinate branch of the Government forecloses any assumption that improbable hypotheticals like those mentioned by Justice White and Justice Souter will ever occur.30 Accordingly, the wise policy of judicial restraint, coupled with the potential anomalies associated with a contrary view, provided a sufficient justification for his agreement with the views of the Chief Justice.31
Joined by Justice Blackmun
Justice White found no prohibition on reaching the merits.32 He would have reached the claim that the Senate's method violated the requirement to try impeachments.33 He concurred in the judgment only because the Senate fulfilled its constitutional obligation to try the petitioner.34 White emphasized that the Senate has very wide discretion in specifying impeachment trial procedures.35 It is extremely unlikely that the Senate would abuse its discretion.36
He would not announce an unreviewable discretion in the Senate to ignore completely the constitutional direction to try impeachment cases.37 White disagreed with the majority's conclusion that the issue meets the criteria for political questions.38 He argued that the word sole does not indicate exclusive interpretive authority for the Senate over the Clause.39 The term try does present a judicially manageable standard.40 He concluded that the Senate's use of a factfinding committee under Rule XI is compatible with the Constitution's command.41
Justice Souter agreed that the case presents a nonjusticiable political question.42 He based his analysis on the functional nature of the doctrine.43 It requires case-by-case inquiry into the precise facts and posture of the particular case.44 He noted that the Impeachment Trial Clause commits to the Senate the sole power to try all impeachments subject to three procedural requirements.45 It contemplates that the Senate may determine within broad boundaries the procedures for receipt and consideration of evidence.46
Other considerations confirming nonjusticiability include the unusual need for unquestioning adherence to a political decision already made.47 There is also the potentiality of embarrassment from multifarious pronouncements by the different branches of government on one question.48 Souter observed that judicial review of an impeachment trial would entail significant disruption of government.49 He added that in different and unusual circumstances, such as conviction upon a coin toss, judicial interference might be appropriate if the Senate's action was so far beyond the scope of its constitutional authority.50