We the People: Succession of Power

Summary

Throughline Podcast Summary: "We the People: Succession of Power"

Released on March 6, 2025, "We the People: Succession of Power" delves into the historical evolution and critical importance of presidential succession in the United States. Hosted by NPR's Rund Abdelfattah and Ramtin Arablouei, this episode explores the pivotal moments and key figures that shaped the 25th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

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1. The Assassination of President Kennedy and Its Aftermath

On a warm November day in 1963, a routine women's fashion broadcast on Dallas TV station WFAA was abruptly interrupted by a tragic announcement. John Feerick, a professor at Fordham Law School, relayed the shocking news:

John Feerick [01:34]: "President Kennedy and Governor John Colony have been cut down by assassin's bullets."

The nation plunged into chaos as reports conflicted over the President's status. For an hour, uncertainty lingered about whether President Kennedy and Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson were alive. This tragic event underscored the urgent need for clear constitutional guidelines on presidential succession, a topic that had been previously discussed but remained unresolved.

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2. John Feerick’s Quest for Constitutional Clarity

John Feerick, an 88-year-old esteemed professor, had long been obsessed with the ambiguity surrounding presidential succession. His journey began in 1961 when he identified a critical gap in the Constitution:

Ramtin Arablouei [03:27]: "One of the most critical and intriguing constitutional questions ever presented for solution is what happens when the President of the United States becomes incapable of discharging the powers of his office."

In his October 1963 article in the Fordham Law Review, Feerick posed essential questions about the Vice President’s role during a President's incapacity, highlighting the Constitution's lack of explicit instructions beyond Article 2, Section 1, Clause 6.

John Feerick [03:27]: "Does the Vice President become President for the remainder of the term, or merely act as President during the period of inability?"

Despite the pressing nature of these questions, Feerick's article initially received limited attention until President Kennedy's assassination brought the issue to the forefront.

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3. From Academic Inquiry to National Imperative

Following the assassination, Feerick's previously academic concerns transformed into a national imperative. His article garnered attention from prominent figures, including Robert F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon, signaling a broader recognition of the need for constitutional reform.

John Feerick [07:00]: "Presidents are mortal. President Garfield's shooting, President Wilson's stroke, and President Eisenhower's heart attack rendered the respective President temporarily unable to exercise the powers and duties of his office."

Feerick’s proactive engagement with the American Bar Association (ABA) and his collaboration with Senator Birch Bayh of Indiana were instrumental in shaping the 25th Amendment. Their collective efforts aimed to eliminate the existing ambiguity and prevent potential crises stemming from presidential incapacity.

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4. Crafting and Ratifying the 25th Amendment

The ABA convened a Special Conference on Presidential Inability in January 1964, where Feerick presented his well-researched arguments advocating for a constitutional amendment. Key recommendations included:

• Clear Succession Protocol: Power would transfer to the Vice President either temporarily or permanently, based on stringent criteria.
• Checks and Balances: The President, Vice President, and a designated body (such as the Cabinet) would collaboratively determine the President's incapacity to prevent misuse of power.

John Feerick [33:17]: "We need a constitutional amendment. The ABA lawyers, including John, sketched out what this could look like."

Despite initial setbacks, including congressional adjournments, Senator Birch Bayh persisted, reintroducing the amendment in 1965. Through relentless advocacy and widespread educational efforts, the 25th Amendment successfully passed both houses of Congress and received the necessary ratifications from three-fourths of the state legislatures by 1967.

John Feerick [37:11]: "At the White House, a vital piece of legislation reaches President Johnson's desk. It's the 25th Constitutional Amendment providing for the replacement of any disabled president or the filling of any vice presidential vacancy."

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5. Implementing the 25th Amendment: Nixon Administration and Beyond

The 25th Amendment swiftly proved its significance during the Nixon administration amidst the Watergate scandal. Vice President Spiro Agnew’s resignation left the nation without a Vice President, triggering Section 2 of the Amendment:

John Feerick [43:44]: "Whenever there's a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, the President shall nominate a Vice President who shall take office upon confirmation by a majority vote of both houses of Congress."

Gerald Ford was nominated and confirmed as Vice President, and subsequently ascended to the presidency following Nixon's resignation in 1974. This series of events marked the 25th Amendment's first real-world application, ensuring continuity and stability in the executive branch.

John Feerick [45:11]: "We never speculated about that scenario, that's for sure. I mean, we'd never had anything like that in our history."

Further invocations of the Amendment included:

• Section 3: Used when Presidents Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush, and Joe Biden underwent medical procedures requiring them to temporarily transfer power.
• Section 4: Although never formally utilized, it remains a critical provision allowing the Vice President and Cabinet to declare a President incapacitated.

Notably, during the 1981 assassination attempt on Reagan, Section 4 was almost invoked, highlighting its ongoing relevance in safeguarding presidential authority.

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6. Reflections on the 25th Amendment and Constitutional Amendments

In a reflective conversation, Feerick emphasizes the enduring importance of constitutional amendments in adapting to evolving societal needs:

John Feerick [47:58]: "I respect our Constitution. ... If you want to change the Constitution, it's not easy. But I don't rule out another constitutional amendment, even though it's very hard."

Feerick remains optimistic about the Constitution’s capacity to endure and evolve, advocating for continued vigilance and proactive measures to address emerging challenges in governance.

John Feerick [49:20]: "We all have an obligation as lawyers to keep hope alive because of the rule of law and our Constitution. It's not easy, but that doesn't mean it can't be done."

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7. Conclusion: The Legacy of the 25th Amendment

"We the People: Succession of Power" underscores the critical role John Feerick played in shaping the 25th Amendment, ensuring a clear and effective framework for presidential succession. His dedication transformed a scholarly inquiry into a fundamental component of American governance, preventing potential crises and reinforcing the stability of the executive branch.

The episode serves as a testament to the power of individual initiative in constitutional reform and the enduring significance of the 25th Amendment in safeguarding democratic continuity.

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Notable Quotes:

• John Feerick [01:34]: "President Kennedy and Governor John Colony have been cut down by assassin's bullets."
• John Feerick [03:27]: "Does the Vice President become President for the remainder of the term, or merely act as President during the period of inability?"
• John Feerick [07:00]: "Presidents are mortal. President Garfield's shooting, President Wilson's stroke, and President Eisenhower's heart attack rendered the respective President temporarily unable to exercise the powers and duties of his office."
• John Feerick [33:17]: "We need a constitutional amendment."
• John Feerick [45:11]: "We never speculated about that scenario, that's for sure. I mean, we'd never had anything like that in our history."
• John Feerick [47:58]: "I respect our Constitution. ... If you want to change the Constitution, it's not easy. But I don't rule out another constitutional amendment, even though it's very hard."
• John Feerick [49:20]: "We all have an obligation as lawyers to keep hope alive because of the rule of law and our Constitution. It's not easy, but that doesn't mean it can't be done."

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For more insightful stories that bridge history and present-day issues, subscribe to Throughline+ and support NPR’s compelling narrative journalism.

Transcript

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[Ramtin Arablouei]

Well, it depends.

[John Feerick]

On where they're placed. They can be wherever you want them.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

For the pockets, so that.

[John Feerick]

No.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

On a warm day in November 1963, local Dallas TV station WFAA was broadcasting a show about women's fashion.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

There's zippers up the side so that.

[John Feerick]

The jacket will fit tightly around the.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Hips, keeping that straight, sleek look that it's when suddenly, out of nowhere, the show was stopped. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.

[John Feerick]

You'll excuse the fact that I'm out of breath, but about 10 or 15 minutes ago, a tragic thing, from all indications at this point, has happened in the city of Dallas. Let me quote to you this.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

When the broadcast came back on air, a man appeared on screen looking pale and in shock.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

He says President Kennedy and Governor John.

[John Feerick]

Colony have been cut down by assassin's bullets.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

In downtown Dallas, the American President, John F. Kennedy, along with the Governor of Texas were shot. Newsrooms were in chaos trying to figure out what happened.

[John Feerick]

Mr. Kennedy was struck in the head. The first reports say that President Kennedy has been seriously wounded by this shooting. President Kennedy is reported to be fighting for his life in a Dallas hospital. But reports conflict.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

For about an hour, there was no official announcement of whether the President or Vice President were dead or alive.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

John Feerick had become obsessed with the possibility of a moment just like this. But he wasn't expecting it so soon.

[John Feerick]

My name is John Furyk. I'm a professor at Fordham Law School.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Today, John is a professor at the law school he graduated from. He's 88 years old.

[John Feerick]

I am most likely the oldest professor full time at Fordham Law School.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

But back in 1961, two years before Dallas, John was an idealistic, newly minted attorney on a mission to convince people that something essential was missing from The Constitution Clear instructions for what should happen if a US President was unable to do his job. He researched it for years. One of the most critical and intriguing constitutional questions ever presented for solution is what happens when the President of the United States becomes incapable of discharging the.

[John Feerick]

Powers and duties of his office.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

This is an excerpt from an article John published in the Fordham law review in October 1963. Does the Vice President become President for.

[John Feerick]

The remainder of the term? Or.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Or does he merely act as President during the period of inability? The Constitution is not explicit. John focuses in on Article 2, Section 1, Clause 6 of the Constitution. It goes like this.

[Sponsor Voice]

In case of the removal of the.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

President from office, or of his death.

[Sponsor Voice]

Resignation, or inability to discharge the powers.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

And duties of the said office, the.

[Sponsor Voice]

Same shall devolve on the Vice President. And the Congress may by law provide.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

For the case of removal, removal, death, resignation or inability, both of the President and Vice President, declaring what officer shall then act as President, and such officer shall act accordingly until the disability be removed or a President shall be elected.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Okay, now to translate. What that basically means is that if the President dies or resigns or is unable to serve the role of President, then the Vice President would serve in his place. And if the Vice President can't serve, then Congress has to decide which officer of government should step in as President. But that's about it. No more specifics. Now, at the time, this issue was not exactly top of mind for most Americans, because John's article came out in October 1963, a time when President Kennedy, the youngest president in U.S. history, seemed vital and healthy. But John had lots of questions, like who decides when a President is unable to serve? What happens next? Is the transfer of power to the Vice President temporary or permanent? What if there is no Vice President to him? The fact that the current President was young and healthy, that the questions didn't seem urgent, made it the ideal time to hash it out.

[John Feerick]

I didn't want the article to just go on a library shelf, so he.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Started mailing out copies. He sent them everywhere to current and former politicians. He even sent one to the White House.

[John Feerick]

I had a response from an assistant to President Kennedy on November 13th.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

It went like this, President has received.

[John Feerick]

Your letter and asked me to thank you for sending him the accompanied copy of your article.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

An acknowledgment. Not bad. But then the personal responses started coming in. He got one from the Attorney General, Robert F. Kennedy, John F. Kennedy's brother.

[John Feerick]

It says as follows. Dear Mr. Feerick, thank you very much for sending me a copy of your article on the subject of presidential inability. I appreciate you bringing it to my attention as this is a subject which we have been studying here in a department for some time. Sincerely, Robert F. Kennedy.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Then he hears from Richard Nixon.

[John Feerick]

Dear Mr. Furich, I appreciate your sending me a copy of your article on presidential inability. This is a subject in which I am most interested.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

You aimed high.

[John Feerick]

Well, I didn't know better.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

And it didn't stop with politicians. He wrote a letter to the editor of the New York Times. In all of these letters, he emphasized this problem has come up before in our history, more than once, and Congress has never solved it.

[John Feerick]

Presidents are mortal. President Garfield's shooting, President Wilson's stroke and President Eisenhower's heart attack rendered the respective President temporarily unable to exercise the powers and duties of his office. Despite this, Congress has consistently failed the American people by not acting to eliminate the possibility of a gap in the executive because of the confusion existing over the meaning of the succession provision of the Constitution.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

In the end, John didn't just want a discussion, he wanted more. He wanted a constitutional amendment.

[John Feerick]

I think I had an expectation that people who had an interest in the subject would examine the article with the hope that it would make a case for reform. Six days later, the President was assassinated. It's official now. The President is dead. There's only one word to describe the picture here, and that's grief. And much of it. It's official. As of just a few moments ago.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

November 22, 1963, John F. Kennedy became the eighth U.S. president to die in office. Suddenly, the alarms John Furyk had been raising became very loud. And John believed that then, finally someone would do something about it. I'm Ramtin Arablouei.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

And I'm Rund Abdelfattah. You're listening to Throughline from npr.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Written into the Constitution is a way to change it. But we do that less and less on this episode of our ongoing series, we the People, the story behind one of the last amendments to the Constitution, the 25th and the man who got it done.

[John Feerick]

Hi, this is Mike from BRNO in the Czech Republic, and you're listening to Throughline. A class act. This program.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Foreign.

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[Ramtin Arablouei]

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[Ramtin Arablouei]

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This message comes from Pemco Mutual Insurance Company. You know that moment when things take an unexpected turn and you get that sudden sinking feeling that maybe it could have been avoided? Pemco Insurance wants to help you avoid that feeling by sharing prevention tips that empower you to prevent some of life's preventable pitfalls. Because Pemco's commitment to their customers goes beyond the moment of acclaim. It's about being with their customers every day. [e-mail] Prevention Part 1 the question of succession.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Ready?

[Rund Abdelfattah]

All right, I'm recording. All right, I'm ready.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

You're always ready, Ron. True professional. All right, so you and throughline producer extraordinaire Lawrence Wu went to Fordham University to interview our main character in this story, John Furyk. All right, so take me through what happens when you get there.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

It was a cold, cold day round the city.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The worst.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

And I remember I took the subway and I met Lawrence in the lobby.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Okay.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

And then, you know, we turned on the recorder, as you have to do, and then we got on the elevator, rode up to. I don't remember which floor it is, but when we got off the elevator, I think it was John's assistant. She very nicely, like, walked us to his office.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Hi.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Are you here for Dinker?

[Ramtin Arablouei]

To meet you.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Nice to meet you, too.

[John Feerick]

Yeah.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Sarah's been. And, like, from the moment that we walked into the office, honestly, like, this is going to sound cheesy, but it was like walking into a time capsule.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Okay. Hello.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Hi.

[John Feerick]

Hi.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

I'm Run.

[John Feerick]

Have we met before?

[Rund Abdelfattah]

We have not met before, but.

[John Feerick]

What is your name?

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Rund. Ren R E N R U N D. Like Rund with the D. Oh, yen.

[John Feerick]

Nice to see you.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Like, you look around and it was like, all around. I mean, it was interesting. Half of the office was covered with, like, framed pictures of him and, like, congress people and lawyers and other people that he'd worked with over the years. And then the other half of the office was covered with pictures of, like, his grandkids and. And. And then, you know, he had, like, all these law books, you know, along the wall.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

And did it seem like he was eager? Because people aren't just Knocking on his door every day wanting to talk about this story.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

I think it had been a while. Yeah, I think it had been a while. He's been at Fordham, you know, like, for so much of his, you know, academic life. And obviously that's where he got his start. That's where he worked on the 25th Amendment office. Because it's so special to be here, right? I mean, Fordham is where it all began.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

John Furyk was born in 1936 in New York. His parents had arrived in the US not long before.

[John Feerick]

My parents were immigrants and no formal education. I was the firstborn.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

John experienced a similar upbringing that I, and many of you listening experienced.

[John Feerick]

I grew in understanding of the importance of getting an education and in using it to make a difference.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Despite that pressure, John wasn't a good student as a kid, no matter how hard he tried. But his parents weren't accepting any excuses.

[John Feerick]

It was a slow start for me in grammar school, and my father insisted one summer that I not go out until I understood math much better than my grades indicated.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Whatever his parents did, it worked. In fact, he did well enough to get a scholarship to go to Fordham University in the Bronx, New York, a school just a short subway ride away from where he grew up. He lived between two worlds, one at college and one back in his blue collar neighborhood. He went to classes during the day and worked shifts at a local supermarket in the evenings.

[John Feerick]

I felt a real commitment working in a supermarket. Be as good as you can be, and serving people at the cash register and putting food on shelves.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Even with the job, he found time to be a part of Fordham's student government.

[John Feerick]

I was vice president of my class and also the student body. That service experience was very important because I saw that you could make differences.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

And it was in the college student government where John had his first experience with the problem of succession of power in the most nerdy, dramatic kind of way.

[John Feerick]

I remember when I was vice president of the student body at Fordham College in my last year, I had to deal with the inability of a newly elected president.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Inability as in the president is unable to serve.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

What would that mean? A medical issue?

[John Feerick]

Yeah, he had a medical issue. And as soon as he was elected, he resigned.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The president of the student government stepped down, and suddenly everyone had an opinion about who should succeed him. Some people called for a new election, but remember, John was the student body vice president.

[John Feerick]

I said that under the Constitution, the vice president becomes the president and is not going to. It should not be a new election, a standoff.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

But Fordham had A student court, I'm not joking here, that would decide these kinds of matters.

[John Feerick]

And they sustained the position I had taken that the student constitution provided for succession.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

That's dramatic for a student body like counts. It kind of. It's almost like a mock trial of what would come later a little bit.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

So John became president of the student government because the student constitution spelled out that process. President resigns, then vice president becomes president. In this case, John Feerick. And he found this whole process really motivating.

[John Feerick]

It became clear to me by the time I got into my last year of college that going to law school would be very supportive of an interest in going into elective politics and making a difference.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

So John applied for law school at Fordham University and got in. He thrived there. He was the editor of the school's law review. But he didn't forget about presidential succession. He couldn't. It was all over the news.

[John Feerick]

Eisenhower seemed perfectly healthy in these films made in 1955, just before his sudden heart attack. His illness revealed once again America's unpreparedness to deal adequately with such an emergency.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

In 1955, President Dwight D. Eisenhower had a major heart attack in the Denver.

[John Feerick]

Church where Ike worshiped in churches and synagogues. All across a shocked nation, America joined in spirit with Vice President Nixon facing grave burdens in a situation not adequately defined by constitutional law.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The President was hospitalized. And right away people started asking, who's going to run the White House while he's on the mend? Well, first place they might go is the Constitution to figure it out. Okay. Article two, section one, clause six of the Constitution says that if the President is no longer able to discharge his duties because of removal from office, death, resignation or inability, then the Vice President assumes the powers and duties of the President. Okay, so then what happens? People quickly realized that the Constitution didn't say anything beyond what was in Article 2. For example, would the Vice President just be a caretaker until a new election was held, or would he be the legitimate president? And so, with President Eisenhower's mounting medical troubles, it wasn't clear who was going to decide if and when the Vice President Richard Nixon, would take over his duties. The two men eventually did work out a deal. Nixon would serve as acting president until Eisenhower returned. Disaster averted. But John Furyk wasn't satisfied.

[John Feerick]

I saw that there was a problem of inability.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Remember, John had experience with this kind of thing and he loved tied to.

[John Feerick]

Interest in the Constitution. So I started to collect information.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

That is an understatement. John began obsessively researching the history of this issue. Even after he graduated and got a job as a lawyer, he kept going.

[John Feerick]

I used to go to the Fordham library at the Rose Hill campus, and if there was a holiday, I worked on it whenever I could. I was putting in a lot of hours at the law firm, and I wanted to take a look at the history of terms of the problem itself.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

What kinds of, like, historical examples were you coming across as you were. As you were digging into the research?

[John Feerick]

Wilbur Wilson. James Garfield.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Okay, here we're going to stop and I'm going to take you on a fun journey into the past. Cases where a president died and there was some lack of clarity about who would take on their role. Let's start with President William Henry Harrison, the ninth president of the United States. His inauguration was on a cold, Rainy Day in 1841. Standing outside in the rain, he gave the longest inaugural speech in American history. He spoke for nearly two hours. Anyway, he came down with pneumonia and died a month later. His vice president, John Tyler, quickly assumed his office. He was the first vice president to become president after the president died. It set up a new precedent because up to that point, no president had died in office. And again, there was no explicit instructions in the Constitution about what to do. But interestingly, President Tyler never appointed a vice president and himself nearly died in a sailing accident three years later. And then there was President James Garfield, the 20th president of the United States. He was shot at a train station in Washington, D.C. in July 1881. He survived, but was severely injured and bedridden for weeks. He wasn't dead, and people tried everything to keep him alive. Even Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor of the telephone, tried his newly created metal detector to help doctors try to find where the bullet was lodged in the president's body. But it didn't work, and Garfield couldn't really function as president as an infection slowly destroyed his body. Garfield ultimately lived for 80 days. And the entire time, many people in the country wondered who should serve as president. There was basically no acting president until Garfield died and the vice president took his place. And finally, there was another famous case, this time from the 20th century. In 1919, Woodrow Wilson, the 28th president of the United States, had a massive stroke which incapacitated him for the remainder of his presidency. Many historians believe his wife, Edith Wilson, was effectively acting as president in his absence for nearly a year and a half until the end of his term. Through his research, John Furyk saw all these cases and realized that even though this problem had come up repeatedly in US History. No one had ever crafted a permanent solution.

[John Feerick]

I was shocked by that.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

And so he decided he was going to channel that shock into writing an article about it.

[John Feerick]

And, of course, being a former editor of the Law Review, I had a pathway to writing about the problem of president's inability. And that became my most important writing.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

His October 1963 article in Fordham Law Review.

[John Feerick]

It was called the Problem of Presidential Inability. Will Congress Ever Solve It?

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The Problem of Presidential Inability. Will Congress Ever Solve It?

[John Feerick]

Question mark?

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Question mark?

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Well, I guess this is the thing, right? Because, you know, you were writing it at a time when John F. Kennedy is in office, a young, you know, strapping president. And I guess I wonder, why did you think this was so important? Like you, it's because it sounds like, I mean, you were spending your weekends, your holidays working on this question. Why did you feel like the average person should even care? Why did you think that that was an important problem to solve?

[John Feerick]

The articles I read and learning that I developed indicated that there was really a major problem here, and they just couldn't get their hands around how to solve it.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

And what, in the most simple terms, was the problem for the average person? And what. What could the potential consequences be of not solving it? I guess.

[John Feerick]

Well, I guess one way to look at it, go back to the Constitutional Convention.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The Constitutional Convention was the big meeting that lasted the entire summer of 1787, where a group of delegates from the American states met in Philadelphia and wrote the U.S. constitution. And they saw this coming, this problem of presidential succession that John was tackling almost 200 years later. The delegates actually discussed it at some.

[John Feerick]

Point in the convention. John Dickinson of Delaware, as I recall, says, what is an ability? He says, who determines what is an inability?

[Rund Abdelfattah]

And he's asking this in, like, 1787, 1787.

[John Feerick]

And so what is an inability? What happens in the case of an inability, so to speak? And who determines it? And nobody answered him.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

What is the threat to the country potentially? Or what is the threat hanging over the country in the event of, you know, an inability of the president?

[John Feerick]

I wrote the article at a time of potential nuclear war. And if something happened to a president.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Who is still alive after an assassination attempt or illness, for example, the consequences.

[John Feerick]

For the country would have been enormous. It would have been a crisis. A flash from Dallas coming up, a.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

President is shot, and John goes to Washington.

[Sponsor Voice]

This is Rachel from the Upper west.

[John Feerick]

Side of Manhattan, and you're listening to Throughline on npr.

[Sponsor Voice]

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[Ramtin Arablouei]

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[Ramtin Arablouei]

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[Ramtin Arablouei]

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[Rund Abdelfattah]

Part 2 the Road to an Amendment.

[John Feerick]

Well, the president was shot in Texas. What is your reaction to that? Well, I tell you, it upsets me very much the because that's the only.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Man that I got my trust in for President.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

On November 22, 1963, when President John F. Kennedy was pronounced dead, John Furich was only two years out of law school.

[John Feerick]

I remember being in a meeting as a young lawyer and receiving a call telling me the president had just been shot. We were all just in a state of shock hearing that.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Even before that day, John was already laser focused on the question of what would happen if a president suddenly couldn't serve for about an hour. There was no official word if JFK was alive or dead. In that uncertainty, John gamed out.

[John Feerick]

The options clearly would have been disabled and we would have had a crisis on our hands. With the ambiguity about the status of a vice president in a case of inability, does he take the office for the rest of the term of that president, even if the president recovers? Or does he be just an acting president for the duration of the inability?

[Ramtin Arablouei]

And Arthur Kroc, a New York Times journalist who'd read John's article about this.

[John Feerick]

Issue, publishes an article and makes reference to My article, what is inability?

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Who raises the question of when it.

[John Feerick]

Has occurred and when it has ended?

[Ramtin Arablouei]

And who resolves these questions when they have been raised? Suppose a disabled president refuses to certify it, or if he asserts it, proclaims.

[John Feerick]

The end of his disability when it still exists. How is the government crisis to be met? I'm totally shocked when somebody told me that I was quoted in the New York Times, they ought to crack. And then I started getting calls.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

One of the best studies of the subject was published by John D. Feerick in the October 1963 issue of the Fordham Law Review. His solution is a constitutional amendment.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Suddenly it looked like you almost predicted.

[John Feerick]

My life changed because somehow I started to get requests for the article.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Things started moving and it became clear that John's writing and ideas could play a role in whatever came next.

[John Feerick]

I realized that elective politics was not for me, but law reform. And communicating through writings, through talks, would be who I am.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Just a few weeks after President Kennedy's assassination, the American Bar association, the aba, announced a meeting called Special Conference on Presidential Inability. The lawyers were ready to dive in. It was scheduled for January 1964, and John was invited to be a part of it.

[John Feerick]

The staff of the aba, they had seen the reference to the article, and they recommended this young lawyer in New York who wrote this article that was quoted in the Times should be invited to be a member of the group.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

All of the lawyers invited to the conference were given background materials in preparation.

[John Feerick]

And the first document to read is my article.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Our strength and survival depend on our having an able leader at the head of the executive branch at all times. The continuity of the executive should never be in doubt. At present it is.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

You had done all the work already? Basically, yeah.

[John Feerick]

Oh, yeah. It was complete. The article was out there.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

A constitutional crisis exists. It is time that Congress act to resolve it once and for all. So John goes to the ABA meeting in January. He's sitting around with all these lawyers. One of them was even an elected politician, Democratic Senator Birch Bayh from Indiana. And they've all read his article, and obviously they have some questions for John.

[John Feerick]

Why an amendment? Is there any issue about whether the President should be able to declare his own inability?

[Ramtin Arablouei]

So basically, can the President decide himself when he's not able to do the job anymore, or should someone else make that call? Should the Vice President? This was tricky territory.

[John Feerick]

If you gave the authority only to the Vice President. The American public are going to see a battle between the the President and the Vice President. And it looked like A coup. It's like a coup.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

In other words, if it's just up to the VP to decide if the President is fit to serve, then what's stopping them from using that power to basically take over the presidency?

[John Feerick]

So all of that we sort of worked through and at the end of the day, put out recommendations.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The biggest one being we need a constitutional amendment. The ABA lawyers, including John, sketched out what this could look like. First they said that if the President is unable to serve, then power goes to the Vice President, who will serve either to the end of the term or until the President is able again. Who decides if the President is unable to serve? Well, the President himself can do that, or the vice President, as long as he has enough votes from the Cabinet or some other body approved by Congress. Okay. So the ABA took these recommendations to Congress.

[John Feerick]

Several of us on the. On the conference also were invited to testify in subsequent days. Do you have some concern that it.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Would be difficult for the vice President and also the Cabinet members to act with the necessary degree of impartiality? Would they be torn between loyalty to the President and the Vice President? I think all of these are legitimate questions for us to discuss before making a final decision.

[John Feerick]

I feel this way, Mr. Chairman.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

First of all, I feel that nobody outside of the Cabinet would have the confidence of the people of the country. Certainly the Cabinet is a body that is recognized as consisting of people close to the President. This is from John Furyk's testimony in Congress. It wasn't recorded, so it's being reenacted here. Senator Birch Bayh is asking the questions. In other words, you don't think removal of a disabled President is something to be taken lightly?

[John Feerick]

Not at all, Senator.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

I feel very strongly that any provision which we adopt should be weighed as heavily in favor of the President as possible, because it seems to me that this is the single greatest institution we have, and I would be very reluctant to see us set up a commission consisting of people who were neither appointed or elected. Eventually, a draft of a constitutional amendment worked its way through Congress with Senator Birch Bayh leading the way.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

This is top priority at this point.

[John Feerick]

Yeah, it was magnificent.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

It didn't immediately succeed. Congress adjourned without the House voting on it. But Senator Birch Bayh didn't give up. In 1965, he introduced it again.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

How directly were you involved in terms of the deliberations on, you know, the Senate and House floors? Were you, like, you know, running papers to people, taking notes? Like, how directly were you involved in that whole process?

[John Feerick]

Well, in many Ways. I had several roles.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

First, as an organizer, he became a part of the ABA's Young Lawyers Committee on Presidential Inability and Vice presidential Vacancy.

[John Feerick]

I did the best I could to energize the young lawyers of America. And we were very active talking to the members of Congress from our state, both the House and the Senate.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Second, educating lawyers and the public about the amendment.

[John Feerick]

I wrote articles on it in the ABA Journal. So in the ABA Journal at the time, today we got social media. We get so many publications. But at that time, that was an important publication. So the lawyers are getting educated all over America.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

You're educating them.

[John Feerick]

So you were educating them.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

You were really like shepherding it.

[John Feerick]

It sounds like people were carrying the material and the literature and passing it on.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

I mean, that's the part of all this, you know, that I think it's easy to forget. Like you're still in your. You're in your 20s, you're pretty fresh out of law school when all this is happening. Like, it must have been a whirlwind to just be literally on the front lines of shaping the Constitution.

[John Feerick]

Well, I was so busy, I don't think I focused on what was really happening. You know, I was working as a practicing lawyer. I was putting in a lot of time.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

So after months of organizing and educating and Senator Birch Bayh working his colleagues trying to get their votes, the bill was reintroduced.

[John Feerick]

And when that was introduced in January 65, it had 70 sponsors in the Senate. They all wanted to get their name on it.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The bill passed both houses of Congress. But in order for the bill to become an Amendment to the U.S. constitution, 3ths of state legislatures had to ratify it. It's very time consuming and difficult to achieve. But in 1967, two years after the bill was introduced, the 25th Amendment to the US Constitution was ratified. John Feerick's dream had become a real.

[John Feerick]

At the White House, a vital piece of legislation reaches President Johnson's desk. It's the 25th Constitutional Amendment providing for the replacement of any disabled president or the filling of any vice presidential vacancy.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The 25th Amendment has four sections. The first three are straightforward. Basically, collectively, they say that when a president is removed from office or dies or resigns, the vice President automatically becomes president. If a vice President dies or resigns, then the President nominates a replacement, and that person has to be approved by votes from both houses of Congress. If a President sends a letter to Congress saying they can't continue their duties because they're unable physically or mentally, then the vice President takes on the president's duties until the president can do it again or there's another election.

[John Feerick]

Availing myself of the constitutional option, all to this Office by Section 3 of the 25th Amendment, which permits through a written declaration to temporarily transfer all powers of the presidency to the next in the constitutional line of succession.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Anyone else who watches the show, the West Wing like me, might remember when President Bartlett invoked the 25th Amendment after his daughter was kidnapped, there was no vice president, so he handed power to the speaker of the House.

[John Feerick]

I want it as clear as can be that this administration stands squarely behind and shoulder to shoulder with the acting president.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Then there's Section four, the longest section, the most controversial one. It basically says that the vice president and the cabinet or some other body designated by Congress can determine if the president is unable to serve. If they get together and vote that the president is mentally or physically incapacitated, then the vice president will assume the powers and duties of the president.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

I'm wondering if you can explain what the thinking was in terms of making it pretty, you know, like a really high bar, essentially, to get to the point where a president is being declared, you know, as having an inability.

[John Feerick]

We start with the principle that people choose a president, as we recently did, for a term of four years. And that's a major part of the Constitution. So the amendment makes it clear. It goes to Congress, the vote is in two houses and it takes 2/3 of each house. And it was felt that that was really protective of the four year term and nobody wanted to process uninhabited. We got to make an instant decision and it could be a crisis if you don't make it. President's plane went down. You can't find the president, whatever it might be.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Coming up, the 25th amendment gets its first test.

[John Feerick]

Hi, my name is Alastair Hetting and I am a professor of history at Muskingham University in New Concord, Ohio. I often use your show in my classes. You are listening to throughline from NPR.

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[Ramtin Arablouei]

Part 3 the 25th before Richard Nixon resigned in 1974 following the Watergate scandal, there was his vice president, Spuro Agnew.

[John Feerick]

The American people deserve to have a vice president who commands their unimpaired confidence and implicit trust. For more than two months now, you have not had such a vice president.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

During the Watergate investigation, which implicated Nixon in a major political scandal that was rocking the country, a separate investigation was happening involving Agnew. There were allegations that he had been involved in bribery while serving in Maryland politics, including his role as governor Agnew. Agnew called these allegations damned lies and at least to the public, Nixon backed him.

[John Feerick]

The charges that have been made against him and which he has denied publicly, he has denied to me privately on three occasions.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

But the pressure for Agnew to resign was growing. He told Nixon first in October 1973, then he told the country on national television.

[John Feerick]

In this technological age, image becomes dominant. Appearance supersedes reality. An appearance of wrongdoing, whether true or false in fact, is damaging to any man. But more important, it is fatal to a man who must be ready at any moment to step into the presidency.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Spiro Agnew's resignation left Richard Nixon without a vice President, which meant that six years after the 25th Amendment was ratified, it got its first test. The amendment has four parts. The one that concerns the vice presidency is Section 2.

[John Feerick]

Section 2.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

John Furich, who helped draft the 25th Amendment, reads it for us Whenever there's.

[John Feerick]

A vacancy in the office of the Vice President, the President shall nominate a Vice President who shall take office upon confirmation by a majority vote of both houses of Congress. And it was used for the first and only time during the period of 1973 and 74 when the Vice President resigned from office. The President Nixon was able to nominate Gerald Ford, the minority leader of the House of Representatives, to be the new Vice President, who was confirmed within two months after the nomination on today, having confirmed the nomination of Gerald R. Ford of the State of Michigan to be Vice President of the United States. The proceedings required by Section 2 of the 25th Amendment to the United States Constitution have been complied with.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

So Gerald Ford became the vice president. Then the following year, President Richard Nixon resigned, which meant that under the 25th Amendment, Section 1, newly confirmed Vice President Ford would now become President Ford. He then nominated his new vice president again under Section 2, Nelson Rockefeller. So within a year, the 25th Amendment was invoked three separate times.

[John Feerick]

We never speculated about that scenario, that's for sure. I mean, we'd never had anything like that in our history.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Right. As someone who had helped to build this amendment that was becoming very, very critical in this chaotic moment around the Watergate scandal, what did that look like for you, realizing this was having a very, very direct impact on the country's future?

[John Feerick]

I was just thrilled, obviously, like so many of us, because Watergate was terrible. But keep in mind, process involved both houses of Congress filling a vacancy and a vice presidency. And every district in the country had a representative in Congress. They wanted to get as close to the people as possible without a popular election, because you'd have an Electoral College election and the House had to be included in every district in the country.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

This wouldn't be the only time the 25th Amendment would be invoked. Section 3, which allows the President to initiate a power transfer that was used once by Ronald Reagan, twice by President George W. Bush, and once by President Joe Biden, all for being under anesthesia for medical procedures. The only part of the amendment that has never been used is. Is Section four. That's the one where power is taken from the president. It basically says that the vice president and the Cabinet can determine if the president is unable to serve if they get together and vote that the president is physically or mentally incapacitated, then the vice president will assume the powers and duties of the president as acting president. Section four almost had to be invoked when President Ronald Reagan was shot in 1981. A bullet was about an inch from Reagan's heart, and he had to undergo surgery, but it wasn't invoked. People also mentioned section 4 more recently when talking about former President Joe Biden's age and when President Trump's opponents questioned his capacity to lead at the end of his first term. But so far, all that discussion has only been hypothetical.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Obviously impossible to predict the future. But I am curious, given your lifetime of work on all sorts of issues relating to the Constitution, and we have been working on a series about amendments, and this is one of the last amendments to have ever been passed, what do you think is the future of the 25th Amendment, specifically, and the amendment process generally?

[John Feerick]

I do think at the end of the day, we've been through a lot of issues in our country's history. We had, you know, the Confederacy and long time before women could vote, participate, African American women, even when other women could vote. And we've gotten been able to move beyond that. The way I see the world, I respect our Constitution. I hear presidents of both parties say, talk about the Constitution as part of their advocacy. It's a written Constitution. It's been the longest written Constitution in the history of the world. And it makes clear from the start the sovereignty of the people, we the people. And if you want to change the Constitution, it's not easy. But I don't rule out another constitutional amendment, even though it's very hard. And I have the confidence that the American people, whether you understand the Constitution or not, you do understand there's something out there called the Constitution.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

It's rare to hear someone speak hopefully about any of this. Frankly, today it feels like the popular sentiment is despair. Is pessimism what fuels your hope?

[John Feerick]

Well, I said to students the other day, we all have an obligation as lawyers to keep hope alive because of the rule of law and our Constitution. It's not easy, but that doesn't mean it can't be done. I'm not somebody who gives up hope. And I was just that young lawyer that thought that Congress should do something about the 25th Amendment.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

I feel like it's especially, you know, I don't know, powerful kind of having this conversation with you sitting here in Fordham where like all this began. And I think it's kind of beautiful that you're here. Like, it's sort of a nice of you.

[John Feerick]

I mean, that just it's, you know, when I read the pages in there last night, you know, I wouldn't be able to do that today. And it brought back a lot of, a lot of memories of people who are all gone, you know, and, and yet, like myself, had a belief in America.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

That's it for this week's show. I'm Ramtin Arablouei.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

I'm Rund Abdelfattah and you've been listening to Throughline from npr.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

This episode was produced by me and.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Me and Lawrence Wu Zhu Kay, Anya.

[Sponsor Voice]

Steinberg, Casey Miner, Christina Kim, Devin Katayama, Sarah Wyman, Irene Noguchi.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

And a special thank you to Sarah Wyman, who did most of the reporting and writing for this episode. You are amazing and we miss you here at Throughline.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Voiceover work in this episode was done by Neal Rauch and Zach Forrest.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Thank you to Johnnette Oaks, Keandre star Johannes Durkee, Tony Cavan, Nadia Lancy, Edith Chapin and Colin Campbell.

[Rund Abdelfattah]

Fact checking for this episode was done by Kevin Voelkel. This episode was mixed by Robert Rodriguez. Music for this episode was composed by Ramtin and his band Drop Electric, which.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Includes Naveed Marvi, Sho Fujiwara, Anya Mizani. And finally, if you have an idea or like something you heard on the show, write [e-mail] thanks for listening.

[Sponsor Voice]

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[Ramtin Arablouei]

Earn unlimited double miles on everything you buy, plus get premium benefits at a.

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