University of Virginia law school professor Charles Barzun said he also believes that arguments against convicting a former president are incorrect. "It would enable the person impeached to avoid one of the two available sanctions for having committed a 'high crime or misdemeanor,' disqualification from future office-holding, by resigning once he or she has been impeached but before the Senate trial, thereby undermining one of the chief purposes of granting Congress the impeachment power in the first place," Barzun said.