Re: Alternatives to the Twenty-Fifth Amendment (on Vice-Presidential Vacancies)

In article <memo.20080706030026.256C@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>,
Richard Gadsden <richard@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:

> In article <Xns9AD0EAF1E3118dtennerameritechnet@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> on Thu, 03
> Jul 2008 23:05:46 -0500, dtenner@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 (David Tenner) wrote:
> 
> > [1] As early as 1796, the first contested presidential election, 
> > the original assumption that electors would use their own judgment 
> > was already obsolete, and the conduct of Samuel Miles (a 
> > Pennsylvania Federalist elector who voted for Jefferson and 
> > Pinckney instead of Adams and Pinckney) provoked exactly the same 
> > kind of indignation seen in the cases of more recent "faithless 
> > electors."  As one angry Pennsylvanian wrote in a letter to the 
> > *Gazette of the United States*:  "What, do I choose Samuel Miles to 
> > determine for me whether John Adams or Thomas Jefferson shall be 
> > President?  No! I choose him to act, not to think." 
> 
> Could the electoral college have been constructed to be more
significant?
> 
> Perhaps if the college convened in the capital (ie in DC once it has
been
> built) and therefore existed as a collegiate body, and then remained in
> existence for the full term, with perhaps a responsibility to scrutinise
> the presidency and the operations of the executive branch.
> 
You've either duplicated Congress or created a fourth branch of
government here :)

-- 
Chris Mack        *quote under construction*
'Invid Fan'