Have any American presidents, upon leaving office, ever turned around and become a senator, congressman, governor, etc.? If not, is there any law which prevents this?
There’s no law restricting former presidents from running for other offices. William Howard Taft became (IIRC) Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court after he left the White House.
My guess as to why there haven’t been oodles of other ex-presidents running for public office is simply that most of them have been at an advanced age when they left the presidency.
Robin
Yes, some have. John Quincy Adams was elected to Congress after he was President, and Andrew Johnson became a senator. While you didn’t include the judiciary in your list, Taft became Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.
John Quincy Adams served, not merely as a Congressman, but as Speaker of the House.
Andrew Johnson served as U.S. Senator from Tennessee in 1875.
None of the others appear to have served in an elective office or major appointive office after being President.
John Quincy Adams did serve in the House after his presidency, but he never assumed the Speakership.
John Tyler served in the Confederate House of Representatives during the Civil War.
Taft: Chief Justice
JQ Adams: House (not Speaker)
John Tyler: Confederate Senate
Other ex-presidents have served in a number of ad-hoc positions of varying formality at the request of sitting presidents.
To be a nitpicker, John Tyler died before he could be sworn in for his seat in the Confederate HOUSE of Representatives.
To be even more nitpicky, John Tyler served in the provisional Confederate CONGRESS, a unicameral body elected by the state secession conventions (or in some cases, the state legislatures) which served until regular Congressional elections could be held in November 1861. As indicated, Tyler was elected to the First Confederate House of Representatives at that time, but died before he could serve.
This has nothing to do with anything, but I think it’s interesting: John Tyler and Woodrow Wilson were the only U.S. presidents to spend the Civil War behind Confederate lines. Tyler was an old man; Wilson a small child.
This also has nothing to do with anything, but I know John Tyler’s grandson and he’s a very nice guy. It never ceases to amaze me that he’s only a generation removed from someone who served as President of the United States in the 1840s.
Tyler’s sort of exceptional that way. He was born when Washington was President, re-married while President, and fathered several children after leaving office, when he was in his 50s. His youngest child was born when he was 70, and one of his children lived to meet Harry Truman.