Superior is a city in northwestern Wisconsin. At the 2010 census, the population was 27,244. Superior is at the western end of Lake Superior.
Superior was the last place that the "Edmund Fitzgerald" visited before it sank.
Twenty-fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Twenty-fifth Amendment (Amendment XXV) to the United States Constitution says that if the President becomes unable to do his job, the Vice President becomes the President (Section 1) or Acting President (Sections 3 or 4). This can happen for a short period of time, if the President is just sick or disabled for a short time. It could also happen until the end of the President's term (the President's time in office), if the President died, resigned, or is "unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office".
The Twenty-fifth Amendment also says what should happen if there is a "vacancy" in the Vice President's office (meaning there is no Vice President).
The Amendment was ratified by the states and became part of the U.S. Constitution on February 10, 1967.
of the Constitution says:
This means that if the President is fired, dies, resigns, or is unable "to discharge [his] Powers and Duties" (unable to do the things a President has to do), the Vice President will take over their job. The Vice President will do the President's job until they get better (if they are just sick or disabled), or until the next Presidential election (if the President resigned or is dead). If neither the President nor the Vice President can do the President's job, Congress can decide who takes over the President's job. This is all the Constitution says about this subject.
This clause was not very specific. It did not say:
In 1841, the ninth President, William Henry Harrison, became the first United States President to die in office. Before this, Representative John Williams had suggested that the Vice President should become Acting President if the President died. Also, after Harrison died, his Cabinet had met and decided that Vice President John Tyler would become "Vice-President Acting President." However, Tyler did not like this idea. He announced that he had become the President, and was not just doing the old President's job. He refused to look at any papers that were addressed to him as "Acting President."
Tyler took the Presidential Oath, moved into the White House, and took over all of the old President's powers. Nobody formally challenged Tyler's claim to the Presidency. Eventually, both Houses of Congress passed a resolution saying that Tyler was the tenth President of the United States. This created "the precedent of full succession." A precedent is a rule or law that might be followed in the future if a similar situation came up again. "Full succession" means that the Vice President would become the President, not Acting President, if the actual President died. The "precedent of full succession" became known as the "Tyler Precedent."
At other times, Presidents did not die, but they were unable to do their jobs because of illness. For example, during his Presidency, Woodrow Wilson had a stroke. However, the First Lady, Edith Wilson, and the official White House doctor kept the stroke a secret. Because of this, no one took over the Presidency, even though Wilson could not do the job at that time.
Before the 25th Amendment, the office of Vice President had been empty eighteen times because the Vice President died, resigned, or had to take over for the President. For example, there was no Vice President for nearly four years after Franklin D. Roosevelt died.
These problems made it clear that the government needed more specific rules.
On November 22, 1963, President John F. Kennedy was murdered. Kennedy's assassination made it very clear to Congress that they needed to figure out a solution about presidential succession right away. The United States was in the middle of the Cold War. The new President, Lyndon B. Johnson, had previously had a heart attack in 1955 along with a family history of Johnson men dying relatively young (in their early 60s, which he did in 1973 aged 64). The next two people in line for the presidency were the Speaker of the House of Representatives, John McCormack (who was 71 years old), and the President pro tempore of the Senate, Carl Hayden (who was 86 years old). Congress started moving more quickly.
Members of Congress suggested two different amendments to fill in the details missing from Clause 6.
The KeatingKefauver Proposal suggested allowing Congress to make a law about who should decide when a President is disabled. It was proposed in 1963 by Senator Kenneth Keating of New York, and supported by Tennessee Senator Estes Kefauver. However, other Senators were worried that Congress could abuse this power, or would not actually make the law after the amendment was passed.
The BayhCeller Proposal ended up becoming the Twenty-fifth Amendment. On January 6, 1965, Senator Birch Bayh proposed the amendment in the United States Senate, and Representative Emanuel Celler (Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee) proposed it in the United States House of Representatives. Unlike the KeatingKefauver Proposal, it suggested a way to fill the Vice President's position if it was empty, and also set out rules for how a President could be declared "disabled."
On February 19, 1965, the Senate passed the amendment. However, the House passed a different version of the amendment on April 13. The House and Senate had to form committees to figure out a version of the amendment they could all agree on. On July 6, 1965, both Houses of Congress passed the final version of the amendment and sent it to the states for ratification.
As with all Constitutional amendments proposed by the Congress, the Twenty-fifth Amendment had to be ratified by three-fourths of the states (38 of 50). Ratification was complete 19 months after the Amendment was proposed. Another nine states subsequently also ratified the Amendment; three states did not vote to ratify the Amendment.
The states ratified the Amendment in this order:
Section 1 made the "Tyler Precedent" a law. It says that if a President is removed from office, dies, or resigns, the Vice President immediately becomes President (not "Acting President").
Before the Twenty-fifth Amendment, if the Vice President's position was empty, it stayed empty until the next election.
Under Section 2, whenever there is a vacancy in the office of Vice President, the President nominates someone to replace the Vice President. If a majority of both Houses of Congress agree, that person becomes the Vice President.
Section 3 says that a President can declare themselves "unable to discharge the powers and duties of their office" (unable to do their job). He or she must say this in a written letter to both the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives. Once the President does this, the Vice President becomes Acting President. The President can take back the Presidency at any time by sending letters to the President pro tempore and the Speaker of the House, saying he or she is able to discharge the powers and duties of the Presidency again.
Section 4 is the only part of the Amendment that has never been used. It allows other executive officials to declare the President unable to do his job. The Vice President must agree to do this. So must:
To declare the President unable to do his job, these people would have to sign and give a letter to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House. As with Section 3, the Vice President would then become the Acting President.