First. If a President goes insane; I mean seriously needs-to-be-institutionalized insane, is there any procedure or person that can declare them unfit for duty so the hopefully sane VP can take over, short of impeachment ?
And second, if such an insane President were to order a nuclear launch for no rational reason, like say ordering London to be nuked “because that’s where the Martians are hiding”, does that order need some sort of second opinion or confirmation? Or do we just have to hope that a subordinate thinks it’s a criminal order ?
As to your first question, Section 4 of the 25th Amendment to the US Constitution provides:
Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.
Thereafter, when the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives has written declaration that no inability exists, he shall resume the powers and duties of his office unless the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive department or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit within four days to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office. Thereupon Congress shall decide the issue, assembling within forty-eight hours for that purpose if not in session. If the Congress, within twenty-one days after receipt of the latter written declaration, or, if Congress is not in session, within twenty-one days after Congress is required to assemble, determines by two-thirds vote of both Houses that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall continue to discharge the same as Acting President; otherwise, the President shall resume the powers and duties of his office.
Any use of nuclear weapons requires the consent of the National Command Authority which consists of the President plus the Secretary of Defense (or their successors in the case of a catastrophe.) When it comes to nuclear weapons, all stages of the chain of command have similar redundancies that require at least two people to consent.
Of course, the Secretary of Defense works for the President, and the President could, conceivably, fire the SecDef keep firing his way down the Department of Defense line of succession, Saturday Night Massacre-style, until he found someone willing to be Acting Secretary of Defense and push the button – but that might take a little while.
Good question: suppose the President is at a retreat somewhere and has a stroke or siezure or something overnight which makes her somewhat delusional, who can stop her?
Reading the 25th Amendment, it provides for the removal of the President by the Vice president and the Cabinet. With no Vice President it falls on the Cabinet to do so.
In a nuclear scenario, the military advises the President (and his advisers) that there is an attack underway. Barring that, a unilateral attack will almost certainly be seen as an irrational act by the members of the Cabinet and that will trigger the provisions of the 25th Amendment, in which case the Speaker of the House becomes the Acting President (without a VP he/she is next in the line of succession).
That’s how it is supposed to work. I have little doubt that it will work effectively if needs be.
Incidentally, “who can stop her”? That’s a tad presumptuous, wouldn’t you say? :dubious:
Suppose they are not available? Can Joe Random Soldier (who is, even if a private, however tenuously, in the chain of command), being the senior other officer, relieve the President of his duties? Note that I am seperating relieving of duties and assumption of office.
No soldiers in the U.S. are ever in the chain of command. The civilian world and the military worlds are entirely separate, even if the President is also commander-in-chief.
I think in a real world situation like this, the first person involved would consider this an illegal order, and relieve the President of his command and order his arrest.
The soldiers around him, having brains of their own, would comply.
The analogy to the Nixon Saturday Night Massacre is not a good one, as it was a political matter where you can find a partisan hack somewhere down the line.
In this situation we are talking about using nuclear weapons against our best ally in the world. Nobody in his right mind, and if the President were off his gourd, we exclude him, would comply with his order.
And since nobody must obey and illegal order, they would (obviously) be vindicated in the aftermath…
It says “and”, not “or”. Though I suspect that if this situtation ever did come up the Speaker and Cabinet would do just as you suggest and let Congress and the Supreme Court sort everything out later.
It would also take Senate approval. An “Acting” Secretary of Defense wouldn’t have National Command Authority. I believe there’s a list of positions that can assume NCA duties if the people above them are dead or missing but I doubt it goes too far down the ranks. If the President went crazy and tried to nuke Canada, I’m sure he’d exhaust the list before he found somebody who was willing to agree with him.
There was an excellent Frontline series on modern presidents, each episode dealt with one president. The episode on Reagan revealed that during his second term, the cabinet convened to assess Reagan’s mental ability to remain president per the 25th amendment and (obviously) found him competent.
Sorry, I missed the windo for edits, but I wanted to issue a correction:
The series on the presidents cited above was “The American Experience,” not “Frontline.” We regret the error.
The President doesn’t need Senate approval to fire someone. The next highest ranking DoD official automatically becomes the Acting Secretary without the Senate being involved. An Acting SecDef would most certainly have National Command Authority, otherwise how could the President launch a nuclear attack if the SecDef suddenly died or was killed?
I agree that the President doesn’t need Senate approval to fire a cabinet official. After that, we’re in disagreement. The next guy in line may become the acting secretary but he or she does not automatically assume all the authority of the office. There’s probably about thirty or forty people who have NCA status. So at least one or two of them should be available to co-authorize any legitimate Presidential order. But if the President goes crazy and decides to nuke London and fires the top fifty people in the Defense Department because they don’t agree with his plan, then the Assistant Manager of the Office of Finance and Accounting will not be on the NCA list and will not have the authority to co-sign the launch orders even if he agrees with them even if he’s the senior remaining official in the Department.
It’s like the Presidential line of succession. There are currently thirteen people in line to succeed to the Presidency if George Bush and the other people ahead of them were to die tomorrow. Two cabinet officials are ineligible because they were born in another country and three cabinet officials are ineligible because they are serving in an acting capacity.
Years ago I was in Washington on business, and caught up with an old friend who had recently become engaged to a someone senior in the military. It was during Reagan’s presidency (yes, I’m that old) and over a quiet beer in a Baltimore pub I casually asked the question what would happen should the President burst a blood vessel and start to act irrationally or, well clearly mad. The answer came back very straightforwardly that it would be “dealt with” and the President would the next day be found to have died quietly in his sleep. While I have no idea now of the credentials of my friend’s fiance, I had no reason to doubt him…
During the Watergate investigations, Nixon remarked to some Congressmen, “I can go into my office, pick up the phone and in twenty-five minutes 70 million people will be dead”. This remark sparked a Congressional investigation into the mechanism of command and control. (‘First Use of Nuclear Weapons: Preserving Responsible Control’; Hearings before the Subcommittee on International Security and Scientific Affairs of the Committee on International Relations, House of Representatives, 94th Congress, 2nd Session, March 1976).
Secretary of Defense Schlesinger quietly told his staff to hold any ‘unusual’ orders from the White House until he had examined them.
Can anyone else invoke the 25th beside the President or Vice-President?