Veepstakes '08

The buzz from Washington this week is about vice presidential candidates. Who will they be? When will they be chosen? And what effects will they have come November?

Naturally, we have our own "veepstakes" questions. What does the Constitution say about the vice president's job? How have former vice presidents (and others) described it? And why, given this, would anyone actually want to be VP? We'll answer the first two questions today. Tomorrow, we'll return to the third--and look back at the first VP to succeed.

What the Constitution Says

• "The Vice President of the United States shall be President of the Senate, but shall have no Vote, unless they be equally divided." – Article I, Section 3
• "After the Choice of the President, the Person having the greatest Number of Votes of the Electors shall be the Vice President." – Article II, Section 1
• "In Case of the Removal of the President from Office, or of his Death, Resignation, or Inability to discharge the Powers and Duties of the said Office, the Same shall devolve on the Vice President." – Article II, Section 1

What Constitutional Amendments Say

• "The Electors shall . . . name in their ballots the person voted for as President, and in distinct ballots the person voted for as Vice-President." - 12th Amendment, 1804
• "In case of the removal of the President from office or of his death or resignation, the Vice President shall become President." – 25th Amendment, 1967
• "Whenever the President transmits . . . his written declaration that he is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, and until he transmits . . . a written declaration to the contrary, such powers and duties shall be discharged by the Vice President as Acting President." - 25th Amendment, 1967

(This also applies if "the Vice President and a majority of . . . the principal officers of the executive departments" say the president is "unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office." If the president says it isn't so, "Congress shall decide the issue.")

What Vice Presidents (and Others) Say

• "My country has in its wisdom contrived for me the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived or his imagination conceived."
  - John Adams, vice president 1789-97
• "I do not propose to be buried until I am really dead."
  - Daniel Webster, U.S. senator 1827-41 and 1845-50, on not accepting a nomination for the vice presidency
• "This is a helluva job. I can do only two things here. One of them is to sit up here on this rostrum and listen to you birds talk without the ability to reply. The other is to look at the newspapers every morning to see how the president's health is."
  - Charles Gates Dawes, vice president 1925-29, to Senator Alben Barkley (vice president himself 1949-53)
• "The vice presidency isn't worth a pitcher of warm spit."
  - John Nance Garner, vice president 1933-41
  (and witnesses vow that "spit" was the press's euphemism for another warm liquid)
• "Look at all the vice presidents in history. Where are they? They were about as useful as a cow's fifth teat."
  - Harry Truman, vice president 1945