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When ordinary people too cavalierly throw around the word “treasonous,” they devalue civil discourse and constitutional understanding. When a president wantonly uses the word, he himself is being almost, well, treasonous.

And if that second sentence above is a slight overstatement, even with the modifier “almost” included, well, it’s still a lot closer to truth and reason than it was for President Trump to tweet the accusation Monday morning at two top law-enforcement officials. Trump concluded a series of tweets by saying that Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and then-Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe had done something “ illegal and treasonous” in questioning his fitness for office.

No, Mr. President. What they did was patriotic by some lights, and at the very least was dutiful. But what you do by your charges of “treason,” coming from the Oval Office, is to dangerously ratchet up the political temperature. The president is not a king. Opposition to him is not a crime. And mere consideration of a constitutional provision to remove him is nowhere near treason.

Trump was reacting to McCabe telling TV newsmagazine “60 Minutes” that he and Rosenstein were at least somewhat serious in wondering whether Trump was mentally fit for office, and in trying to figure out ways to ascertain the answer in a way that would be dispositive – including including a wiretap if it could be done legally. In doing so, they were in the very earliest stages of considering use of the Constitution’s 25th Amendment, a section of which allows for the removal of an incapacitated president.

It is almost inarguable that Trump acts strangely sometimes, and mercurially and rashly. It is beyond question that a spirited public debate was occurring about whether Trump was indeed mentally unfit in 25th Amendment terms. The amendment is there for good reason. Prior presidents have suffered incapacitation. Witness former President Woodrow Wilson, who suffered a stroke and was forced to rely on his wife to carry on his official duties.

The amendment is not to be used lightly, and it contains significant internal safeguards against misuse. It was a well-considered reaction by the public at large, supported by two thirds of Congress and by the legislatures of three-fourths of the states, to the assassination of former President John F. Kennedy.

To even suggest that the mere consideration of beginning a process of ascertaining a president’s mental fitness is illegal, much less treasonous, is to suggest that the 25th Amendment itself should be ignored. It is to suggest that the American people acted illegitimately in instituting the amendment, and that public officials are acting unlawfully by taking it seriously. It is to suggest that the president is a law unto himself, and that the mere act of questioning his fitness is not just a crime, but also is the single worst crime against the state itself that the Constitution recognizes.

A president holds a unique position of power. When he yells “treason,” it carries particular weight. And when he uses it to suggest that questioning him is illegitimate, he at least suggests that he is above the law.

For Trump to use the word treason in this way, as he now has done several times during his presidency, is to create a public impression which, if it takes hold, would undermine our constitutional order.

Of course, we all know that Trump tweets with abandon and often from ignorance. We know we aren’t supposed to take all his tweets literally. But that doesn’t excuse him. It just means we have even more reason to question his judgment, even if not his sanity.