Passing the baton.

so, as a fourth year law student I was given an internship at the U.S. capitol in Washington with with a senator, to see and experience how the branch of the legislature works. Experience exposure, round out my knowledge. It was fascinating, and I decided it wasn’t something I wanted to pursue as a career. It definitely wasn’t my cup of tea. One day I was given an assignment to research the presidential succession if the sitting president died in office. I got down to work in the legislative law library and started to make notes.this what I found out: If a U.S. president cannot carry out the duties of the office, the responsibilities are passed to another government leader in a specific order.

The president of the United States may be replaced if he or she:

Becomes incapacitated

Dies

Resigns

Is unable to hold office

Is removed from office

The U.S. Constitution and the Presidential Succession Act of 1947 outline the presidential order of succession. The line of succession of cabinet officers is in the order of their agencies’ creation.

Vice President

Speaker of the House

President Pro Tempore of the Senate

Secretary of State

Secretary of the Treasury

Secretary of Defense

Attorney General

Secretary of the Interior

Secretary of Agriculture

Secretary of Commerce

Secretary of Labor

Secretary of Health and Human Services

Secretary of Housing and Urban Development

Secretary of Transportation

Secretary of Energy

Secretary of Education

Secretary of Veterans Affairs

Secretary of Homeland Security

The order of succession specifies that the office passes to the vice president; if the vice presidency is simultaneously vacant, the powers and duties of the presidency pass to the speaker of the House of Representatives, president pro tempore of the Senate, and then Cabinet secretaries, depending on eligibility.

to be thorough I went to the constitution which was the original source of this procedure, and found this:

U.S. Constitution: Article II, Section 1, Clause 6, the 12th Amendment, 20th Amendment, and 25th Amendment. The vice president is designated as first in the presidential line of succession by the Article II succession clause, which also authorizes Congress to provide for a line of succession beyond the succession of the vice president.

‘Big yawn.

the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963 which finally pushed Congress to create a detailed, specific, and unambiguous outline of executive succession. After over six months of negotiations between the House of Representatives and the Senate, an amendment proposing a new series of executive succession was released to the states for ratification in July 1965. In February 1967, the required thirty-eight states had ratified the proposal, officially making it the Twenty-fifth Amendment to the constitution.

Upon its ratification in 1967, the Twenty-fifth Amendment reaffirmed several of the precedents set by previous presidents and vice presidents in response to their own succession crises. Section 1 authorizes the vice president to become the president upon the former’s removal from office, resignation, or death. Section 2 further requires the president to nominate a politician who can replace the vice president when necessary. This was invoked for the first time with Gerald Ford replacing Vice President Spiro Agnew after his resignation in 1973. Using the precedent set by Dwight D. Eisenhower, Section 3 grants presidents the authority to temporarily transfer the power of their office to the vice president. The president can accordingly petition to have their powers restored after the interval concludes. In the complex and unique scenario where a president is considered to be unable to do their job but does not want to step down, Section 4 authorizes the vice president and a majority of the president’s cabinet or Congress to decide if the president is unable to perform their duties. Should the group have a majority opinion of “yes,” then the president’s powers are automatically transferred to the vice president. In response, the president can announce that they are able to resume their leadership role, after which the voting group has four full days to disagree, otherwise the president’s powers are fully restored when the time elapses. If the voting group disagrees with the president’s assertion, then they conduct a quick vote in Congress to decide if the president is unable to serve. With all its explanations of procedure, the Twenty-fifth Amendment managed to clear up the succession ambiguities that had persisted in the Executive Branch since the end of the 18th century.

Another big yawn.

After poring through several books and writing down numerous notes,which took hours, I finished the project, but just to be sure I looked on line and found the exact information on Wikipedia. It took me 2 minutes. Go figure.

‘The elections had just happened, and a new president had been elected, in a landslide popular vote and electoral vote. The country was excited, cabinet secretaries had been nominated by the new president, and the legislature had approved their appointments. The speaker of the house had been elected by tcongress, and all was in order for the new administration to start work on their agenda.

but then disaster structure. The new president, vice president, speaker of the house, pro tempore, and several cabinet secretaries were onboard Air Force one when the plane crashed with no survivors. The country was thrown into shock. The whole world was thrown into shock. Who would run the government now? My research paper was taken, and examined, and corroborated. And followed. The next in line of succession was traced to the next surviving/living cabinet secretary and she was quickly sworn in as the new president. This was an historic event. Not only was the new president a woman, she was a Native American, the first Native American cabinet secretary ever to be appointed, and now the first Native American president. Again the country was again thrown into shock. They didn’t vote for a Native American. Or a women. They knew nothing about her. Was she a democrat? Or a republican? A good leader?

we will have four years to find out, and if she is a good president, the voters can re-elect her again. This is democracy at work. Let’s hope it does work. God bless America.