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<blockquote data-quote="JSRG" data-source="post: 77534838" data-attributes="member: 418772"><p>The Twelfth Amendment of the Constitution says that the same requirements that apply to the President also apply to the Vice President ("But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.").</p><p></p><p>While this obviously includes the "normal" requirements for presidency (natural born citizen, required age, and so on), there is a notable difference in verbiage in the 22nd Amendment compared to the requirements for President later. Here's what the Constitution says are the requirements for President:</p><p></p><p>"No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be <strong>eligible</strong> to the Office of President; neither shall any person be <strong>eligible</strong> to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States."</p><p></p><p>This refers to eligibility. You can't be President if you don't fulfill the requirements. Note also the Fourteenth Amendment's Disqualification Clause, which has gotten much attention as of late:</p><p></p><p>"<strong>No person shall be</strong> a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or <strong>hold</strong> any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability."</p><p></p><p>While there has been some dispute as to whether the President counts as an office under the United States and/or an officer of the United States (there's a decent analysis of the question <a href="https://decivitate.substack.com/p/an-officer-and-a-gentleman-and-a" target="_blank">here</a>), in any event the phrasing here is a bit different, but again makes it clear that anyone who has run afoul of the rules here <em>cannot</em> be any of those things, and <em>cannot</em> hold any of those positions. The way someone could get that position is irrelevant; you simply can't have it.</p><p></p><p>Now let's look at the applicable portion of the 22nd Amendment:</p><p></p><p>"No person shall be <strong>elected</strong> to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be <strong>elected</strong> to the office of the President more than once."</p><p></p><p>Notice the difference. The previous ones ruled out any possibility of being in the office at all. But this very specifically says "elected". This therefore raises two questions.</p><p></p><p>The first is, does this mean someone can--even if they have served two terms already--become President without being elected? The way someone becomes President without being elected is if they're in the line of succession and everyone "above" them dies or leaves office. The "line of succession", for those unaware, is a list of positions for President who will become President if everyone prior is unavailable. The Vice President is obvious, but if both President <em>and</em> Vice President are unavailable (due to dying or leaving office), then the Speaker of the House does so. If the Speaker of the House also can't, then it falls to the President pro Tempore of the Senate, then the Secretary of State, then the Secretary of the Treasury, and then there's a lot of other positions until it concludes with the Secretary of Homeland Security (the order, if anyone is curious, is the order that those positions were created).</p><p></p><p>Obviously there is no constitutional question of whether Obama could be elected to the House of Representatives and become Speaker or be appointed as a Secretary--but suppose he was Speaker of the House and both the President and Vice President were to leave office (death, resignation, impeachment, and/or invocation of the 25th Amendment). Would he then become President? After all, it says he cannot be <em>elected</em> president, but doesn't specifically say he can't <em>be</em> president!</p><p></p><p>The second question is related to the first. Even if we accept that Obama could become President in the above manner if he was Speaker of the House or anywhere else down the line of succession, does that mean he could be <em>elected </em>Vice President? As noted, the 12th Amendment says no person constitutionally <em>ineligible</em> for the President is eligible to become Vice President. But as we have discussed, the it doesn't specifically say someone <em>cannot</em> be president after serving two terms, only that they cannot be <em>elected</em> president. Does this therefore mean that the Vice President cannot be <em>elected</em> Vice President either? Or, because the requirement is for eligibility and the requirement isn't specifically a ban on eligibility but rather a restriction on the normal way of becoming Vice President, does this therefore not prevent them from being elected Vice President? Additionally, even if he cannot be elected Vice President, would this mean he can be <em>appointed</em> as the Vice President, should the position become open?</p><p></p><p>As one can see, there's a number of questions here! And we don't have hard answers, because no court has weighed in on these because, well, they <em>can't</em> weigh in on them officially until any of this becomes an issue, and it won't happen until someone who has been President for two terms opts to run for Vice President, a new President tries to appoint the two-therm President as Vice President, or they hold any of the later positions in the line of succession only for everyone ahead of them to die or leave office. None of these are particularly likely to occur anytime soon. And when that happens, we can be sure the whole issue will go to court and the SCOTUS is going to have to figure it out.</p><p></p><p>If I had to make the decision--and let it be noted I am neither a lawyer nor anyone who has done much research on this issue--I would be inclined to believe that while a two-term President cannot be re-elected as President, they can become President again if it's through the line of succession, and could even be elected as Vice President. But again, I'm not an expert, and it won't be my opinion that decides anything.</p><p></p><p>tl;dr version: The answer is "maybe."</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="JSRG, post: 77534838, member: 418772"] The Twelfth Amendment of the Constitution says that the same requirements that apply to the President also apply to the Vice President ("But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States."). While this obviously includes the "normal" requirements for presidency (natural born citizen, required age, and so on), there is a notable difference in verbiage in the 22nd Amendment compared to the requirements for President later. Here's what the Constitution says are the requirements for President: "No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be [B]eligible[/B] to the Office of President; neither shall any person be [B]eligible[/B] to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States." This refers to eligibility. You can't be President if you don't fulfill the requirements. Note also the Fourteenth Amendment's Disqualification Clause, which has gotten much attention as of late: "[B]No person shall be[/B] a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or [B]hold[/B] any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability." While there has been some dispute as to whether the President counts as an office under the United States and/or an officer of the United States (there's a decent analysis of the question [URL='https://decivitate.substack.com/p/an-officer-and-a-gentleman-and-a']here[/URL]), in any event the phrasing here is a bit different, but again makes it clear that anyone who has run afoul of the rules here [I]cannot[/I] be any of those things, and [I]cannot[/I] hold any of those positions. The way someone could get that position is irrelevant; you simply can't have it. Now let's look at the applicable portion of the 22nd Amendment: "No person shall be [B]elected[/B] to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be [B]elected[/B] to the office of the President more than once." Notice the difference. The previous ones ruled out any possibility of being in the office at all. But this very specifically says "elected". This therefore raises two questions. The first is, does this mean someone can--even if they have served two terms already--become President without being elected? The way someone becomes President without being elected is if they're in the line of succession and everyone "above" them dies or leaves office. The "line of succession", for those unaware, is a list of positions for President who will become President if everyone prior is unavailable. The Vice President is obvious, but if both President [I]and[/I] Vice President are unavailable (due to dying or leaving office), then the Speaker of the House does so. If the Speaker of the House also can't, then it falls to the President pro Tempore of the Senate, then the Secretary of State, then the Secretary of the Treasury, and then there's a lot of other positions until it concludes with the Secretary of Homeland Security (the order, if anyone is curious, is the order that those positions were created). Obviously there is no constitutional question of whether Obama could be elected to the House of Representatives and become Speaker or be appointed as a Secretary--but suppose he was Speaker of the House and both the President and Vice President were to leave office (death, resignation, impeachment, and/or invocation of the 25th Amendment). Would he then become President? After all, it says he cannot be [I]elected[/I] president, but doesn't specifically say he can't [I]be[/I] president! The second question is related to the first. Even if we accept that Obama could become President in the above manner if he was Speaker of the House or anywhere else down the line of succession, does that mean he could be [I]elected [/I]Vice President? As noted, the 12th Amendment says no person constitutionally [I]ineligible[/I] for the President is eligible to become Vice President. But as we have discussed, the it doesn't specifically say someone [I]cannot[/I] be president after serving two terms, only that they cannot be [I]elected[/I] president. Does this therefore mean that the Vice President cannot be [I]elected[/I] Vice President either? Or, because the requirement is for eligibility and the requirement isn't specifically a ban on eligibility but rather a restriction on the normal way of becoming Vice President, does this therefore not prevent them from being elected Vice President? Additionally, even if he cannot be elected Vice President, would this mean he can be [I]appointed[/I] as the Vice President, should the position become open? As one can see, there's a number of questions here! And we don't have hard answers, because no court has weighed in on these because, well, they [I]can't[/I] weigh in on them officially until any of this becomes an issue, and it won't happen until someone who has been President for two terms opts to run for Vice President, a new President tries to appoint the two-therm President as Vice President, or they hold any of the later positions in the line of succession only for everyone ahead of them to die or leave office. None of these are particularly likely to occur anytime soon. And when that happens, we can be sure the whole issue will go to court and the SCOTUS is going to have to figure it out. If I had to make the decision--and let it be noted I am neither a lawyer nor anyone who has done much research on this issue--I would be inclined to believe that while a two-term President cannot be re-elected as President, they can become President again if it's through the line of succession, and could even be elected as Vice President. But again, I'm not an expert, and it won't be my opinion that decides anything. tl;dr version: The answer is "maybe." [/QUOTE]
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