NO PROVEN ISSUE IN CONTROVERSY: NO ADJUDICATION.

In any prosecutorial process, there is always a known crime, committed by the defendant, who is then indicted and tried for the crime followed by a conviction or acquittal and in some cases mistrial as a result of a hung jury. Upon conviction, there is a penalty or  punishment or fine. All the stages of the process are spelt out and in some cases codified to avoid any unjustifiable "making it up as you go" rules which might lead to persecution rather then prosecution because justice demands fairness. So, starting out, both the defense and the prosecution know exactly what the deal is. At any step in the process, whenever there is an intervention which will render the end result (verdict) impossible to reach the matter becomes a nolle resulting in discontinuance or dismissal. it is like a road block which makes further proceeding impossible. 

So yes the argument is not whether President Donald John Trump should be impeached because that threshold has already been crossed when the House of Representatives impeached the president last December 2020. The question is whether the process of his impeachment trial and conviction or acquittal in the Senate should continue now that he is no longer in office. To understand this, the test is whether impeachment trial survives the office of a president or terminates at the end of is term and to answer this, we have to ask ourselves  whether impeachment attaches to the office or the person of a president. The office is the res upon which impeachment anchors because removal of a president therefrom is the prescribed remedial measure of impeachment. It is to protect the presidency and not to punish a president that the sanction of impeachment exists. 

It is also important to note that you cannot ban a president from ever contesting for the office without first removing him from the office as the former is predicated on the later. Removal from office is the foundation upon which other sanctions are built on and without the first there cannot be the second. Since the president is no longer suffering any office there is no more office to remove him from upon conviction because he occupies none. Also there is no more office for him to remain in should he be acquitted. Therefore the process seeking either should and ought to be discontinued because it has become impossible to attain the objective. 

It is the case in every cause or matter that when the issue in controversy no longer exists or abates, the matter is automatically resolved because there is nothing more in disputation. The issue in controversy in impeachment trial is whether the president can remain in office or be removed from office. No such controversy presently exists, thus making the matter resolved and any matter resolved can no longer remain an issue needing a resolution by an arbiter. #EndTheCharade