A Glimpse at the History of the Vice Presidency

The vice presidency is the U.S. Constitution’s oddity. Aside from presiding over the U.S. Senate and casting a vote when there is a tie, there are few official duties associated with the office. Unless delegated a policy portfolio the vice president basically sits around awaiting the earthly demise of the president.

John Nance Garner, the Texan who served as Franklin D. Roosevelt’s first vice president, is reputed to have said “the vice presidency is not worth a bucket of warm spit,” although some accounts suggest he used a more colorful term. Had Garner stuck around until Roosevelt’s fourth term he may have had a different view of the office. 

If At First You Don’t Succeed

At the dawn of the republic the Constitution provided that each member of the Electoral College would cast two electoral votes but no distinction was made between the offices of president and vice president. The candidate receiving the highest number of electoral votes, providing it was a majority, was elected president. The candidate with the second highest number of electoral votes was elected vice president. If no candidate received a majority of electoral votes then selection of the president passed to the U.S. House of Representatives, selection of the vice president would be decided by the U.S. Senate. (READ MORE: The State of the President) 

Keeping in mind political parties are not a constitutional construct, the framers did not envision the difficulties that would arise from that process. While the election of George Washington as the nation’s first president and John Adams as the first vice president was virtually unanimous, competition intensified when Washington decided against seeking a third term.

In the election of 1796, the first post-George Washington contest, Vice President John Adams prevailed and was elected to the nation’s highest office. But the emergence of political parties resulted in an acrimonious contest that ended with Thomas Jefferson being elected vice president. Four years later Jefferson ousted Adams and ascended to the Presidency with Aaron Burr becoming his first vice president.

The Twelfth Amendment

During the early days of the Jefferson Administration the experience of having the nation’s two highest offices occupied by political rivals prompted Congress to reconsider the process. As a result the Twelfth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was proposed. It provided that electors would cast one vote for president and one vote for vice president. The U.S. House of Representatives would still decide the Presidency in the event no candidate received a majority of electoral votes; the U.S. Senate would decide the vice presidency. The Twelfth Amendment was ratified by the requisite three-fourths of the state legislatures on June 14, 1804 putting into place the process we use today.

The lack of constitutional clarity relative to the role of the vice president again became an issue in 1841. After serving just 32 days in office, President William Henry Harrison became the first U.S. President to die while in office. Vice President John Tyler became president but only after some debate as to whether the Constitution proscribed automatic ascension. The issue was resolved and precedent was established that the vice president would immediately become president upon the death or resignation of the incumbent president.

A footnote to vice presidential history: the only vice president of the United States to be chosen by the U.S. Senate after no candidate had received a majority of electoral votes in the Electoral College was the nation’s ninth vice president, Richard Mentor Johnson. Johnson had served in both the House of Representatives and as a U.S. Senator from Kentucky and was vice president during the administration of Martin Van Buren.

Vice Presidential Vacancies

There were times in U.S. History when the office of the vice president became vacant. George Clinton served as vice president under two different presidents — Thomas Jefferson and James Madison — and died in 1812 as Madison prepared to seek a second term. Being vice president under Madison was hazardous duty as his second vice president, Elbridge Gerry, died in November of 1814 leaving the nation without a vice president for over two years.

Vice President John C. Calhoun became the first of two vice presidents to resign from office. He did so after a wide political rift developed between him and President Andrew Jackson. Spiro T. Agnew resigned as vice president in 1973 after pleading no contest to a felony tax evasion charge.

Franklin Pierce, Ulysses S. Grant, Grover Cleveland, William McKinley, and William Howard Taft all had a vice president die while in office. Eventually, in 1965 the Twenty-Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified. It finally clarified the succession issue — the vice president becomes president upon the death or resignation of the president. And it provided a mechanism for filling a vacancy in the office of vice president between national elections. The amendment empowers the president to nominate a vice president who then takes office upon confirmation by a majority of votes in both houses of Congress.

The amendment came into play upon Agnew’s resignation when President Richard M. Nixon nominated U.S. Representative Gerald R. Ford of Michigan to be vice president. Ford was quickly confirmed. Nixon himself was forced to resign in the wake of the Watergate scandal in August of 1974 resulting in Ford becoming the first and only person to serve as President of the United States without having first been elected either president or vice president. 

Upon becoming president, Ford appointed Nelson Rockefeller to serve as vice president. Rockefeller was confirmed and served as vice president for the remainder of Ford’s term in office. Ford ran for election to a full term in 1976 having chosen U.S. Senator Bob Dole rather than Rockefeller as his running mate. The duo subsequently lost to Jimmy Carter and Walter Mondale.

Accidental Presidents

Eight U.S. presidents have died while in office, four of whom were assassinated and four who died of natural causes. Harrison was the first to die of natural causes having taken ill shortly after delivering a long-winded inaugural address on a cold March day. Zachary Taylor, Warren Harding, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt each died of natural caucuses. Abraham Lincoln became the first president to die at the hands of an assassin; a fate which also befell James A. Garfield, William McKinley, and John F. Kennedy.

The performance of the vice presidents who followed the eight presidents to die while in office has been decidedly mixed. Tyler alienated his own party leaving him out of contention for a full term in his own right. He eventually sided with the Confederacy during the Civil War. Millard Fillmore, who had an otherwise distinguished career proved to be an unremarkable president. A Whig, he was the last president not associated with either the Republican or Democratic Party.

Lincoln’s second vice president, Andrew Johnson, became the first president to be impeached; he avoided conviction and removal from office when the effort fell one vote short of the two-thirds majority needed. When President James A. Garfield was shot by a disappointed office seeker and months later succumbed to his wounds, Chester A. Arthur became president. Arthur had been added to the Republican ticket to appease powerful New York political interests. Ill and after a somewhat unremarkable presidency, Arthur did not seek election in his own right and died shortly after leaving office.

On September 6, 1901 President William McKinley was shot by a crazed ideologue while at the Pan American Exposition in Buffalo, New York. He was succeeded in office by Vice President Theodore Roosevelt. Like Arthur, Roosevelt was placed in the vice presidency in a New York political deal. Unlike Arthur, however, Roosevelt became one of the nation’s most impactful presidents and in 1904 secured election to the office in his own right.

The next vice president to ascend to the presidency upon death of the president was Calvin Coolidge. The mild mannered Coolidge, referred to at the time as “silent Cal” took office when President Warren G. Harding died of a likely heart attack. Harding’s presidency was overshadowed by the Tea Pot Dome scandal which touched upon members of his administration but not on him personally. Like Theodore Roosevelt, Coolidge ran and won a full term as president. (READ MORE: Presidents’ Day and Problematic Presidential Rankings)

Franklin Delano Roosevelt is considered by many historians to be one of the nation’s most influential presidents. He has the distinction of being the only president to have been elected to four terms in office. His first vice president was the aforesaid mentioned John Nance Garner who found little oxygen of his own serving under the charismatic Roosevelt. Garner was replaced in the vice presidency by Henry A. Wallace who served during Roosevelt’s second and third terms. When he ran the fourth time Roosevelt placed Harry S. Truman on the ticket. On April 12, 1945, just days into his fourth term, Roosevelt died of a brain hemorrhage. Three years later, in 1948, Truman defeated Thomas E. Dewey election to win a full term in office.

The nation was stunned once again on November 22, 1963 when bullets fired by Lee Harvey Oswald struck President John F. Kennedy, who was riding in an open car through Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas. Lyndon Baines Johnson became president, won a landslide election in 1964 only to become bogged down in the war in Vietnam. He abruptly withdrew from the 1968 presidential election.

Vice Presidents Who Were Elected President

In addition to the vice presidents who became president due to the death or assignation of the president, four sitting vice presidents have been elected to the presidency: John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Martin Van Buren, and George H.W. Bush. Richard M. Nixon lost as a sitting vice president in 1960, but was elected president in 1968. Joseph Biden served as vice president in the Barack Obama Administration and then was elected president four years later.

The vice presidency has seldom been a pathway to the Oval Office. Kamala Harris is the nation’s 49th vice president. Only six of her predecessors have been elected to the presidency in their own right. Despite that, holding the office is currently viewed as an asset for those who aspire to the nation’s top job.

Pathways to the Vice Presidential Nomination

The mixed performance of the vice presidents who have become president through the death or resignation of the incumbent president has placed a brighter spotlight on the office. Thus, when selecting a running mate presidential nominees at least give lip service to a candidate’s ability to step in at a moment’s notice and serve as president.

Political considerations have often played a greater role in the selection process. During the era of American politics where nomination conventions actually selected presidential and vice presidential candidates the vice presidency was frequently a prized bargaining chip. As referenced, Millard Fillmore, Chester A. Arthur, and Theodore Roosevelt were the result of political deals. 

The bargaining chip has not always worked. In 1976 Ronald Reagan announced the selection of Richard Schweiker, a U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania as his running mate weeks before the Republican National Convention in an effort to woo Keystone state delegates. The effort fell short and the convention went on to nominate incumbent President Gerald R. Ford. 

Geographic and political considerations have also loomed large in the process of ticket building. In an effort to bind the nation together in the midst of the Civil War, the Republican National Convention of 1864 nominated Andrew Johnson of Tennessee as Abraham Lincoln’s second running mate. Notably, Johnson was also a Democrat in what was an effort not only for unity but to shore up Lincoln’s re-election chances.

The nomination for vice president has also been used to bind the party together after a contentious presidential nomination fight. In the modern era, John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson competed for the 1960 Democratic Presidential nomination. After some acrimony Kennedy prevailed, but then offered Johnson the second spot on his ticket to unify the party. Johnson, then a U.S. Senator from Texas, also brought geographic balance to the ticket headed by Kennedy who was serving as a U.S. Senator representing Massachusetts.

During the same era Republicans were having their own internal issues with the GOP having been split between more moderate so-called “Rockefeller Republicans” and an ascendant conservative “Goldwater” wing initially spearheaded by U.S. Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona, who became the Republican nominee in 1964 only to lose a landslide election to Lyndon Johnson.

In 1980, former California Governor Ronald Reagan had become the conservatives’ leading light and engaged in a spirited primary with George H.W. Bush and several other candidates. Reagan prevailed and bound the party together by selecting the more moderate Bush as his running mate. Interestingly, Reagan chose Bush only after considering a novel co-presidency offer to former President Gerald R. Ford. 

More recently identity politics have played a role in vice presidential selection. In 1984, former Vice President Walter Mondale was nominated by Democrats to challenge incumbent President Ronald Reagan. Mondale broke new vice presidential ground by selecting Geraldine A. Ferraro, then a U.S. Representative from New York as his running mate. She became the first woman to be nominated on a major party ticket. The effort resulted in a landslide loss to Reagan.

In 2008, the presidential nomination in hand, U.S. Senator John McCain of Arizona surprised the political world by picking then little known Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate, making her the first and so far only female to be nominated for vice president by the Republican Party. The duo lost to Barack Obama in the General Election.

In 2020, Kamala Harris, a U.S. Senator from California was tabbed by Joe Biden to be his vice presidential running mate. Following a controversial election Biden and Harris took office making her the first female, and the first person of color, to be elected to the vice presidency.

Vice Presidency in the Spotlight

Aside from the death of a president or the casting of a high profile tie-breaking vote in the U.S. Senate, the vice presidency occupies the spotlight when a party’s presidential nominee is in the process of selecting his or her running mate. This year, with both parties poised to nominate men of advanced age, the selection of the vice presidential nominee looms even larger.

The Democratic ticket is set with President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris seeking election to a second term. Donald Trump has parted ways with his first vice president, Mike Pence, so speculation has been building as to whom he will select to be nominated with him at next month’s Republican National Convention.

As has become customary a rather long list of potential candidates is being circulated. Presidential nominees tend to keep the short list close to their vest, and Donald Trump is especially known for calling his own shots. 

The many factors that have come to influence such decisions are all at play. Will Trump follow the lead of Lyndon Johnson and Ronald Reagan and attempt to bind up the GOP’s internal ideological divisions by picking former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley? Will he attempt to appeal to a significant minority group by selecting a person of color like U.S. Senator Tim Scott or Dr. Ben Carson? Perhaps U.S. Senator Marco Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants? Or will he give the GOP its second female nominee with South Dakota Governor Christi Noem? He could stick with an ideological apostle in Ohio U.S. Senator J.D. Vance. Or he could set aside geographical, ideological, and identity considerations and select North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum, a safe competent choice.

Safe and competent can be important because vice presidential nominees hurt rather than help a ticket. Such was the case in 1972 when the Democratic Party nominee, George McGovern, picked U.S. Senator Thomas Eagleton of Missouri as his running mate. The hapless McGovern campaign had failed to conduct a comprehensive background check and it came to light that Eagleton had been hospitalized several times for treatment of depression. Eagleton was forced to resign the nomination and was replaced by Sargent Shriver, a brother-in-law of the late President John F. Kennedy. The result was a landslide loss to Richard M. Nixon.

Trump’s decision will matter more this year than usual. Regardless of the outcome of the November election neither Donald Trump nor Joe Biden will be a candidate in 2028. And while the vice presidency has only rarely been a successful launching pad to the presidency, this year’s nominees will have a head start on the 2028 presidential nominating process.

And, well, as we have learned from history, whoever is elected is always just a heartbeat away.

Lowman S. Henry is Chairman & CEO of the Lincoln Institute and host of the weekly American Radio Journal and Lincoln Radio Journal. His e-mail address is lhenry@lincolninstitute.org.

The post A Glimpse at the History of the Vice Presidency appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.