# Mental illness of a sitting US President **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 24, 2012, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mental-illness-of-a-sitting-us-president/619799 "2012-04-24T12:28:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Springtime\_for\_Spacers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Springtime\_for\_Spacers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Springtime_for_Spacers)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mental-illness-of-a-sitting-us-president/619799/21 "2012-04-25T01:15:21Z")
I’m speculating to myself about the role of a President’s family, they might be the first to notice mental deterioration so they could alert the VP or the President’s doctors but there would have to be checks to be sure they weren’t mistaken, malicious or mad themselves. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mental-illness-of-a-sitting-us-president/619799/22 "2012-04-25T02:15:33Z")
> [@Labdad](#): > > The intertesting thing about _Night of Camp David_ was that it was written in 1965, and the 25th Amendment was ratified in 1967. At the time Knebel wrote _Camp David_ there was no procedure for dealing with an incapacitated President! It’s not really a coincidence. While the 25th Amendment wasn’t enacted by the states until 1967, it had been passed by the Senate in 1965. So Knebel was aware of the proposal (and probably inspired by it) when he wrote his novel. ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mental-illness-of-a-sitting-us-president/619799/23 "2012-04-25T03:00:25Z")
The President cannot unilaterly order a first nuclear strike, the Secretary of Defence must countersign the order (jointly they form the National Command Authority). Of course the President can simply keep dismissing DoD officials as the next highest ranking officer automatically becomes Acting SecDef and he finds someone who’ll agree with him. :smack: > [@Jim\_s\_Son](#): > > …William Safire once wrote a novel about a President where the 25th amendment hqd to be used and along the way pointed out some problems the amendment didn’t answer. One major problem with the 25th amendment is that it’s silent on what were to happen if the President & Vice-President were to both become incapacited at the same time, or if the President did while the VP’s office was vacant. What happens then? Does the VP’s role just go to the next-in-line (House Speaker), or can the amendment simply not be invoked without a sitting VP? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mental-illness-of-a-sitting-us-president/619799/24 "2012-04-25T03:03:51Z")
Heck, it’s easy to imagine a scenario where Oswald’s aim was slightly off and JFK gets shot in the head but is _not_ instantly killed - merely left in a permanent vegetative state. I presume this possibility was not considered far-fetched to the people who drafted the 25th. For fictional treatments, there’s also the novel _The President’s Plane is Missing_, where Air Force One crashes in a storm and President Haines’s body cannot be found. Vice-President Madigan, an otherwise sharply mediocre man, sees a chance at glory and wants to be declared Acting President so he can resolve a growing crisis with China by, well… nuking them. Oddly, for all the reserch author Robert Serling must have done, he seemed to think there was an actual button in the Oval Office the President (or Acting President) could press to start Armegeddon. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mental-illness-of-a-sitting-us-president/619799/25 "2012-04-25T03:07:36Z")
> [@alphaboi867](#): > > The President cannot unilaterly order a first nuclear strike, the Secretary of Defence must countersign the order (jointly they form the National Command Authority). Of course the President can simply keep dismissing DoD officials as the next highest ranking officer automatically becomes Acting SecDef and he finds someone who’ll agree with him. I remember this issue was discussed once in a previous thread and there was a question if an acting Secretary of Defense had the authority to approve a nuclear launch or if it had to be a Secretary of Defense who had been approved in that title by the Senate. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 3:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mental-illness-of-a-sitting-us-president/619799/26 "2012-04-25T03:13:18Z")
Huh… while looking up other tidbits, I found the wiki article on the Presidential state car (the heavily-modified and reinforced limousine used by the president) and it includes a picture of Obama and Biden riding inside the same vehicle during a motorcade, which I thought was something specifically prohibited by law, i.e. the Prez and Veep travelling in the same conveyance. ---
**Author:** ![Donnerwetter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b2d939/32.png) [@Donnerwetter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Donnerwetter)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 10:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mental-illness-of-a-sitting-us-president/619799/27 "2012-04-25T10:12:11Z")
> [@Sarabellum1976](#): > > Weren’t there some rumblings about this sort of thing for the final year or two or Reagan’s presidency when the Alzheimer’s rumors were starting? In the Wikipedia article about the 25th amendment, there is a passage about Reagan’s alleged incapacity in 1987: > [@](#): > > Upon assuming the role of White House Chief of Staff in 1987, Howard Baker was advised by his predecessor’s staff to be prepared for a possible invocation of the Twenty-fifth Amendment due to Reagan’s perceived laziness and ineptitude. > According to the PBS program American Experience, > “What Baker’s transition team was told by Donald Regan’s staff that weekend shocked them. Reagan was ‘inattentive, inept,’ and ‘lazy,’ and Baker should be prepared to invoke the 25th Amendment to relieve him of his duties.” > Reagan biographer Edmund Morris stated in an interview aired on the program, > “The incoming Baker people all decided to have a meeting with him on Monday, their first official meeting with the President, and to cluster around the table in the Cabinet room and watch him very, very closely to see how he behaved, to see if he was indeed losing his mental grip.” > Morris went on to explain, > “…Reagan who was, of course, completely unaware that they were launching a death watch on him, came in stimulated by the press of all these new people and performed splendidly. At the end of the meeting, they figuratively threw up their hands realizing he was in perfect command of himself.”[22] ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 11:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mental-illness-of-a-sitting-us-president/619799/28 "2012-04-25T11:54:02Z")
A relevant GQ thread of mine: [Two Related Questions about Insane Presidents](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=441881) ---
**Author:** ![bouv](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bc8723/32.png) [@bouv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bouv)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mental-illness-of-a-sitting-us-president/619799/29 "2012-04-25T16:04:12Z")
> [@KneadToKnow](#): > > Not at all. Just seasons 4 and 6. 🙂 And 2. Palmer wouldn’t authorize a “retaliatory” strike against the nations suspected of planning the nuclear attack on the US, so he’s removed from office by his cabinet…I guess because wanting to wait for all the facts to come in is a sign of mental illness? 😕 ---
**Author:** ![Donnerwetter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b2d939/32.png) [@Donnerwetter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Donnerwetter)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mental-illness-of-a-sitting-us-president/619799/30 "2012-04-25T17:09:39Z")
A related question would be: What happens if the President on one occasion consumes way too much alcohol and ends up being completely drunk? Basically, a President, in every minute during his 4 year tenure, has to be able to make important decisions in a moments notice, being woken up in the middle of the night if necessary. In 2002, President George W. Bush underwent a colonoscopy. He decided to invoke section 3 of the 25th amendment and thus making Dick Cheney the acting President. The medical procedure itself took only 20 minutes, and GWB re-assumed his duties a little over 2 hours later. What if a President drank a whole bottle of Whiskey and then is confronted with a devastating national security issue in the magnitude of 9/11? ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mental-illness-of-a-sitting-us-president/619799/31 "2012-04-25T20:45:39Z")
> [@Donnerwetter](#): > > …What if a President drank a whole bottle of Whiskey and then is confronted with a devastating national security issue in the magnitude of 9/11? A Staff Report that may be of interest, written by this guy I know: [Is the Secret Service responsible for keeping the president from getting drunk? - The Straight Dope](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2910/is-the-secret-service-responsible-for-keeping-the-president-from-getting-drunk) ---
**Author:** ![Donnerwetter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b2d939/32.png) [@Donnerwetter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Donnerwetter)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mental-illness-of-a-sitting-us-president/619799/32 "2012-04-25T21:05:17Z")
> [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](#): > > A Staff Report that may be of interest, written by this guy I know: [Is the Secret Service responsible for keeping the president from getting drunk? - The Straight Dope](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2910/is-the-secret-service-responsible-for-keeping-the-president-from-getting-drunk) Wow. One would imagine that the President and commander-in-chief would refrain from drinking at least during a major international crisis. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2012, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mental-illness-of-a-sitting-us-president/619799/33 "2012-04-26T20:15:37Z")
> [@Donnerwetter](#): > > Wow. One would imagine that the President and commander-in-chief would refrain from drinking at least during a major international crisis. One would imagine that, but then, perhaps, one would not understand Nixon. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mental-illness-of-a-sitting-us-president/619799.md?page=1)