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Saturday, June 05, 2004
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CNN IS GETTING SOFTHEADED
As with virtually everyone else in America, CNN is abuzz with whom Senator John Kerry may pick as a running mate on his sad and doomed presidential ticket. There is the familar chorus of names, Edwards, Gephardt, McCain, Clark, yadda, yadda, yadda.
There's been another name that has popped up from time to time, mostly on blogs and foreign newspapers. I'm actually surprised that CNN would run it even as a joke.
The name is that of.......
Bill Clinton
Few vice-presidential possibilities boast the accomplished resume -- or political baggage -- of former President Bill Clinton. Clinton studied at Georgetown, Yale and Oxford (as a Rhodes scholar) before returning to his home state of Arkansas. He taught at the University of Arkansas' law school for three years before, at 30, being elected the state's attorney general. Clinton later served six terms as Arkansas' governor (he won in 1978, lost a 1980 race, then was re-elected two years later), before defeating incumbent George H.W. Bush to become U.S. president, starting in January 1993. While federal law prohibits a person from seeking a third presidential term, the Constitution does not specify whether or not a former commander in chief can become vice president.
I hate to break this to the good folks of CNN, who one would assume would know more about such things than I, but the Constitution actually does "specify whether or not a former commander in chief can become vice president."
Let's check, shall we?
[Article XII.]
The Electors shall meet in their respective states, and vote by ballot for President and Vice-President, one of whom, at least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves; they shall name in their ballots the person voted for as President, and in distinct ballots the person voted for as Vice-President, and they shall make distinct lists of all persons voted for as President, and of all persons voted for as Vice-President, and of the number of votes for each, which lists they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, directed to the President of the Senate;--The President of the Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certificates and the votes shall then be counted;--The person having the greatest number of votes for President, shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed; and if no person have such majority, then from the persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as President, the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President. But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by states, the representation from each state having one vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice. And if the House of Representatives shall not choose a President whenever the right of choice shall devolve upon them, before the fourth day of March next following, then the Vice-President shall act as President, as in the case of the death or other constitutional disability of the President. (See Note 14)--The person having the greatest number of votes as Vice-President, shall be the Vice-President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed, and if no person have a majority, then from the two highest numbers on the list, the Senate shall choose the Vice-President; a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two-thirds of the whole number of Senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice. But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.
Pretty clear, no? And how is former president Clinton "constitutionally ineligible to the office of President?"
That couldn't be clearer.
Amendment XXII
Section 1. No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once. But this article shall not apply to any person holding the office of President when this article was proposed by the Congress, and shall not prevent any person who may be holding the office of President, or acting as President, during the term within which this article becomes operative from holding the office of President or acting as President during the remainder of such term.
There. All nice and cut and dried. Couldn't be clearer, really. So can we finally put this ridiculous "Bill for VP" story to bed? It makes the people selling it sound stupid.
It was actually proposed once before. During the 1980 Republican convention in Detroit, former governor Ronald Reagan approached former president Gerald Ford to be his running mate. This was problematic for a number of reasons, specifically, why would anyone who had been number 1 want to become number 2. Ford was uncomfortable with Reagan's foreign policy positions, but agreed to run if two conditions were met; that former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger be put back in that office and that Ford be given overall management of foreign policy. Since the Reagan people loathed Kissinger, and that no president would jettison such a large portion of his power, the idea was quickly abandoned and former CIA director George H.W Bush was named to the ticket.
Even if the conditions were acceptable, Ford assumed the presidency on August 9, 1974 and left on January 20, 1977. That would be over two years, which would bring this part of the amendment into effect,
and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once.
While Ford could have been elected vice-president in 1980 (having lost his race for election in his own right to Jimmy Carter in 1976), he would have been constitutionally ineligible for re-election to that office in 1984.
For John Kerry to name Clinton to the ticket, even outside of the Constitutional restrictions, would be politically stupid. Clinton, still highly popular and gifted and charasmatic in ways that Kerry could never hope to be, would make Kerry even more irrelevant than he already is. The vice-president only has two constitutionally designated duties, pesiding over the Senate and waiting for the president to die. Now let's consider all the trouble Clinton got himself into as president. Can you imagine what would happen if he were back in the White House with nothing to do?
Besides, President Clinton would never accept for another important reason. Hillary would never speak to him again.
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