se of removal, death, resignation or inability of both
the President and the Vice-President of the United States,
the President of the Senate, or, if there is none, then the
Speaker of the House, for the time being, shall act as President,
until the disability is removed or a President elected."

There is a tradition that when this awkward arrangement was
made, the proposition that the Secretary of State should succeed
in the case of such vacancy was defeated by the suggestion
that Mr. Jefferson had too much power and consequence already.
The arrangement seemed to me clearly objectionable. In the
first place the Vice-President, who, it is supposed, has died
or become incapable, is the Constitutional President of the
Senate. The Senate, under the practice and construction of
its power which prevailed down to a very recent period, only
elected a President pro tempore when the Vice-President vacated
the chair. His office terminated when the Vice-President
resumed it, and there was no Constitutional obligation on
the Senate to elect a President pro tempore at all. So it
was quite uncertain whether there would be a President pro
tempore of the Senate at any particular time, especially when
the Senate was not in session. There have been two instances
where the President of the Senate has refused to vacate the
chair, for the reason that he did not desire to have a President
pro tempore elected, and thereby have an honor conferred on
a member of another party than his own. That happened once
in the case of Vice-President Gerry, and again, within my
personal knowledge, in the case of Vice-President Arthur.
When he succeeded to the Presidency there was no President
of the Senate who would have taken his place if he too had
happened to be assassinated. So of the Speaker of the House.
For a great many years the first session of a newly-elected
House of Representatives has begun in December. There is
no Speaker from the previous fourth of March until that time.
Beside, the Senate, whose members hold office for six years
and of whom only one-third goes out every two years, is very
apt to have a majority whose political opinions are opposed
to those which have prevailed in the last Presidential election.
So, if the President and Vice-President both die before taking
their seats, the President of the Senate is quite likely to
bring into the Executive Office opinions which the people
have just rejected in the election.

On