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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: ChinuSFO who wrote (20948)	6/14/2006 1:33:30 PM
From: TimF	Respond to of 541938

I'm not so sure it would work well now. It would basically cause the VP to be shut out of every government function except those granted to him by the constitution. (pretty much just operating as president of the senate, and being 1st in line to the presidency). I don't see how it would cause a reduction in partisanship and partisan tensions. Also it could result in the people voting overwhelmingly for one party, and than when the president dies or is unable to continue as president, they would have a new president from the currently less popular party. I might be able to accept the downsides if I thought it would have a great benefit, but I see almost no benefit. Also it would require a constitutional amendment for this new idea to go in to effect. ------ More detail about how it used to be done - "...Under the original terms of the Constitution, the members of the U.S. Electoral College voted only for office of President rather than for both President and Vice President. The person receiving the greatest number of votes (provided that such a number was a majority of electors) would be President, while the individual who was in second place became Vice President. If no one received a majority of votes, then the U.S. House of Representatives would choose between the four highest vote-getters, with each state getting one vote. In such a case, the person who received the highest number of votes but was not chosen President would become Vice President. If there was ever a tie for second, then the U.S. Senate would choose the Vice President. The original plan, however, did not forsee the development of political parties. In the election of 1796, for instance, Federalist John Adams came in first, and Democratic-Republican Thomas Jefferson came second. Thus, the President and Vice President were from different parties. An even greater problem occurred in the election of 1800, when Democratic-Republicans Jefferson and Aaron Burr tied the vote. While it was intended that Jefferson was the Presidential contender and Burr was the Vice Presidential one, the electors did not and could not differentiate between the two under the system of the time. After 35 unsuccessful votes in the U.S. House of Representatives, Thomas Jefferson finally won on the 36th ballot and Burr became Vice President. John Tyler, the first to assume the Presidency following the death of the President Enlarge John Tyler, the first to assume the Presidency following the death of the President The tumultuous affair led to the adoption of Amendment XII in 1804, which directed the electors to use separate ballots to vote for the President and Vice President. While this solved the problem at hand, it ultimately had the effect of lowering the prestige of the Vice Presidency, as the Vice President was no longer the second choice for President. The Constitution also prohibits electors from voting for both a Presidential and Vice Presidential candidate from the same state as themselves. In theory, this might deny a Vice Presidential candidate with the most electoral votes the absolute majority required to secure election, even if the Presidential candidate is elected, and place the Vice Presidential election in the hands of the Senate. In practice, this requirement is easily circumvented by having the candidate for Vice President change the state of residency as was done by Dick Cheney who changed his legal residency from Texas to Wyoming, his original homestate, in order to run for election as Vice President alongside George W. Bush..." en.wikipedia.org