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Can a President be removed from office if there wasn't a crime?
如果总统没有犯罪，是否还能免除其职务？
Beneath the heated partisan language surrounding President Donald Trump's impeachment trial lies a constitutional question:
特朗普总统的弹劾审判引发了激烈的党派言辞，然而这些言辞背后还隐藏着一个事关宪法的问题：
Can a President be removed from office if he hasn't committed a crime?
即便总统没有犯罪，是否还能免除其职务？
That's the key question facing the Senate now that its formal trial began in earnest on Jan. 21.
这一问题也是参议院面临的核心问题，鉴于参议院已于1月21日展开了对特朗普的正式审判。
The fate of Trump's presidency and the carefully calibrated balance of power between the White House and Congress hang on the answer.
问题的答案不仅事关特朗普的总统任期，还会影响到日后白宫与国会之间精心维持的权力平衡。
House Democrats say Trump twisted U.S. foreign policy to try to stay in office,
众议院民主党人表示，为了连任，特朗普扰乱了美国的外交政策，
withholding defense and diplomatic aid to Ukraine to get the country to announce investigations into his political rival Joe Biden.
为了让乌克兰宣布对其政治对手乔·拜登展开调查扣押了对该国的国防外交援助。
Trump's lawyers dispute that framing of what happened—
特朗普的律师驳斥了民主党对事情原委的假设——
but regardless of the President's motivations, they say, there is no law saying anything he did was illegal.
他们声称，无论总统当时是出于何种动机，没有任何法律表明他存在任何违法行为。
"House Democrats newly invented ‘abuse of power' theory collapses at the threshold
“众议院民主党最近捏造的‘滥用职权'之说已经不攻自破，
because it fails to allege any violation of law whatsoever,"
因为他们的这一书佛啊没有指出（特朗普的行为存在）任何意义上的违法之处，”
Trump's lawyers wrote in a brief filed on Jan. 20,
特朗普的律师在1月20日提交的一份简报中写道。
arguing that the impeachment trial must concern only the legality of the President's actions,
他们声称，弹劾审判必须只考虑总统行为的合法性，
not the appropriateness of the possible reasons he undertook them.
而非他采取这些举措背后可能的原因是否恰当。
In other words, Trump's lawyers argue, his pressure on Ukraine fell within the presidency's powers to make foreign policy,
换句话说，他对乌克兰施压的做法并未逾越总统制定外交政策的职权范围，
whether he was doing it to root out corruption, as Trump has said, or for political advantage, as Democrats allege.
无论他采取这一措施是为了铲除腐败，像特朗普所说的那样，还是为了政治利益，像民主党声称的那样，特朗普的律师辩称。
The other side flatly rejects this reading of the Constitution.
民主党则断然否决了特朗普律师对宪法的这一解读。
The "assertion that impeachable offenses must involve criminal conduct is refuted by two centuries of precedent
“两个世纪以来的弹劾惯例早已否定可被弹劾的恶行必须包含犯罪行为在内的论断，
and, if accepted, would have intolerable consequences," House impeachment managers wrote in response on Jan. 21.
如果接受这一论断，必然引发令人难以容忍的后果，”众议院弹劾经理在1月21日的回应中写道。
The debate among constitutional experts over what constitutes an impeachable offense is robust.
宪法专家就可弹劾的行为含有哪些要素展开了激烈的讨论。
But the idea that impeachable conduct need not be an actual crime is well established.
尽管如此，可弹劾的行为无需包含实际的犯罪行为这一观点依然得到了广泛的认同。
In the Federalist papers, Alexander Hamilton wrote that impeachment should apply to cases involving
亚历山大·汉密尔顿曾在联邦宪法的文件中写道，弹劾适用于
"the abuse or violation of some public trust" and "injuries done immediately to the society itself."
涉及“滥用或违背某些方面的公众信任”以及“立即对社会造成了伤害”的情况。
Congress has sometimes interpreted the Constitution in this way in the modern era too.
进入当代社会以后，国会有时也会这样解读宪法。
Even Trump's lawyer Alan Dershowitz sounded a different tune in 1998, during President Bill Clinton's impeachment,
就连特朗普的律师艾伦·德肖维茨都曾在1998年比尔·克林顿总统弹劾案期间发出不同声音，
arguing at that time that "if you have somebody who completely
声称“如果有人滥用民众的信任，
corrupts the office of (the) President and who abuses trust and who poses great danger to our liberty,
对我们的自由构成了极大的威胁而彻底腐化了总统办公室，
you don't need a technical crime" to be impeached.
那无需违法犯罪行为”就应对他实施弹劾。
As Trump's trial began, Dershowitz tweeted that he wants to "retract" that previous statement.
对特朗的审判开始后，德肖维茨发表推文表示，他想“收回”1998年的声明。
Fortunately for Trump, no Congress in the country's history ever explicitly outlawed using the power of the presidency to help win re-election.
好在，对特朗普而言，美国历史上从未有国会明确宣布，利用总统职权助选连任为违法操作。
Now Senators will have to decide whether, in the end, that's all that matters.
如今，参议员们不得不决定，归根结底，这一法律背景是否是最重要的证据。
译文由可可原创，仅供学习交流使用，未经许可请勿转载。
