CthulhuFhtagn
Banned
Exactly what it says on the tin. With a PoD after January 1, 1792, remove the President's power to veto legislation.
AHC: Presidential Veto Power Removed by Constitutional Amendment
- Thread starter CthulhuFhtagn
- Start date
Whigs super-majority is my first thought: Probably over Jackson if the economy bursts under his reign. Another would be the Radical Republicans get so pissed of at Johnson's veto (and their failure to reverse it) before they take back Congress, that they make this an issue and get it passed as the 14th or 15th Amendment in this universe.
Consider this thread from 2 months back
American Presidential Veto was Curtailed or Removed
polyharmonic
American Presidential Veto was Curtailed or Removed
polyharmonic
How would this happen? I mean don't amendments have to be approved by Congress, a majority of states and the President? If so then the President could veto the anti-veto.
CthulhuFhtagn
Banned
IIRC, it just requires a 2/3 majority of both houses of Congress. The President doesn't have any official say in the matter.
jahenders
Banned
It would definitely tilt the balance of power toward the legislature. Without a veto option the President is little more than a rubber stamp as far as legislation is concerned -- the worst he can do is refuse to sign something in protest, but it becomes law anyway.
The President then becomes largely a head of state and head of the executive branch.
If the House and Senate are fairly strongly under one party, the President will be subjected to laws he hates.
In general, our body of law would probably be more varying and chaotic -- the veto (and Senate filibuster) both act as checks on congressional action and/or whim.
The President then becomes largely a head of state and head of the executive branch.
If the House and Senate are fairly strongly under one party, the President will be subjected to laws he hates.
In general, our body of law would probably be more varying and chaotic -- the veto (and Senate filibuster) both act as checks on congressional action and/or whim.
Or, it might work out more positively. Fewer people may have the 'strong man' view of government where we elect a leader and he tells us what to do and everything good and bad is blamed on the president.
People might have a better, more accurate understanding of the whole legislative process. Or, at least some people have the two strong men view with the Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader!
We might essentially have more of a parliamentary system with the president as head of state, which is still a role where you can get a lot of good done.
And if this change occurs early, Reconstruction may go much better with persons newly freed from slavery actually receiving a fair shake.
People might have a better, more accurate understanding of the whole legislative process. Or, at least some people have the two strong men view with the Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader!
We might essentially have more of a parliamentary system with the president as head of state, which is still a role where you can get a lot of good done.
And if this change occurs early, Reconstruction may go much better with persons newly freed from slavery actually receiving a fair shake.
You'd have to see either a completely different constitutional check held by the executive on congressional power, or a completely different mindset from the framers.
I just don't see this. Even the Whigs did not argue that the veto power was illegitimate per se, only that it ought to be confined to cases where Congress had passed a law too hastily or had passed something of dubious constitutionality, etc. And in any event, the Whigs never remotely approached a two-thirds majority in either house of Congress, or control of both houses of three-fourths of the state legislatures.
The only party that could pass such an amendment would be one so overwhelmingly popular that it wouldn't need it.
The only party that could pass such an amendment would be one so overwhelmingly popular that it wouldn't need it.
It is impossible for an amendment to be unconstitutional, simply because once put in force it becomes part of the Constitution, unless it actually modifies something that the Constitution itself explicitly says can't be modified.
If a newer amendment conflicts with an older part of the Constitution, the newer amendment simply supersedes it. That's what amendments are for, for goodness's sake.
Okay let me rephrase that, could the Supreme Court point out the proposed amendment and strike that down or no?
jahenders
Banned
Agreed -- I found the notion that an amendment might be deemed unconstitutional to be obtuse.
No. The Supreme Court cannot change an amendment because it is legally part of the Constitution itself.
If the amendment conflicts with something the Constitution says cannot be amended, the SC can strike it down. At the moment, the only amendment which would qualify is one creating non-equal suffrage in the Senate without unanimous consent by the states, as the other restrictions on amendments expired in 1808.
To me, it is questionable whether any provision of the Constitution can be unamendable, even if it says it is. The proposed Corwin Amendment stated that "No Amendment shall be made to the Constitution which will authorize or give to Congress the power to abolish or interfere, within any state, with the domestic institutions thereof, including that of persons held to labor or service by the laws of said State." Yet I doubt that this would prevent a future Congress and state legislatures from repealing the Corwin Amendment itself. And indeed, as Peter Suber points out, "the Corwin amendment did not (explicitly) bar its own repeal." http://legacy.earlham.edu/~peters/writing/psa/app1.htm Suber's *The Paradox of Self-Amendment * is an interesting philosophical study of the problems. http://legacy.earlham.edu/~peters/writing/psa/
Great point there - and as for the OTL Constitution's only current entrenched clause, the one about the states getting equal suffrage in the Senate, all one has to do is repeal the clause entrenching it - which, by the way, is not itself entrenched - and then do away with equal state Senatorial suffrage. This could even be done in different clauses of a single amendment, so long as the de-entrenching clause takes effect before the de-equal-Senatorial-suffraging clause does.