Goldstein - The White House vice presidency: the path to significance, Mondale to Biden

The White House
Vice Presidency

The White House
Vice Presidency

The Path to Significance, Mondale to Biden

Joel K. Goldstein

u n i v e r s i t y p r e s s o f k a n s a s

2016 by Joel K. Goldstein

All rights reserved

Published by the University Press of Kansas (Lawrence, Kansas 6045 ), which was organized by the Kansas Board of Regents and is operated and funded by Emporia State University, Fort Hays State University, Kansas State University, Pittsburg State University, the University of Kansas, and Wichita State University

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Goldstein, Joel K. (Joel Kramer), 1953 author.

The White House vice presidency : the path to significance, Mondale to Biden / Joel K. Goldstein.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN -- 7006 - 2202 - (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN -- 7006 - 2203 - (ebook)

. Vice-PresidentsUnited StatesHistoryth century.. Vice-PresidentsUnited StatesHistoryst century.. United StatesPolitics and government 1977 1981 .. United StatesPolitics and government 1981 1989 .. United StatesPolitics and government 1989 . Vice-PresidentsUnited StatesBiography. I. Title.

E..G 2016

.' 90973 dc

2015035632

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data is available.

Printed in the United States of America

The paper used in this publication is recycled and contains percent postconsumer waste. It is acid free and meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials Z.- 1992 .

For Maxine, and for Rachel, Josh, and Jenna

contents

acknowledgments

With distractions and diversions, this book has been in the works for more than a dozen years. Hundreds of peopleloved ones, strangers, and many in betweenhave helped me along the way, and I am grateful to them for their time, kindness, and wisdom. I hope I have thanked them each personally because the limited space here constrains me to mention a few individually but most generically.

I have taught at Saint Louis University School of Law during the life of this project and appreciate its support and the encouragement from my deans and colleagues on the faculty and staff over the years. Stephanie Haley assisted with administrative matters and patiently helped type and retype much of the manuscript. I used materials at various archives listed in the bibliography and found that the archivists who assisted me to be among the most helpful people I have encountered. An ODonnell Grant from the Scowcroft Institute at the Bush School of Government and Public Service at Texas A & M University helped fund research at the George H. W. Bush Library.

More recently, the University Press of Kansas helped me get to the finish line. Kelly Chrisman Jacques, Jane Raese, and Connie Oehring improved the book through their project management and copyediting. My acquiring editor, Charles Myers, expressed early and enduring interest in the project; helped me define its shape and content; and patiently, skillfully, and thoughtfully worked through a range of issues with me.

Many have generously spoken to me about the vice presidency over the years and shared insights or information with me. Nigel Bowles, Roy Brownell II, Jeff Cohen, Josh Goldstein, Charles Myers, Michael Nelson, and Richard Pious read, and commented very helpfully, on all or part of the manuscript in earlier versions to my great benefit. Many others contributed by generously inviting me to speak or write about the topic or aspects of it in a range of settings, by raising questions for me, and by reacting to my thoughts and work. I am grateful for the education they provided and stimulated.

Some language in previously appeared in Joel K. Goldstein, Constitutional Change, Originalism, and the Vice Presidency, Uni versity of Pennsylvania Journal of Constitutional Law , no. (November 2013 ), ; I have drawn some ideas for this book from that article and from some of my other writings on the vice presidency and related topics, which are identified at pages of the selected bibliography.

I am fortunate in having friends and family members who, over meals, calls, and on vacations, generously indulged me with questions about vice presidents and vice-presidential wannabes when other topics might have had more appeal to them. My wife, Maxine, and our children, Rachel, Josh, and Jenna, were most patient, even visiting the Natick home of Henry Wilson (U. S. Grants second vice president) with me. They drew the line only once, to reject my suggestion that, since one of our rescue dogs came with the name Levi, we call the other Morton to honor Benjamin Harrisons vice president. Primo was a better name for him, they rightfully insisted.

I came away from the experience convinced of the potential for good in the vice presidency that Jimmy Carter and Walter Mondale created, and that many of their successors refined, and impressed by the capacity of our constitutional system to adapt to changing circumstances, especially when guided by enlightened leaders. I also came away deeply touched by the generosity of many people who selflessly helped me so much on a project important to me. I am grateful to many, but I alone am responsible for the books judgments and shortcomings.

The White House
Vice Presidency

Introduction

I am nothing but I may be everything, John Adams, the first vice president, wrote of his office. For most of American history, the nothing part of Adamss formulation captured the second office, at least so long as the presidents heartbeat maintained a normal rhythm. The Constitution prescribed only one ongoing duty for the vice president, presiding over the Senate, a role that conferred little power even when the Senate met, which it did infrequently. Most vice presidents found themselves unwelcome in both the legislative and executive branches. The vice president might become everything if called upon to discharge presidential duties upon the death or resignation of the chief executive, an event that occurred nine times from 1789 to 1974 . Otherwise, he had status but not power.

The huge disparity between the vice presidents humble existence and contingent significance helped make the office a target of derision. The vice presidency was lampooned as unnecessary and ill-conceived. One senator referred to Adams as his superfluous Excellency.

Things have changed dramatically. The perception and reality of the vice presidency is quite different now. Seeing Vice President Dick Cheney as the power during the George W. Bush administration, some joked that Bush was a heartbeat from the presidency. One scholar wrote of the Co-Presidency of Bush and Cheney. This characterization exaggerated Cheneys role, but he was much closer to everything than to nothing.

The phenomenon of vice-presidential power did not begin with Cheneys inauguration nor end when he left office. Paul C. Light coined that phrase in to describe the tenure of Walter F. Mondale ( 1977 1981 ), and the concept, to varying degrees, also applies to Mondales five successors. Adams, Webster, Marshall, and Rockefeller, among many others, could not have imagined Cheneys vice presidency, but they also would have found shocking the roles of Cheneys predecessor, Al Gore, and his successor, Joe Biden, both consequential number twos. Vice-presidential power varies from administration to administration, yet the change is largely institutional, not simply personal. The vice presidency is no longer a sinecure. It matters now. A lot. An office that was nothing has become a robust political institution.