Impeachment of Judge James H. Hardy, 1862
![handle is hein.journals/scal28 and id is 71 raw text is: 1954]
IMPEACHMENT OF JUDGE JAMES H. HARDY, 1862
Frank M. Sfewart*
The only member of the California judiciary to be impeached and
removed from office, after a trial by the Senate in 1862, was James H.
Hardy, judge of the sixteenth judicial district. In other respects, also,
the impeachment was noteworthy. The legislature, for the first time,
published a full record of the proceedings, including the testimony of
witnesses, arguments of counsel, and the deliberations of the court of
impeachment. During the trial and at a later session of the legislature
several important problems of procedure and of constitutional law were
debated and decided.
James H. Hardy was born in Hamilton County, Illinois, April 3, 1832.
He studied law and was admitted to practice in Illinois. Coming to Cali-
fornia in 1852, he entered law practice in Sacramento, and was elected
district attorney of Sacramento County in 1854. Later he removed to
Jackson. When the sixteenth judicial district, comprising the counties
of Amador and Calaveras, was created in 1859, he was appointed judge
of the new district by Governor Weller. Later in the same year he was
elected to the position. A Democrat of the extreme Southern type, he
was prominent in party councils for twenty years.1
IMPEACHMENT BY THE ASSEMBLY
On March 26, 1862, the Assembly unanimously adopted a resolution
calling for the appointment of a committee of five to consider the
charges and to report to the Assembly whether Judge Hardy should be
impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors in office. Testimony and
affidavits collected by the committee were placed before the Assembly
on April 10, with a recommendation of four members of the committee
that Judge Hardy be impeached for misdemeanors in office. A minority
report of one stated that, while the evidence was strong, it did not prove
that he had acted corruptly or criminally. The majority report was adopted,
fifty-one to four. A committee of two was appointed to inform the Senate
of the Assembly's action and to demand that the Senate order the appear-
ance of Judge Hardy to answer the impeachment. Five members of
the Assembly were appointed to prepare articles of impeachment and to
manage the conduct of the case before the Senate. They were given
power to employ counsel to assist them. Fifteen articles of impeachment
against Judge Hardy were adopted by the Assembly, April 11, by a vote
*Professor of Political Science, University of California, Los Angeles.
'History of Amador County, California (1881), 289-290; Alta California, June 12,
1874, p.1; Hittell, History of California, IV (1897), 300 Davis, History of Political Conven-
tions in California, 1849-1892 (1893), 88, 173, 234, 291, 292, 316, 334, 628.](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/scal28&div=11&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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Impeachment of Judge James H. Hardy, 1862
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