WI sitting POTUS constitutionally forbidden from leaving US

Before Theodore Roosevelt, no President of the United States left the country while in office:

"Prior to President and Mrs. Theodore Roosevelt's visit to Panama in 1906, no American president had set foot outside the country during his tenure in office, not even crossing a bridge to Canada or Mexico. In an August 1906 letter to Andrew Carnegie, President Roosevelt bemoaned the 'ironclad custom which forbids a President ever [going] abroad' that kept him from engaging in direct personal diplomacy with 'the Kaiser and the responsible authorities of France and England' to negotiate events of the day.1 Considering Roosevelt's view of the United States' waxing role in global influence, his desire to witness construction of the Panama Canal--something he considered his 'most important [presidential] action . . . in foreign affairs'--is perfectly understandable.2

"There were multiple reasons for a president to remain inside the nation's continental borders. The historian Richard J. Ellis argues that while technology limited travel options for the earliest presidents due to both pace of travel and lack of communications, presidents were equally 'constrained by norms and expectations that were rooted in the nation's understanding of its role in the world.'3 Americans eschewed 'entangling aliances' (George Washington's term) [actually, it was Jefferson's--DT] with European nations, beyond trade agreements, and abhorred 'European monarchy and autocracy.' The nation believed that the unique U.S. system saved it from 'the path of war, conquest, taxation, and empire.' According to Ellis, 'A republican president was to exhibit simplicity of manners; he was to be the nation's 'first citizen'--distinguished and admired but a fellow citizen nonetheless.'4 Thus Americans had historic fears that, combined with the travel and communication complications, kept presidents home and limited their contacts with European royalty and its potentially negative influences. Roosevelt clearly recognized the national tenets that constrained him but was determined to visit nonetheless...

"The trick was getting around the 'ironclad custom.' The administration of President William McKinley helped make that possible. McKinley not only expressed interest in going outside the national boundaries, but the imperialist United States that matured during his terms in office--mostly owing to the 1898 war with Spain--helped establish the view that 'imperialism [was] no longer . . . a perversion of America's mission but its fulfillment.'7 An assassin's bullet cut short McKinley's plan to visit Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and Cuba during his second term--all American territories or lands under U.S. protection--or he might have been the first president to travel abroad instead of that distinction going to the vice president who succeeded him...". https://www.whitehousehistory.org/off-for-the-ditch

Question: What if the "ironclad custom" had been enshrined in the Constitution? Probably the Framers would not put in an absolute prohibition, recognizing that sometimes such trips might be advantageous or even necessary--but perhaps they could require such trips to have congressional approval, maybe even a supermajority, perhaps even a two-thirds vote of the Senate. This could certainly have consequences in 1919, when many people in Congress (and elsewhere) did not like the idea of Wilson going to Paris...
 
The Secretary of State become all more powerful, vicepresident too if he can go away the loophole
 
I think it would be considerably later. That would be when it was first seriously mooted, but I don't think I can see it happening until after WW2 - during at a pinch.

Around 1890 or so the US becomes the richest country on the planet, it is only a matter of time that US citizens will start wanting national influence to at least approach its wealth. A cheap way to start it on that path is to pass the amendment.
 
Around 1890 or so the US becomes the richest country on the planet, it is only a matter of time that US citizens will start wanting national influence to at least approach its wealth. A cheap way to start it on that path is to pass the amendment.
Yeah, they're going to start talking about it. But amendments are difficult to pass. Isolationism was still a major open thing until the 50s - that plus inertia is enough to stop it.
 
Well if he just brings boxes filled with his native soil to sleep in I am sure everything would be fine . . .

Actually, Embassies may be a loophole, just need a moving one to get from one to the other.
 
Well if he just brings boxes filled with his native soil to sleep in I am sure everything would be fine . . .

Actually, Embassies may be a loophole, just need a moving one to get from one to the other.

It may also be a loophole declaring military ships to be the sovereign property of the country involved, and thus counting anyone on them as "still in the country." The same with aircraft. Thus a visiting president could get away with parking a ship in the Thames, or a plane at Heathrow Airport, to speak to the the British PM, and as long as the meeting is held on the ship or plane, it would still count as "still in the country."
 
Yeah, they're going to start talking about it. But amendments are difficult to pass. Isolationism was still a major open thing until the 50s - that plus inertia is enough to stop it.

I doubt it, some amendments passed fairly quickly. Isolationism existed in the 1950s but it was hardly a major thing, both parties were against it by then. WWII and the Cold War basically killed it.
 

B-29_Bomber

Banned
It may also be a loophole declaring military ships to be the sovereign property of the country involved, and thus counting anyone on them as "still in the country." The same with aircraft. Thus a visiting president could get away with parking a ship in the Thames, or a plane at Heathrow Airport, to speak to the the British PM, and as long as the meeting is held on the ship or plane, it would still count as "still in the country."

Nope. The whole "Continental borders" thing would bugger that right up.
 
Somewhere around 1900 an amendment is passed repealing it.

If not then the latest would be 1917, when President Wilson, declares that as Sitting President, he needs to travel to Europe to evaluate the damage caused by the Great War and to bring home a peace treaty.
 
I suppose it wouldn't make sense even during the early 19th century. A reasonable early modern man thinks that a Commander-in-Chief is supposed to -physically- lead armies. To make it work, someone else would need to be the CINC - what would probably be a bad idea, resulting in Dutch-like situation (i.e. Stadholder v. Grand Pensionary).
 
I suppose it wouldn't make sense even during the early 19th century. A reasonable early modern man thinks that a Commander-in-Chief is supposed to -physically- lead armies. To make it work, someone else would need to be the CINC - what would probably be a bad idea, resulting in Dutch-like situation (i.e. Stadholder v. Grand Pensionary).

However, it probably wouldn't be an absolute prohibition, but only one--like war itself--requiring congressional consent for the president to go abroad. There would be a historic precedent in the Act of Settlement of 1701, which provided that "No monarch may leave "the dominions of England, Scotland, or Ireland," without the consent of Parliament." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Act_of_Settlement_1701 True, as the article goes on to say, "This provision was repealed in 1716, at the request of George I who was also the Elector of Hanover and Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg within the Holy Roman Empire; because of this, and also for personal reasons, he wished to visit Hanover from time to time." But of course there would be no foreign princes like George I as president under the Constitution.
 
However, it probably wouldn't be an absolute prohibition, but only one--like war itself--requiring congressional consent for the president to go abroad.

In this case, I don't think it would change things a lot, since the POTUS needs Congressional support to lead an effective foreign policy.
 
Well if he just brings boxes filled with his native soil to sleep in I am sure everything would be fine . . .

Actually, Embassies may be a loophole, just need a moving one to get from one to the other.

I don't know the historical accuracy of that, but rumor has it, Abdulaziz, the first Ottoman sultan to visit Europe had a similar trick. It was argued that, Western Europe being dar al harab a muslim ruler can not peacefully visit. Therefore, insider a secret compartment under his shoes narive Ottoman soil is filled.
 
Top