; Whereas legitimate objectives include determinations of whether laws have been violated, whether they have been properly enforced, whether new laws are needed, or whether funds should be appropriated or withheld; Whereas Congress is endowed with independent constitutional authority to determine whether presidential defiance of a congressional subpoena constitutes an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor without a court adjudication of any claimed executive privilege, state secrets, or other defense; Whereas Congress possesses all the contempt powers of Article III courts; Whereas Presidents Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln recognized that each branch of government has independent authority to interpret the Constitution within their respective spheres of power; Whereas the United States Supreme Court has never opined on whether executive privilege may be invoked to block the congressional power of investigation; Whereas in United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683 (1974), the Court subordinated the privilege to the needs of a single criminal prosecution; Whereas the importance of congressional oversight to our constitutional dispensation and separation of powers is orders of magnitude greater than prosecution of a single criminal case; Whereas the Nixon tapes precedent mandates that executive privilege is subservient to legislative oversight of the executive branch; and Whereas the absence of a specific definition of an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor invites the appearance or actuality of partisan exercises of the impeachment power which subverts its legitimacy and deters its use: Now, therefore, be it