Amendment25W2

25W2 AMENDMENT 25

= = Essential Questions: 1. What issues prompted the creation of 25th amendment? 2. What impact did 25th amendment have on society at that time?



Amendment 25 This amendment addresses Presidential Succession, Vice Presidential Vacancy, and Presidential Inability. The first section states that when the President dies, resigns or is removed from office, the current Vice President will take over the position. The second section states that when there is a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, the President appoints a candidate who will then be voted on by both Houses of Congress. The third and fourth amendment describe the procedures the government must follow when the president is disabled to conduct his responsibility. To farther this explanation, when the President shows a written paper that he/she is temporarily unable to perform the duties, the Vice President assumes the role by serving as "Acting President" until the President recovers. However, if the President refuses to have inability or is unconscious, the Vice President and Cabinet may claim that the President is disabled. In this case, the Vice President will serve the position until the President can return to the office. When they have a disagreement over the President's ability, a two-thirds vote of both houses is required to decide that the President cannot fulfill the duties.

Questions and Answers:

Q.1 What problems was the U.S. facing before the ratification of the amendment?

A. When President William Henry Harrison died in the office, his Vice President, John Tyler assumed the president's position, and eventually became the U.S. tenth president. However, at the time, there were no procedures about the vice-president taking over the position of the President. Another conflict aroused when President Woodrow Wilson suffered a stroke, and there were no one in the office to substitute his position. Other events also led the Congress to demand this amendment. ([])

Q.2 Why was the amendment needed?

A. The 25th amendment had been demanded by people for many years with separate events that caused changes in the positions of the President and the Vice President. One big event that finally led to the creation of this amendment is the assassination of President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963. Vice President Lyndon Johnson was also wounded, but became the president two hours after President Kennedy was killed without any laws in Constitution supporting the procedures that he took. Furthermore, while Lyndon Johnson had served as the President for 14 months before being elected in 19, the office of the Vice President had been vacant.



Q.3 Who substituted the president before the creation of the amendment?

A. Before the creation of this amendment, the Vice President took over the role of the President most of the times. For example, when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated, his vice-president, Lyndon Johnson became the President. ([|http://blog.constitutioncenter.org/2015/11/how-jfks-assassination-led-to-a-constitutional-amendment/])



Q.4 When was the amendment passed by Congress? And when was it ratified?

A. The amendment was passed by Congress on July 6, 1965, and ratified on February 10, 1967. This is 4 years after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy which is the biggest cause of the ratification. ([])

Q.5 How long did it take for 25th amendment to be ratified? A. It was ratified in 584 days, which equals to about 1 year, 7 months, and 12 days. This stresses how difficult it is for an amendment to pass through the process of ratification. Click this link to view the states participated and not participated in the ratification of the amendment. ([])

Q.6 Which states did not participate in the ratification of the 25th amendment?

A. Georgia, North Dakota, and South Carolina did not ratify the amendment. In these three states, the President will nominate a Vice President when the office is vacant. ([])



Q.7 What previous law did the amendment affect? How?

A. The amendment caused changes in Article 2, Section 1, Clause 6 of the U.S. Constitution. The statement made in the Constitution was vague and unclear about whether the Vice President becomes a President or an "Acting President", meaning to take the role of a vacant position temporarily. The 25th amendment describes the procedures to be followed when the presidential positions are unoccupied, precisely and straightforward.([])

Q.8 Did the citizens agree or disagree when the amendment was created?

A. The citizens agreed to have solutions to the problems they had faced in the past. They were happy because they now know that if the President cannot fulfill his job, they can have someone else to rule them which is the Vice President, or opposite when the president appoints a new Vice President. The agreement of the citizens can be shown by the number of states that had ratified this amendment, which is 47 states out of 50.

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Q.9 How did the amendment affect the Presidents? A. Now the President feels less worried about the future of the country when they die, becomes ill, resigns, or is impeached on by the Congress because they know that the Vice President will substitute them. Furthermore, it is guaranteed by the amendment that the President gets their position back after they recover from temporarily illness.This allows the President to assume the role without feeling pressured with their responsibilities.

Q.10 How did it affect Vice Presidents? A. Because Vice Presidents now know that they have to assume the roles of Presidents when the Presidents are unable to conduct their jobs, they would be more focused on their work to be ready to substitute the Presidents whenever they need to. In addition, after a President appoints a candidate for a Vice President, the person must now be voted on by the Congress. This makes the process of becoming a Vice President more difficult when the position of the Vice President is vacant.

Q.11 How did it solve the problem faced by the U.S.?

A. It solved the problem faced by the U.S. regarding the presidential positions by providing a set of clear procedures for the government to follow in a case where the President or the Vice President dies, falls ill, or resigns. The citizens of the U.S. don't have to worry about not having the President/Vice President anymore!

Q.12 What is one event after the ratification of 25th amendment that showed importance of the amendment?

A. One event in our history that shows the importance of this amendment is when President Richard Nixon resigned from office, and Gerald Ford, the former Vice President of President Nixon became the new President on August 9, 1974. Without the article stating that the current Vice President will be the President after resignation, we might have had a different 38th president, and citizens might have panicked with the vacancy of the Oval Office at the time. ([])

Answers to the Essential Questions:

1.What issues prompted the creation of the 25th amendment?

There were many issues with the president and government that had really cause the creation of this amendment. One of the causes was the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Which basically means he is not able to fulfill his job. That's when the problem began to occur. Who was going to rule them if the president isn't there? That's when they needed to figure out a solution to this problem. They decided that when the president resigns or dies, or basically cannot fulfill their job. The vice-president takes over. Another thing that lead to the When President William Henry Harrison died in the office, his vice-president took the president's position, and eventually became the tenth president of the United States. Those are the two main reason why they decided to create the amendment. (R.S.)

2.What impact did 25th amendment have on society at that time?

25th amendment impacted not just governors, but also the society as a whole. It provides a set of procedures for the President and Vice President to follow when either of them cannot conduct their jobs for a reason. Because they are able to follow this amendment, citizens of the U.S. would be panicked less in cases of sudden deaths, illness, or resignation of President and Vice Presidents, compared to when they do not have an amendment to follow. The biggest idea of 25th amendment is that a Vice President acts as "Acting President" and goes back to the position of the Vice President when the President recovers from a temporary illness. This prevents the Vice President from easily gaining control of our country through the substitution for the President. The President in particular would not be feeling pressured with their responsibilities since they know that the Vice President can substitute their position. This is the same for the Vice President because the President can appoint a new Vice President in a case of a vacant position. Because the candidate for the Vice President must get votes of more than half the members of Congress, citizens have a chance to express their opinions through representatives and senates. This also means that the Vice President would not be decided on a personal reason, for example, simply by their relationship with the President. (M.H.) __**Current Events**__ Website: [] In the case that the President cannot fulfill its duties, succeeds, or dies, the vice president takes over. There are also more people that come after the Vice President just in case the Vice President has something happen to them. If the Vice President has something happen to him, the next person who gets the presidency is the speaker of the house. Next it goes to the Senate President Pro Tempore, then to the Cabinet members. The list of the cabinet members is: Secretary of State, Secretary of the Treasury, Secretary of Defense, Attorney General, Secretary of the Interior, Secretary of Agriculture, Secretary of Commerce, Secretary of Labor, Secretary of Heath and Human Services, Secretary of Housing and Urban Services, Secretary of Transportation, Secretary of Energy, Secretary of Education, Secretary of Veterans Affairs, Secretary of Homeland Security. One of the most recent occurrences that have to do with the 25th amendment is when the Secretary of Homeland Security was added to the line of succession. That happened during the March of 2006. The second part of the amendment says that if the there is no vice president or one is unable to serve, the president must nominate a Vice President, that must be confirmed by the congress. Also, If something happens to the president before the Vice President is nominated, the line of succession will go the the Speaker of the House.

The 25th amendment is important to have today and is still relevant today. If we didn't have it, when something happens to the President, it will be very chaotic. People wouldn't know what to do at that point and everyone will be in panic. This will not help the situation and there wouldn't be a set of rules to follow if this happens. This will show that they are unprepared as well. That's why we have the 25th amendment. It gives the government a set of procedures to follow if anything were to happen to the president. So if anything happened to the president, the vice president would get the rule, and if anything happened to the Vice President, the next person in the line of secession will become president. It basically gives the government and the states someone that will rule them until a new vote takes place. The person who gets chosen to be the President after the President, Vice President...etc. has something happen to them will serve until the the original President's term is over. Without this, the government will fall apart and there will be no one to rule the people until they figure out what to do. Therefore, its important to have this amendment. Website: []

On November 22, 1963, President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Two hours after his assassination, Vice President Lyndon Johnson took presidency which helped let the nation know that a constitutional change of office has taken place. However, Kennedy's sudden death caused a big uproar about a constitutional change that was in the works. During the time of the assassination, in the constitution, it never stated that the Vice President would take over if something happened to the President. Therefore, later on, they added that to the constitution as the 25th amendment. There were also many more occurrences of presidents dying. However, those happened after the 25th amendment was made, so they had a set of procedures to follow and it was less chaotic.

The 25th amendment is important to have today and is still relevant today. Without it, if something similar to the assassination of Kennedy happened, it would cause major problems. One of those problems is that it was cause a lot of chaos between the government and the people. The government wouldn't know what to do and would be panicking. The people would probably be panicking because they have no one to rule them and lead them at that moment. Therefore, having this amendment is important. With it, less chaos will occur and we will be able to quickly shift gears without causing more problems. All in all, its important to have this amendment to keep everything in order when something happens to the president.