Category — History

Harry Truman on TV, October 5, 1947

62 years ago today, President Harry S Truman (33) gave the first televised address by a US President.  In the speech, Truman asked Americans to save wheat, meat, and eggs.  The speech made very little impression on the history books, and Truman didn’t even mention it in his memoirs.   The TV simulcast was clearly an afterthought for the President, and Time’s article on the speech didn’t even mention that it had been televised.  The New York Times devoted less than a sentence to the fact that the President had been on TV. It’s impossible to say just how many people watched President Truman that night, as TV ratings weren’t calculated until 1948, but considering that in 1947 only 14,000 television sets were in use in the United States, compared with tens of millions of radios, the oversight is understandable.

Still the address launched the TV presidency.  All of Truman’s subsequent White House speeches were televised and a month later, the first Senate committee hearing was televised. Truman later became the first political candidate to buy a television ad, in the 1948 presidential campaign.   President Franklin Roosevelt (32) was actually the first to appear on television on April 30, 1939, but radio and FDR’s fireside chats ruled the day.

After the recent death of Robert McNamara, the Secretary of Defense under John F. Kennedy (35) and Lyndon B. Johnson (36), I was reading and noticed something peculiar.  From1963-1965, there was no Vice President.

Secretary of State Dean Rusk, LBJ, and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, February 1968

It seems that until 1967, there was no provision in the US Constitution for filling a vacancy in the office of Vice President.  Amendment XXV to the United States Constitution deals with succession to the Presidency and establishes procedures both for filling a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, as well as responding to Presidential disabilities. It supersedes the ambiguous wording of Article II, Section 1, Clause 6 of the Constitution, which does not explicitly state whether the Vice President becomes the President if the President died, resigned, was removed from office or was unable to discharge the Presidential powers.

This can all be traced back to 1841.  Newly elected President William Henry Harrison (9) wanted to show what a tough guy he was and delivered the longest inaugural address in American history without wearing a coat or hat despite the miserably cold and wet weather.  After a two hour, 8,444 word speech, he rode through the streets for the inaugural parade, still with no hat or coat. While it is debated whether this heroic act of supreme manliness is what caused him to catch cold, Harrion died a month later of right lower lobe pneumonia, jaundice, and septicemia.  Consquently, President Harrison became the first US President to die in office, and Vice President John Tyler (10) immediately asserted that he had succeeded to the office of President.  Vice President Tyler’s claim was not formally challenged, and so the precedent of full succession was established.

Since Amendment XXV was ratified, it has been invoked several times, most notably twice in the case of Gerald Ford (38).  Ford was both appointed to the office of Vice President and succeeded to the Presidency as a result of the resignation of President Richard Nixon (37) on August 9, 1974.  Incidentally, President Ford is the only person ever to be Vice President and President without being elected to either office.

Grover Cleveland (22 & 24)

As the only US President who served two non-consecutive terms, Grover Cleveland (22 & 24) often sparks debate about whether a US President can serve more than two terms if latter terms are non-consecutive to the first two.  In fact, Cleveland was the winner of the popular vote for President three times—in 1884, 1888, and 1892.

These days, there are probably a lot of people walking around thinking that President Bill Clinton (42) could leverage his popularity and run for a third non-consecutive term.  In fact, he cannot.  According to the 22nd Amendment to the US Constitution, “No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once.”  That’s a bit of a mouthful, but what it means is that after February 21, 1947, the date on which the amendment was ratified, no president can serve a third term, regardless of whether the terms are consecutive or not.

Franklin D Roosevelt (32) was the last 2+ term President.  He was elected to 4 terms, but died less than three months after beginning his fourth term.  Harry S. Truman (33), the last President to which the 22nd Amendment would not have legally applied, was eligible for a third term and began a campaign for a third term in 1952, but quit after a poor showing in the New Hampshire primary.  Dwight D. Eisenhower (34)  was the first President elected post-Amendment 22 and was worried by the lame duck condition created by a second-term President’s preceived loss of power and influence.  Nonetheless, most Americans consider term limits a good thing.