Skip to main content

blog 3.2 25th amendment

1. Then the vice president would immediately become “Acting President,” and take over all the president’s powers.
2. One vice president and any eight Cabinet officers can, theoretically, decide to knock the president out of power at any time.
3. If the president wants to dispute this move, he can, but then it would be up to Congress to settle the matter with a vote. A two-thirds majority in both houses would be necessary to keep the vice president in charge. If that threshold isn’t reached, the president would regain his powers.
4. The chaos and instability that followed John F. Kennedy’s assassination finally spurred Congress to move toward solving these problems. For once, it moved quickly, passing what became the 25th Amendment to the Constitution in 1965 and winning its ratification in the states by 1967.
5. How to fill a vice presidential vacancy in the middle of a term (in practice, the answer was interpreted as “you can’t”).
6. The power to sideline the president for inability is given to the vice president and a “majority” of “the principal officers of the executive departments.” (President Reagan’s Justice Department interpreted this to mean the main Cabinet departments, which today number 15.) Theoretically, Congress can also create and empower some “other body” that could make this declaration, but so far it has not done so.
7. There’s zero precedent for this actually happening in US history, and the vast majority of Americans are likely unaware that it’s even possible. Even savvy political actors or entrenched institutional ones likely aren’t all that familiar with how the amendment is meant to work.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Blog 1: Why the ACLU defends white nationalists' right to protest - including in Charlottesville

1. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) advocates for the freedom of speech for everyone regardless of the "unsavory" topic. The ACLU believes that the First Amendment right to free speech must be a universal right. Although, the ACLU may not agree with the group and topic at hand; nonetheless, it supports their right to exercise freedom of speech. They argue that standing up for free speech in ALL cases is the necessary work for civil rights. Civil rights without the freedom of speech would be shut down completely by those in power. 2. The city of Charlottesville originally tried to revoke the protest permit of the rally organizers, Jason Kessler, and this presents a problem to the ACLU. The ACLU joined the defense team of Kessler arguing that this infringes on his right to free speech. 3.Liberals have supported the ACLU more this year since Trump took office because they vowed to hold the administration accountable in court. 4. The ACLU argues that the government mi...

blog 2.5 Lisa Murkowski

1. (R-AK) Murkowski and Susan Collins (R-ME) 2.  She told Roll Call she would consider voting for the bill if the Senate also passed a bipartisan Obamacare stabilization bill — then walked it back a few hours later. A few days later, she wrote an op-ed for a local newspaper declaring she supported repealing the individual mandate. But then her office said the same day that did not necessarily mean she would support the tax overhaul. 3.a provision that could allow oil drilling in the Arctic Wildlife Natural Refuge. 4. It has been a long-held dream of Alaska politicians for the revenue it would bring to the state. 5.Alaska, one of the states that did expand Medicaid under Obamacare, has seen its uninsured rate fall from 18.9 percent to 11.7 percent under the health care law. While Murkowski is still a Republican, and therefore still has problems with the law, she didn’t want to see those gains reversed. The Republican plans were projected to hit her state, which already has the h...

blog 2.6 Lobbying and tax reform

1.One part of the bill could cost the conglomerate more than $1 billion in new taxes if it becomes law. 2.GE lobbyists scrambled and won an alternative in the Senate’s version of the tax bill preserving the company’s ability to use those losses when calculating its tax liability 3.Foreign airlines including Emirates Airline of Dubai and Etihad Airways of Abu Dhabi are fighting to jettison a provision included in the Senate bill that would require foreign airlines to pay taxes on income earned on U.S. flights in some cases. Delta Air Lines Inc. is lobbying to keep the new tax in the final bill, arguing that it could raise $200 million over a decade. 5. Its centerpiece is a reduction in the corporate tax rate to 20% from 35%. It would also repeal the alternative minimum tax, lower estate taxes and cut some individual rates. It is estimated to cost about $1.4 trillion over the next decade. Republicans say some of the revenue loss would be recouped by higher government receipts fro...