Vice-President

A person elected as Vice-President expects that he will have no defined function (except, curiously, to preside over the Senate) unless he happens to be thrust into the highest office through the chance of the President’s death – though some Vice-Presidents have been given real work to do (particularly Nixon under Eisenhower in 1952-1960) and most Vice-Presidents during a second term regard the office as a useful base from which to try to win their party’s next candidature for the Presidency (as Nixon did in 1960, Humphrey in 1968, and Bush in 1988).

Out of 19 men elected to the Presidency between 1840 and 1960, four were assassinated (JFK in 1963) and four died in office, so eight of the men elected as Vice-Presidents before Ford acceded to the highest office – and in May 1945 Vice-President Truman became President only four months after the four-years period has began.

Parties and Elections

Exactly every 4^th year since 1792, on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November, the people have cast their votes to choose a President.

General principles of elections:

1. the candidate with most votes wins; there is no proportionality;

2. with the “first past the post” system, politics is dominated by two parties, Republican and Democratic;

3. each party is a coalition of disparate interests, without a unified national policy;

4. the two parties choose their candidates at public “primary elections” (where there may be a second ballot);

Primaries means that the party chooses the most appropriate candidate for the presidential elections; they can be open, closed, mandatory, optional and partisan; they are held between February to June in the year of the elections.

5. elections for many offices, national, state and local, are usually held together, so that on a single visit to a polling booth a voter may choose candidates for 20 or mote offices;

6. in most states people vote in referendums, on state or local questions, at the same time as they vote for candidates for offices.

Citizens aged 18 or more may register as voters in their home towns. In some states only people who have registered as Democrats may vote in Democratic primary elections; so too with Republicans. At the final elections iu November, a voter’s registration is irrelevant.

32 states elect their governors in the presidential mid-term years, also for 4 years. The other states elect their governors in other years; 3 of them have two-year terms. Each state also has its own elected legislature. Several other state officials, such as the Treasurer (finance minister) may be individually elected as well, and in some cases judges; each state has its own mixture of election and appointment. At the same election people may be choosing mayors for their cities, local councilors, and other local officers, though some local elections are held at other times.

The parties

There are two great American parties - the Republican and the Democratic.

Around 1850 the two parties were the Whig and the Democrats. The old Democrats tended to support state autonomy against the central government. In 1854 a northern alliance of people determined to abolish slavery founded a new party, called “Republican”. It rapidly absorbed the Whigs. Abraham Lincoln was the first Republican President; the Republicans were identified with the northern fight in the Civil War. The Republicans were supported by businessmen and industrialists.

The Republicans have, at least since 1900, shown more qualities associated with the right: less government intervention in the economy; little enthusiasm for new social programs, patriotic language; much talk about responsibility of the individual, and about state and local economy.

The Democrats were supported by labor unions. Since 1933 the Democrats have been the party of the left – outside the South.