During the Nineteenth Century five incumbent presidents, with one full term or less of service, who presumably would have accepted renomination and reelection, were not nominated by either party. Four of them were vice presidents who succeeded and were serving out their first term. Two were of ambiguous party affiliation.
1844–John Tyler, former VP, ambiguous affiliation. Tyler was a longtime Democrat who had been nominated as VP by the Whigs in 1840 and wasn’t popular with either party. No organized movement for his renomination developed in either party in 1844. He toyed with forming his own party to promote the annexation of Texas but withdrew when the annexationist Polk was nominated by the Democrats.
1852–Millard Fillmore, former VP, Whig. Fillmore was too pro-slavery for the North and lost the Whig nomination to Winfield Scott.
1856–Franklin Pierce, Democrat. Pierce also was too pro-slavery for the North and lost the Dem nomination to James Buchanan (who turned out to be even more pro-slavery).
1868–Andrew Johnson, former VP, ambiguous affiliation. Johnson was a longtime Democrat nominated by the Republicans as VP in 1864. By 1868 Republicans hated him. Democrats liked him but regarded him as an ineffective politician, and he attracted only limited support for the 1868 Dem nomination.
1884–Chester Arthur, former VP, Republican. Arthur was in poor health in 1884, and had fallen out with party bosses over civil service reform, but he did allow his name to be offered as a candidate at the 1884 GOP convention. He lost the nomination to James G. Blaine.
That four of them were vice presidents is crucial. The vice presidency was considered a meaningless afterthought. Chester Arthur was certainly the least-experienced and probably the least-qualified person ever elected to the office. (Though he wasn’t all that bad a president.)
Once in office they were consider mere seat-warmers until the next election. There never was any realistic chance that they would be nominated and elected in their own right.
The attitude changed after Theodore Roosevelt assumed the presidency. Roosevelt, Coolidge, Truman, and Johnson all got renominated and elected. Three of the four won in landslides. That Truman won at all was testimony to the new 20th century attitude toward and power of being president. A Republican almost certainly would have won over a non-incumbent president.
Ford is the exception, but he was never elected VP in the first place and that changed the equation.
I think only one of them would have been ineligible. A state can’t give both its presidential and vice-presidential votes to people from the state, but it can give either of them to a person from the state.
This article was partially superseded by the Twelfth Amendment:
Neither says what would happen if the electors from a state chose to cast their ballots for two men from their state. There is no case law to say what would happen, either. Your supposition is reasonable, but then so is the supposition that all the votes from that state would be cast aside.
Since it has never been a serious issue (despite some fringe objections to Bush-Cheney as both “really” being from TX), we can’t say for sure what would happen to those electoral college votes.
You used the word “ineligible.” Once California casts its presidential votes for Reagan, then in this scenario, Ford is ineligible to receive California’s votes for vice president. Reagan is at no point “ineligible.” The situation you describe – California going ahead and voting for both of them – is a different situation, and I don’t think the word “ineligible” really describes what’s at issue.
Anyway, with this hanging over their heads, the California electors wouldn’t have cast their votes for Reagan as president and Ford as vice president. They would have cast their votes for Reagan as president and done something else with their vice presidential votes. It might be interesting as an intellectual exercise to see what would happen with the office of vice president, but it wouldn’t have prevented Reagan from winning the election.
(And, since being “from” a state isn’t defined in the constitution, anyway, Ford would have “moved” back to Michigan, thus avoiding any problem at all.)
Possibly, or possibly not. We don’t know, because the Constitution and case law are silent on what would happen if the electors selected two men from their own states. It just says they can’t do it, but there are no penalties or remedies.
Another interesting and plausible supposition, but we really don’t know. The House of Representatives is the only Constitutional judge of whether elector’s vote should count. Who knows what they might decide if the CA electors had named both Reagan and Ford?
My point is that your description of what would happen isn’t set in stone and has no more basis than bizerta’s.
As a middle-roader I object to being called “fringe.” IANAL, but Texan electors violated Article 2 in spirit if not in letter. Googleresults suggest Cheney was living in Texas, driving with a Texas license, and certainly was a Texas resident under Wyoming and federal law:
Kennedy’s disastrous campaign started with an interview with CBS newsman Roger Mudd. Initially the Carter campaign was upset Mudd was selected as he was considered close to the Kennedy family. But when Kennedy proved to be unable to answer softball questions like “Why do you want to be President?”, it proved to be gold for Carter who had earlier publicly vowed to “beat his ass” (Kennedy’s response was he was glad the President stood behind him). The 1980 conventions were about the last I ever watched and at one point there was serious debate as to whether Carter and Kennedy would publicly shake hands (they did). In contrast, four years earlier Reagan gave an address endorsing Ford, living up to his 11th Commandment “Thou shall never speak ill of a fellow Republican”.
IANAL, but Texan electors violated Article 2 in spirit if not in letter.