President’s Day

Washington's_Inauguration — “I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States. Except, of course, in the last quarter of my term.” – George Washington, 1789 (image credit)

Apropos of absolutely nothing but the fact that today is President’s Day, I was reminded earlier that it’s time for my annual perusal of Article II of the U.S. Constitution.

During this year’s reading – again, for reasons entirely unrelated to any events that might have transpired over the weekend – a couple of clauses really grabbed me:

Section 1: [The President of the United States] shall hold his office during the term of four years …

Section 2: … and he shall nominate, and by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint … judges of the Supreme Court …

Straightforward enough, right? The president gets to be president for four years at a time, and it’s the president’s job to appoint new Supreme Court justices. Two simple but all-important mandates from the majestic scroll that governs this great republic.

But why did these clauses, in particular, stand out to me?

Well, I kinda lied about it having nothing to do the events of this past weekend. You see, despite my usual aversion to hard drugs, it seems that on Saturday evening I slipped into a feverish crack dream in which a sudden vacancy on the Supreme Court drove America insane.

In this dream, a pack of crazed, power-hungry horror clowns shrieked at the prospect of the sitting president nominating a new justice. He should wait, they snarled between gnaws of each other’s flesh-stripped clown bones, for one of them to take his place so they could fill the vacancy with their Dark Lord Pennywise.

Meanwhile, Senator Jowly McChickenjowls tried to convince America that Article II was little more than a flight of whimsy dreamed up in a sappy Aaron Sorkin drama. He claimed that executive power goes limp after three years, and vowed the Senate wouldn’t advise and consent to the president’s Netflix queue, let alone any judicial nominee he had the stones to field in an election year.

The argument went that only a mad, ruthless tyrant would seek to fill a high court vacancy before the people (no, not those people – some other people) had had their say. These opponents claimed that doing so would shatter a precious American tradition that had stood for millennia, and swore on the holy shrine of their sainted Spirit Father that the exact same transgression definitely hadn’t occurred 28 years earlier.

For his part, the tweedy Constitution-nerd of a president stubbornly refused to heed these concerns, ignoring, as usual, those who only asked that he relinquish all power, admit his election(s) had been a freak accident of history, and hurl himself into the fiery abyss. Instead, always the lame-ass stickler, he promptly announced his intent to keep on doing president stuff and comply with his Article II, Section 2 directive.

At this, the Senate’s Meathead Caucus – while confessing that none of them had ever actually gazed upon the Sacred Parchment (but promising they would totally get to it at some point) – howled that this outrageous power grab was SOOOOO not cool, and threatened to run President Poindexter’s court-packing shorts up the filibuster flagpole.

Yes, they were ready to risk a republic-torching constitutional crisis just to show that goody-goody buzzkill in the White House what’s what. Because patriotism.

Now it’s Monday, and what a relief that I’ve awoken to sweet, serene reality. No cynical hacks selectively voiding Article II clauses. No nakedly partisan attempts to diminish the president’s effective tenure. No IDGAF denial of the chief executive’s right to nominate Supreme Court justices. Because that’s the kind of insanity that can only be conjured in the fog of a psychedelic night terror.

Thankfully, we exist in a world where responsible Constitutional Conservatives are running the show – righteous guardians who would never subvert a single clause of our cherished founding document, or ever dream of shirking their own constitutional obligations.

So, reassured in the knowledge that Article II of the Constitution still stands, and that the unbridled fuckery of a constitutional showdown isn’t upon us, it’s time for me to go online for the first time since Saturday morning and see what news, if any, may have broken over the weekend.

Happy President’s Day.

Dear friends, I would like to wish you all a very happy President’s Day! Allow me to share with you my holiday salute to all the oath-swearing, veto-wielding, armed-forces-commanding players of the Executive Branch gang, including:

220px-Gilbert_Stuart_Williamstown_Portrait_of_George_Washington — “Money”

220px-Abraham_Lincoln_November_1863 — “Stretch”

170px-Official_portrait_of_Barack_Obama — “Long-Form”

As you might already know, I’m a big ol’ U.S. presidents buff (and have been since 5th grade when I memorized all of the presidents’ names, you know, for fun). So how does a guy like me celebrate this most exciting of holidays? By not going to work, for one thing. (Thank the Maker for bank holidays.) Also, by posting a list of random but totally interesting facts about U.S. presidents. Nothing too heavy here. Just a few of my favorite bits of presidential trivia. It’s geeky holiday fun for the whole family. So read, learn, and above all, enjoy!

Did you know that:

George Washington wore dentures made of hippopotamus tusk.

John Adams died on the 50th anniversary of American independence: July 4th, 1826. His reported last words were, “Thomas Jefferson Survives.” But he was incorrect, as Jefferson died on the exact same day, several hours earlier.

Thomas Jefferson ordered a list of his major accomplishments to be inscribed on his tombstone. This inscription omits the fact that he had been president for eight years.

James Madison was the shortest U.S. president, at 5 feet 4 inches tall.

James Monroe was the last president of the Founding Fathers Generation, and in 1830 he became the third (and, to date, the last) president to die on the Fourth of July.

John Quincy Adams was known for routinely skinny dipping in the Potomac River.

Andrew Jackson is said to have exchanged pistol-fire in anywhere from a dozen to over 100 duels throughout his life. The future president famously killed expert marksman Charles Dickinson in their 1806 “interview.”

Martin Van Buren was the first president born a U.S. citizen (his predecessors were all born British subjects), and was the only president for whom English was a second language (Dutch being his first).

William Henry Harrison had the shortest presidency, dying from pneumonia 32 days after he was sworn in.

John Tyler was elected to the Confederate Congress during the Civil War. He died in 1862, in open rebellion against the nation over which he had once presided.

Zachary Taylor was the father-in-law of Confederate president Jefferson Davis.

James Buchanan was the only president to have never married.

Abraham Lincoln created the U.S. Secret Service – to combat rampant counterfeiting – on the day of his assassination in 1865. The agency assumed presidential-protection duty in 1902 in response to the assassination of William McKinley.

Ulysses S. Grant, heroic Union general of the Civil War, couldn’t stand the sight of blood.

James A. Garfield was ambidextrous, and could write simultaneously in Greek with one hand and Latin with the other.

Grover Cleveland had part of his upper jaw surgically removed early in his second term. For the purpose of secrecy, the operation took place aboard a friend’s private yacht as it sailed off of the coast of Long Island.

Theodore Roosevelt, while campaigning for a third presidential term in 1912, delivered a 90-minute speech only moments after taking a would-be assassin’s bullet in the chest.

William Howard Taft became Chief Justice of the Supreme Court after leaving the presidency. As such, he was the only president to administer the oath of office to subsequent presidents (Coolidge and Hoover).

Woodrow Wilson was the only president to hold a Ph.D. (in political science, from Johns Hopkins University).

Calvin Coolidge was the only president born on Independence Day (1872).

Herbert Hoover, a native of Iowa, was the first person born west of the Mississippi River to become president.

Franklin D. Roosevelt married his fifth-cousin, Eleanor, who opted to keep her maiden name: Roosevelt. At their wedding, Eleanor was given away by her uncle, then-president Theodore Roosevelt.

Harry Truman was the last president to have never attended college.

Dwight D. Eisenhower had never voted prior to running for president in 1952.

John F. Kennedy was the youngest person to be elected president, winning the office at age 43. (Teddy Roosevelt became president at 42, but only by succeeding his assassinated predecessor, William McKinley.)

Lyndon B. Johnson had a wife, two daughters, and a dog, all with the initials LBJ (Lady Bird, Luci Baines, Lynda Bird, and Little Beagle Johnson).

Richard Nixon was the only president to be succeeded by an appointed (rather than elected) vice president – Gerald Ford.

Gerald Ford was the longest-lived president, dying at the age of 93 years and 165 days. (Reagan was a close second, living only 45 fewer days).

Ronald Reagan was the only president to have been divorced. He split from his first wife, Jane Wyman, in 1948, and married Nancy Davis in 1952.

George H.W. Bush, at age 19, was the youngest Naval aviator of World War II.

Bill Clinton was the first president to have his inaugural ceremony broadcast live on the Internet.

Barack Obama holds the record for both first and second most popular votes ever received by a presidential candidate. (69.5 million in 2008 and 65.9 million in 2012).

Did you also know that …

James is the most common first name among the presidents (6). John comes in second (5), and William is third (4).

Virginia is the most popular state for presidential births (8), with Ohio coming in a close second (7). Massachusetts and New York are tied for third (4 each).

There have been 47 vice presidents, but only 14 of them have advanced to the presidency.

The vice presidency was originally awarded not to a president’s running mate, but to the second-place winner in the Electoral College. It was only after the 1804 ratification of the 12th Amendment, which allowed the electors to cast separate votes for president and vice president, that candidates for each office began teaming up on tandem partisan tickets.

Abigail Adams holds the unique distinction of being both the first Second Lady and the second First Lady.

Hillary Clinton, as Secretary of State, became the only First Lady to enter the presidential line of succession (4th in line, to be exact).

Robert Todd Lincoln, in addition to having attended his father’s deathbed, was an eyewitness to the shooting of James Garfield, and was a presidential guest at the event where William McKinley was gunned down. His uncanny association with this string of untimely presidential deaths led Lincoln to refuse all invitations to appear publicly with subsequent presidents. The one exception he made was an appearance with Warren G. Harding at the dedication of the Lincoln Memorial in 1922. Harding suffered a fatal heart attack the following year.

Three presidents have tied the knot during their presidencies, Grover Cleveland being the only one to wed at the White House (and also the only one to have a child born inside the executive mansion).

The private-market value of the White House is estimated to be roughly $295 million.