WI Congress could a make a vote of no confidence?

jack_donaghy_is_the_shado

jack_donaghy_is_the_shado

Forgive, me but I'm not too knowlegable about British parliamentary procedures.

What if the Congress had the power to pass a motion of no confidence for the executive branch? And if so, then could the executive branch could hold a special election?

I know that in theory, articles of impeachment are similar to this but are long and drawn out. And that if this were to happen, rival political parties could and would aggresively use it.

There are plenty of opportunites in the 1800s (John Quincy Adam's corrupt bargain, the nullification crisis, Tyler's assuming the presidency, problems over the Bleeding Kansas affair)

So would it be possible for this happen if the Founding Fathers put it in the Constitution?
 

Sachyriel

Banned
If they put it in the constitution it'd probably be followed until the stars didn't shine over New York. ;)

However, if it was, would the Alaska-buying Seward be enough to bring it about and get the executives thrown out? :confused:
 
jack_donaghy_is_the_shado

jack_donaghy_is_the_shado

The Andrew Johnson administration was universally unpopular. I could see Johnson, Seward, and whom ever replaced Stanton as Secretary of War all getting removed in one swift move.

If it's not added in at the Constitution's inception, if Franklin becomes president over Washington, and still dies in 1790, perhaps it could be added in after another constitutional convention.
 

GreatScottMarty

The entire purpose of the 3 branches of govt. is the separation of powers. if there was a "vote of no confidence" in the Constitution than there wouldn't be much point in having a separately elected President. So in short the whole philosophical design behind the constitution would be different and we would have a different Constitution. Besides how long has the "no confidence vote" been around for anyway? IIRC, the Prime Minister in England served at the pleasure of the King until the 1832 reforms, and I think the "Vote" came around some time after that.
 

usertron2020

Donor
The Federalist Papers

IIRC, this is covered in the Federalist papers. I'm paraphrasing, but "If the Chief Executive could be removed by simple majority of both Houses, no such person could be expected to survive the year."
 

imperialaquila

I think GreatScottMarty says it best. The whole point of the Constitution was to spread power out as much as possible, so no one person or body could hold absolute power. Letting Congress throw out the President by majority vote would make the President a slave to Congress. That goes against the whole principle of separation of powers, which the Constitution was based on.
 

Westbrook

In this day and age of hyper-partisanship, media firestorms and constant crises, we'd have a new President every month.
 

Cicero the Younger

What a nightmare this would be. Congress would use this power to stop presidents from doing things they didn't want done by removing them before they could do it, thus keeping the populace busy having to go back to the polls all the time. Or they would at least keep presidents in line by threatening to remove them unless they did what Congress wanted. Either way, we'd have an executive directly controlled by the legislature and thus no true separation of powers.

I suppose the president could be selected by some means other than general election, which would speed up the replacement process, but then we wouldn't have the government by the people and for the people that was our reason for rebelling in the first place.
 
The Kiat

The Kiat

Then Junior would have been ejected from office in 2007, when a Democratic majority took over Congress (assuming they had the backbone to try), and as for Slick Willy....

It's just as well America doesn't have that on the Federal level, otherwise all that politicking would make the government to... parliamentary. I suppose one reason it wasn't included was because Jeffersonian Democracy had the idea that a citizen would serve a term and then go home, thus keeping the power in the hands of the people.
 

cclittle

Watergate

I was in college during the Watergate scandle. My Parlamenty Societys professor said " If this was a parlamenty society there would have been a no confidence vote and we would be in the middle of an election campaign by now."
 

usertron2020

Donor
cclittle said:
I was in college during the Watergate scandle. My Parlamenty Societys professor said " If this was a parlamenty society there would have been a no confidence vote and we would be in the middle of an election campaign by now."
Click to expand...
No question. Watergate would be a chance for the Parliamentary System to shine. But the American Civil War? Lincoln would be gone by 2nd Bull Run.
 
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