United States presidential line of succession

The current presidential order of succession was established by the Presidential Succession Act of 1947, as amended.[1] The order consists of congressional officers, followed by the members of the cabinet in the order of the establishment of each department, provided that each officer satisfies the constitutional requirements for serving as president.[2] In the table, the absence of a number in the first column indicates that the incumbent is ineligible.

In April 1841, John Tyler became the first person to succeed to the presidency intra-term upon the death of William Henry Harrison.

Although the Presidential Succession Clause in Article II of the Constitution clearly provided for the vice president to take over the "powers and duties" of the presidency in the event of a president's removal, death, resignation, or inability, left unclear was whether the vice president became president of the United States or simply temporarily acted as president in a case of succession.[6] Some historians, including Edward Corwin and John D. Feerick,[19] have argued that the framers' intention was that the vice president would remain vice president while executing the powers and duties of the presidency until a new president could be elected.[20]

The hypothetical debate about whether the office or merely the powers of the office devolve upon a vice president who succeeds to the presidency between elections became an urgent constitutional issue in 1841, when President William Henry Harrison died in office, only 31 days into his term. Vice President John Tyler claimed a constitutional mandate to carry out the full powers and duties of the presidency, asserting he was the president and not merely a temporary acting president, by taking the presidential oath of office.[21]

Many around him—including John Quincy Adams,[19][22] Henry Clay[23] and other members of Congress,[22][23] along with Whig party leaders,[23] and even Tyler's own cabinet[22][23]—believed that he was only acting as president and did not have the office itself. He was nicknamed "His Accidency" and excoriated as a usurper.[21] Nonetheless, Tyler adhered to his position, even returning, unopened, mail addressed to the "Acting President of the United States" sent by his detractors.[24] Tyler's view ultimately prevailed when the House and Senate voted to accept the title "President",[23] setting a precedent for an orderly transfer of presidential power following a president's death,[21] one that was subsequently written into the Constitution as section 1 of the Twenty-fifth Amendment.[20]

Even after the precedent regarding presidential succession due to the president's death was set, the part of the Presidential Succession Clause that provided for replacing a disabled president remained unclear. What constituted an "inability"? Who determined the existence of an inability? Did a vice president become president for the rest of the presidential term in the case of an inability; or was the vice president merely "acting as President"? Due to this lack of clarity, later vice presidents were hesitant to assert any role in cases of presidential inability.[25] Two situations are noteworthy:

• On July 2, 1881, President James A. Garfield was shot; hit from behind by two bullets (one grazing his arm and the other lodging in his back).[26] The president wavered between life and death for 80 days after the shooting; it was the first time that the nation as a whole experienced the uncertainties associated with a prolonged period of presidential inability.[7] Most disconcerting, especially for Garfield administration personnel and members of Congress, was the lack of constitutional guidance on how to handle the situation. No one was sure who, if anyone, should exercise presidential authority while the president was disabled; many urged Vice President Chester A. Arthur to step up, but he declined, fearful of being labeled a usurper. Aware that he was in a delicate position and that his every action was placed under scrutiny, Arthur remained secluded in his New York City home for most of the summer. Members of the Garfield Cabinet conferred daily with the president's doctors and kept the vice president informed of significant developments on the president's condition.[26]
• In October 1919, President Woodrow Wilson suffered a debilitating stroke. Nearly blind and partially paralyzed, he spent the final 17 months of his presidency sequestered in the White House.[27] Vice President Thomas R. Marshall, the cabinet, and the nation were kept in the dark over the severity of the president's illness for several months. Marshall was pointedly afraid to ask about Wilson's health, or to preside over cabinet meetings, fearful that he would be accused of "longing for his place". Though members of both parties in Congress pledged to support him if he asserted his claim to the presidential powers and duties, Marshall declined to act, or to do anything that might seem ambitious or disloyal to Wilson.[28] At a time when the fight over joining the League of Nations was reaching a climax, and domestic issues such as strikes, unemployment, inflation and the threat of Communism were demanding action, the operations of the executive branch were once more hampered due to the fact that there was no constitutional basis for declaring that the president was unable to function.[29]

When President Dwight D. Eisenhower suffered a heart attack in September 1955, he and Vice President Richard Nixon developed an informal plan authorizing Nixon to assume some administrative duties during Eisenhower's recovery. Although it did not have the force of law, the plan helped to reassure the nation. The agreement also contained a provision whereby Eisenhower could declare his own inability and, if unable to do so, empowered Nixon, with appropriate consultation, to make the decision.[25] Had it been invoked, Nixon would have served as acting president until the president issued a declaration of his recovery. Moved forward as a consequence of President Kennedy's November 1963 assassination, this informal plan evolved into constitutional procedure a decade later through Sections 3 and 4 of the Twenty-fifth Amendment, which resolved the uncertainties surrounding presidential disability.[10]

Nine vice presidents have succeeded to the presidency intra-term, eight due to the president's death, and one due to the president's resignation from office.[7][17]

Additionally, three vice presidents have temporarily assumed the powers and duties of the presidency as acting president, as authorized by Section 3 of the Twenty-fifth Amendment: George H. W. Bush did so once, on July 13, 1985; Dick Cheney did so twice, on June 29, 2002 and again on July 21, 2007; and Kamala Harris did so on November 19, 2021.[41][42]

While several vice presidents have succeeded to the presidency upon the death or resignation of the president, and a number of them have died or resigned, the offices of president and vice president have never been simultaneously vacant;[upper-alpha 7][upper-alpha 8] thus no other officer in the presidential line of succession has ever been called upon to act as president. There was potential for such a double vacancy when John Wilkes Booth assassinated President Abraham Lincoln in 1865, as Vice President Andrew Johnson was also targeted (along with Secretary of State William Seward and possibly General Ulysses S. Grant) as part of Booth's plot to destabilize the Union government.[47] It again became a real possibility three years later, when, with the vice presidency vacant, Johnson as president was impeached by the House of Representatives and faced removal from office if convicted at trial in the Senate. Johnson was acquitted by a one-vote margin.[48]

Ratification of the 25th Amendment, with its mechanism for filling an intra-term vice presidential vacancy, has made calling on the speaker, president pro tempore, or a cabinet member to serve as acting president unlikely to happen, except in the aftermath of a catastrophic event.[9] Only a few years after the amendment went into effect, in October 1973, at the height of Watergate, Vice President Spiro Agnew resigned. With Agnew's unexpected departure, and the state of Richard Nixon's presidency, Speaker of the House Carl Albert was suddenly first in line to become acting president. The vacancy continued until Gerald Ford was sworn in as vice president on December 6, 1973.[49] Albert was also next in line from the time Ford assumed the presidency on August 9, 1974, following Nixon's resignation from office, until Ford's choice to succeed himself as vice president, Nelson Rockefeller, was confirmed by Congress four months later.[7]

In 2003, the Continuity of Government Commission suggested that the current law has "at least seven significant issues ... that warrant attention," specifically:

1. The reality that all figures in the current line of succession work and reside in the vicinity of Washington, D.C. In the event of a nuclear, chemical, or biological attack, it is possible that everyone on the list would be killed or incapacitated. For this concern, one of the listed people is selected as "designated survivor" and stays on another secret location during certain events where all others are present.
2. Doubt that the speaker of the House and the president pro tempore of the Senate are constitutionally eligible to act as president.
3. A concern about the wisdom of including the president pro tempore in the line of succession as the "largely honorific post traditionally held by the longest-serving senator of the majority party". For example, from January 20, 2001, to June 6, 2001, the president pro tempore was then-98-year-old Strom Thurmond.
4. A concern that the current line of succession can force the presidency to abruptly switch parties mid-term, as the president, speaker, and the president pro tempore are not necessarily of the same party as each other.
5. A concern that the succession line is ordered by the dates of creation of the various executive departments, without regard to the skills or capacities of the persons serving as secretary.
6. The fact that, should a Cabinet member begin to act as president, the law allows the House to elect a new speaker (or the Senate to elect a new president pro tempore), who could in effect remove the Cabinet member and assume the office themselves at any time.
7. The absence of a provision where a president is disabled and the vice presidency is vacant (for example, if an assassination attempt simultaneously wounded the president and killed the vice president).[64]

In 2009, the Continuity of Government Commission commented on the use of the term "Officer" in the 1947 statute,

The language in the current Presidential Succession Act is less clear than that of the 1886 Act with respect to Senate confirmation. The 1886 Act refers to "such officers as shall have been appointed by the advice and consent of the Senate to the office therein named …" The current act merely refers to "officers appointed, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate." Read literally, this means that the current act allows for acting secretaries to be in the line of succession as long as they are confirmed by the Senate for a post (even for example, the second or third in command within a department). It is common for a second in command to become acting secretary when the secretary leaves office. Though there is some dispute over this provision, the language clearly permits acting secretaries to be placed in the line of succession. (We have spoken to acting secretaries who told us they had been placed in the line of succession.)[65]

In 2016–17, the Second Fordham University School of Law Clinic on Presidential Succession developed a series of proposals to "resolve succession issues that have received little attention from scholars and commissions" over the past several decades; its recommendations included:

• Removing legislators and several Cabinet members from the line of succession and adding four officials, or "Standing Successors", outside of Washington, D.C. The line of succession would be: 1st—Secretary of State, 2nd—Secretary of Defense, 3rd—Attorney General, 4th—Secretary of Homeland Security, 5th—Secretary of the Treasury, 6th—Standing Successor 1, 7th—Standing Successor 2, 8th—Standing Successor 3, and 9th—Standing Successor 4;
• If legislators are not removed from the line of succession, only designate them as successors in cases where the president dies or resigns, not where he is disabled (to protect legislators from being forced to resign to act as president temporarily) or removed from office;
• Eliminate the "bumping provision" in the Succession Act of 1947;
• Clarify the ambiguity in the Succession Act of 1947 as to whether acting Cabinet secretaries are in the line of succession;
• That the outgoing president nominate and the Senate confirm some of the incoming president's Cabinet secretaries prior to Inauguration Day, which is a particular point of vulnerability for the line of succession;
• Establish statutory procedures for declaring 1) a dual inability of the president and the vice president, including where there is no vice president and 2) a sole inability of the vice president.[66]

• Central Locator System
• Designated survivor
• List of United States presidential assassination attempts and plots

• Baker, M. Miller (December 1, 2001). "Fools, Drunkards, & Presidential Succession". Federalist Society.
• Feerick, John D. (2011). "Presidential Succession and Inability: Before and After the Twenty-Fifth Amendment". Fordham Law Review. 79 (3): 907–949. Also available here.
• Neale, Thomas H. (October 3, 2008). Presidential Succession: Perspectives, Contemporary Analysis, and 110th Congress Proposed Legislation. Congressional Research Service Report for Congress. RL34692.
• Whitney, Gleaves (2004). "Presidential Succession". Ask Gleaves. Paper 57. Grand Valley State University.