Because it was already precluded by Amendment XII.
Amendment XX makes Clinton constitutionally ineligible for the presidency, and therefore he is ineligible for the vice-presidency under Amendment XII.
Not only is there no point – it wouldn’t be legal. To be elected vice president, you must legally be qualified to be elected president, which Bill Clinton is not.
Gah, that’s what happens when I forget to hit send before going to lunch, and doing it right when I get back!
:smack:
I stand corrected. Thank you, Spoiler and Spectrum. Rather disappointing, in the sense that it makes life in FLACOD (thanks, Bricker!) world a little less interesting. Oh well…
Except that the flaming toilet scenario, unlikely as the possibility might be, is an event entirely based in the future. The international adoption scenario would have to be based on events which occured sixty years ago but where somehow never known until now.
As long as we’re on the subject, I’ve always wondered what would happen if a president elect cacked it before the inauguration. Would the veep elect automatically be sworn in instead or would something else happen?
And wht if BOTH the prez elect AND the vep elect cacked it before inauguration day? Would the party get to appoint a replacement? is there any contingincy plan in the law for a cacked prez elect?
This question does, in fact, have a factual answer and it has nothing to do with the Constitution.
In 1972, Thomas Eagleton was nominated for VP by the Democrats, then resigned before the election. The Democratic National Committee (not convention delegates, their role was finished after the convention) met in a special session and nominated Sargent Shriver to replace Eagleton on the ticket.
Time magazine ran a relatively famous cover of McGovern and Eagleton together at the convention, with Eagleton’s head cut out and Shriver’s crudely pasted in its place.
The role of the National Committees is forgotten by the public (particularly since the 1972 McGovern-Shriver ticket was buried in the Nixon landslide) but beloved by writers of political fiction. It’s the best “smoke-filled room” scenario left in American politics.
Good heavens, I’d forgotten that! Thanks for the reminder, kunilou!
You mean Amendment 22, don’t you? The 20th Amendment, which deals with questions of what happens when the President-Elect or Veep-Elect dies or “fail[s] to qualify” (whatever that means; maybe it would cover the international-adoption scenario) between the election and the inauguration, could somehow interact with this mess, I suppose, but we start with the 22nd and 12th Amendments.
At any rate, the 22nd Amendment makes Clinton constitutionally ineligible to be elected to the Presidency a third time. It doesn’t speak to the question of whether he could, as Vice-President, succeed to the Presidency upon the death, resignation, or impeachment and removal of the President.
IANAL, but my understanding would be that the absence of any such language legally implies eligibility to succeed in such a fashion.
So then we go to the concluding sentence of the 12th Amendment: “But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.”
Since the 22nd Amendment doesn’t say Clinton’s ineligible to the office of President, but just says he’s ineligible to be elected to that office, it seems that the 12th Amendment doesn’t disqualify Clinton from being veep.
Anything I’m missing, here?
In answer to Dio’s question, the 20th Amendment specifies that “*f, at the time fixed for the beginning of the term of the President, the President-elect shall have died, the Vice-President-elect shall become President.”
Can’t tell the amendments without a scorecard!
We went through a lot of this when people started wondering if Bill could be Kerry’s Vice President. Clinton’s take is that “a reasonable interpretation of the amendment” would bar him from being VP (might not be an exact quote, but close).
If Prince Charles were hit by a Flaming Toilet from the Sky it would be known as a Royal Flush.
I rose off a sick bed to bring you that horrid joke.
I think Dick Cheney missed that memo.
[MPSIMS Moment]
Oh. My. God. We made thread-spotting! Entirely Bricker’s doing because of his lovely acronym, but I’ll settle for that!
Me, little AvhHines! Woo Hoo!
[/MPSIMS Moment]
We now return you to your regularly scheduled debate.
is the flacod made in the usa or canada? sometimes the flacods that are made in the usa don’t get the job done on the first go.
Continuing the theme of FLACODs… 
Suppose the election is over and Kerry has won. It’s the night before (alternate: after) the Inauguration, and as the Earth rotates, it runs into a stream of FLACODs, devastating the entire northern US, from New York to Washington right across the US. Pretty shitty, huh? But everyone of import - Bush and his team, Kerry and his team, the party bigwigs, senators, Pentagon, ex-Presidents, etc - are all gone. Who takes over?
We now have the post-Apocalyptic scenario beloved of sci-fi authors. While Niven and Pournelle’s Lucifer’s Hammer is somewhat outdated in some ways, I think it still makes some valid predictions with respect to this situation, even if the problem there was a comet rather than a stream of FLACODs.
Many people would die, not only in the intial FLACOD strike, but in the subsequent breakdown of infrastructure resulting. There would be a rapid and rather nasty breakdown in law and order, particularly among people who (with some degree of justification) had felt that laws and law enforcement existed to keep them locked into poverty and misery. The cities would, IMHO, within a week or two look like Iraq a few weeks after the invasion was “accomplished” - looting and rampant crime. Industry and agriculture might continue, but would not achieve much because shipping would be dead in its tracks.
Eventually strongholds would evolve, based around a person or group able to provide protection and some basic living needs. Depending on the motivations and relative strengths of the strongholds, we would either plunge into a feudal neo-barbarism or gradually re-establish a civilization as we know it.
Unless you mean that the FLACODS would take out only those who were in the legally established line of succession for President and former Presidents. In that case, I don’t have a clue!
I think I’ve read that in such an unlikely scenario, the Governors of the several states would be in line for succession in order of their admittance to the Union.
Does Arkansas count from 1836 or 1868?
Well, we have now answered the question factually, and also there have been suppositions. My guess is that if Edwards didn’t get it- a non-runner would get it. That’s the way the “smoke-filled rooms” usually perform.
And, yes, the Constitution is unclear, but the current SCOTUS would rule against Bill. No doubt of THAT, In my mind anyway. :mad: