PEACHMENTS

4 definitions found across Law Mind sources

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PEACHMENTSAuthored
The Law Mind • 712 words
Definition
Peachments is an archaic and abbreviated form of the term "impeachments," referring to formal accusations or charges brought against a public officer or other person through the legislative process of impeachment. In historical usage, the term appears most often in compound phrases such as "court of peachments" — a tribunal empowered to hear and determine the guilt or innocence of a person brought before it by the impeachment process. In England, the court of peachments was constituted by the House of Lords. In the United States, the Senate serves this function at the federal level. In most American states, the upper house of the state legislature performs the equivalent role. The term is not a distinct legal concept independent of impeachment; it functions as a variant or abbreviated rendering of that term, encountered primarily in older legal texts, court records, and legislative proceedings.
Common Confusion
PEACHMENTS should not be treated as a separate legal institution from IMPEACHMENT. It is not a distinct doctrine, process, or tribunal type. Researchers encountering "peachments" in historical sources are reading a contracted or variant spelling of "impeachments" — the full process by which a legislative body formally accuses and tries an officer of government. Confusion arises most often when transcriptions of early manuscript records render the prefix "im-" inconsistently or drop it entirely through scribal abbreviation. The substantive law governing the process is found entirely under IMPEACHMENT.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers working in the Law Mind corpus are most likely to encounter "peachments" in one of two contexts: (1) early English legal records and Year Books where scribal abbreviation and contracted spellings were common, and (2) American colonial and early republic legislative journals where typesetting practices and manuscript conventions sometimes dropped the "im-" prefix. The practical trap is search and indexing. A full-text search for "impeachment" will not retrieve documents indexed or transcribed as "peachments." Researchers should run both search strings when working with pre-nineteenth century sources, and should examine surrounding context to confirm the term is functioning as a variant of "impeachment" rather than as a standalone word. The Black's Law Dictionary entries consulted here use "peachments" specifically in the phrase "court of peachments," suggesting the abbreviated form had some recognized shorthand currency in legal reference works of the period, even if it never achieved independent doctrinal standing. There is no meaningful evolution to track for "peachments" as a concept — its entire substance is borrowed from impeachment doctrine. What does evolve over time, and what researchers should track separately, is the scope of who could be impeached: Bouvier's note that Blackstone restricted impeachment of commoners for capital offenses reflects a significant historical limitation that American law did not carry forward uniformly.
Historical Dictionary Support
All three source dictionaries treat "peachments" as it appears in the phrase "court of peachments," defining it as the tribunal constituted to try persons subject to the impeachment process. Black's (both editions) and Bouvier's are in substantive agreement on the structure: House of Lords in England; Senate at the federal level in the United States; upper legislative chamber in the states. Bouvier's adds the most historically instructive nuance, noting the Blackstone limitation on impeachment of commoners for capital offenses — a restriction that American practice did not adopt wholesale and that reflects a divergence between English and American impeachment law that researchers should not collapse. The historical entries are incomplete as standalone research tools. None of the source dictionaries define "peachments" as an independent term with its own legal content. Their entries are, effectively, entries on impeachment courts with the abbreviated label attached. Researchers should treat these entries as gateways to the fuller treatment available under IMPEACHMENT in any of the same dictionaries.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
See Law Mind Encyclopedia: Impeachment; Legislative Tribunals; Constitutional Law — Separation of Powers.
Related Terms
Impeachment — the parent term and substantive doctrine Court of Impeachment — the formal name for the tribunal described Articles of Impeachment — the charging instrument initiating the process Trial by the Senate — the federal constitutional procedure Attainder — distinguished process; legislative punishment without judicial trial Indictment — the analogous charging instrument in criminal courts High Crimes and Misdemeanors — constitutional standard for federal impeachment
PEACHMENTSmain
Black's Law Dictionary • 1891
A tribunal empowered to try any officer of government or other per- son brought to its bar by the process of im- peachment. In England, the house of lords constitutes such a court; in the United States, ords of courts were written from the earliest period down to the reign of George II. Its characteristics were great strength, compact- ness, and undeviating uniformity; and its use undoubtedly gave to the ancient record its acknowledged superiority over the mod- ern, in the important quality of durability. The writing of this hand, with its peculiar abbreviations and contractions, constituted, while it was in use, an art of no little im- portance, being an indispensable part of the profession of "clerkship," as it was called. Two sizes of it were employed, a large and a small hand; the former, called "great court- hand," being used for initial words or clauses, the placita of records, etc. Burrill.
PEACHMENTSmain
Bouvier's Law Dictionary • 1928
A tribunal for de- termining the guilt or innocence of any person properly impeached. In England, the House of Lords, and in this country, generally, the more select branch of the legislative assembly, constitutes a court for the trial of impeachments. A peer could always be impeached for any crime, and although Blackstone lays it down that a commoner cannot be impeached for a capi- tal offence, but only for a high misde- meanor, the opinion seems to have pre- vailed that he could be impeached for high treason; 4 Bla. Com. 260; 4 Steph. Com. 299; May, Parl. Prac. c. 23. See IMPEACH-
PEACHMENTSmain
Black's Law Dictionary (2nd Ed.) • 1910
A tribunal empowered to try any officer of government or other person brought to its bar by the process of impeachment. In England, the house of lords constitutes such a court; in the United States, the senate; and in the several states, usually, the upper house of the legislative assembly.

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