The Vice Presidency: Evolution of the Modern Office, 1933-2001

The Vice Presidency: Evolution of the Modern Office, 1933-2001

Order Code RL30842
CRS Report for Congress
Received through the CRS Web
The Vice Presidency:
Evolution of the Modern Office,
1933-2001
February 13, 2001
-name redacted-
Specialist in American National Government
Government and Finance Division
Congressional Research Service ˜ The Library of Congress

The Vice Presidency: Evolution of the Modern Office,
1933-2001
Summary
Something of an afterthought, the vice presidential office came to the attention
of the delegates to the constitutional convention in the closing days of their
deliberations in 1787. The Vice President’s constitutional mandate vested him with
two responsibilities: presiding over the deliberations of the Senate and standing by to
succeed to the presidency in the event of the incumbent’s death. For the next 140
years, those holding the vice presidential office served only these functions. Indeed,
the Vice President soon came to be regarded as a legislative branch official.
However, for six incumbents during this period, their service was particularly
important to the nation when they succeeded to the presidency.
Although some Vice Presidents informally provided advice to the Presidents with
whom they served, the inclusion of the Vice President in Cabinet deliberations did not
occur until the second decade of the 20th century. Consequently, Cabinet members
usually were more and better informed about the policies and practices of an
administration than the man who might be required to lead that administration in the
event of the President’s death. Woodrow Wilson fractured the precedent in 1919
when he requested his Vice President to preside over a few Cabinet meetings while
he was in France negotiating the treaty of peace concluding World War I. Thereafter,
President Warren Harding regularly included his Vice President in Cabinet sessions,
and with the presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt, the practice became tradition.
Moreover, President Roosevelt began to make other uses of the Vice President as an
arm of the presidency, launching the modern version of this office.
This report reviews the evolution of the modern vice presidency—the historical
events and developments that have contributed to the expansion of the office beyond
its largely legislative branch character to include diverse and important executive
branch duties. It will be updated as changing conditions and circumstances
recommend.

Contents
Expanded Responsibilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
John N. Garner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Henry A. Wallace . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Harry S. Truman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Alben W. Barkley . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Richard M. Nixon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Lyndon B. Johnson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Hubert H. Humphrey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Spiro T. Agnew . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
Gerald R. Ford . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Nelson A. Rockefeller . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Walter F. Mondale . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
George H. W. Bush . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Danforth Quayle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Albert Gore, Jr. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Richard B. Cheney . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Appendix 1: Presidents and Vice Presidents of the United States . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Appendix 2: Institutionalization of the Vice President’s Executive Office . . . . 24

The Vice Presidency: Evolution of the
Modern Office, 1933-2001
Something of an afterthought, the vice presidential office came to the attention
of the delegates to the constitutional convention in the closing days of their
deliberations in 1787. The Vice President’s constitutional mandate vested him with
two responsibilities: presiding over the deliberations of the Senate and standing by to
succeed to the presidency in the event of the incumbent’s death. For the next 140
years, those holding the vice presidential office served only these functions. Indeed,
the Vice President soon came to be regarded as a legislative branch official.
However, for six incumbents during this period, their service was particularly
important to the nation when they succeeded to the presidency. They included John
Tyler, Millard Fillmore, Andrew Johnson, Chester A. Arthur, Theodore Roosevelt,
and Calvin Coolidge.
Although some Vice Presidents informally provided advice to the Presidents with
whom they served, the inclusion of the Vice President in Cabinet deliberations did not
occur until the second decade of the 20th century. Consequently, Cabinet members
usually were more and better informed about the policies and practices of an
administration than the man who might be required to lead that administration in the
event of the President’s death. Woodrow Wilson fractured the precedent in 1919
when he requested Vice President Thomas R. Marshall to preside over a few Cabinet
meetings while he was in France negotiating the treaty of peace concluding World
War I. Thereafter, President Warren G. Harding regularly included Vice President
Calvin Coolidge in Cabinet sessions. Elected to the presidency in 1924, Coolidge
invited Vice President Charles G. Dawes to Cabinet meetings, but he declined.
During the tenure of Herbert C. Hoover, Vice President Charles Curtis only
occasionally attended Cabinet deliberations. With the presidency of Franklin D.
Roosevelt, however, the practice of including the Vice President in the Cabinet
became tradition. Moreover, President Roosevelt began to make other uses of Vice
President John N. Garner as an arm of the presidency, launching the modern version
of this office.1
Expanded Responsibilities
During the latter half of the 19th century, broader thinking about other roles the
Vice President might play began to be evidenced. When Congress chartered the
Smithsonian Institution in 1846, the Vice President was statutorily designated a
1Appendix 1 of this report identifies those individuals who held the position of Vice President
and the Presidents with whom they served.

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member of its Board of Regents.2 Various editions of the Congressional Directory,
the official almanac of Congress, reveal that James S. Sherman served as chairman of
the congressional Commission on Enlarging the Capitol Grounds in 1911; Thomas R.
Marshall was a member of the Arlington Memorial Bridge Commission from 1914 to
1921, succeeded by Calvin Coolidge during 1921-1923, Charles G. Dawes during
1925-1929, Charles Curtis during 1929-1933, and John N. Garner during the final
months of 1933. Similarly, Dawes became a member of the congressional
Commission on Enlarging the Capitol Grounds in 1925, and was succeeded by Curtis,
who chaired the panel, and Garner, who also chaired. In addition, beginning in 1925,
Dawes, Curtis, and Garner were successively ex officio members of the Commission
for the Celebration of the 200th Anniversary of the Birth of George Washington.
John N. Garner
A veteran of the legislature, John N. Garner came to the vice presidency on
March 4, 1933, when he was 64 years old. A lawyer by training, he served as a judge
in Uvalde County, Texas, during 1893-1896; moved on to the Texas House of
Representatives in 1898; and then to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1903,
where he served for the next 30 years. He was chosen House minority leader in 1928,
and was elected Speaker in 1931. A life-long Democrat, Garner has been described
as a Jeffersonian, a man who thought that “we have too many laws,” and who
believed in limited government—confined to protecting the lives and property rights
of citizens.3 He enjoyed the support of newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst
as a presidential candidate in 1932, and won the California primary contest in May.
Placed in nomination at the Democratic national convention in Chicago in June,
Garner found himself locked in a stalemate with Franklin D. Roosevelt and two other
rivals. Breaking the deadlock, Hearst prevailed upon Garner, who was in
Washington, to release his delegates to Roosevelt. In doing so, Garner gained
sufficient favor with FDR that he was selected as his running mate.4 For many,
Garner was viewed as a counterweight to the progressive, internationalist Roosevelt.
He subsequently found himself in opposition to the administration’s deficit spending
policy, attempt to enlarge the composition of the Supreme Court, and some New Deal
legislative initiatives. He was also among those in his party who opposed a third term
for President Roosevelt.
Like his predecessors, Garner, as Vice President, maintained offices on Capitol
Hill, but he did not regard himself as primarily a legislative officer. He regularly
attended and actively participated in Cabinet meetings, often advised the President,
and, particularly during the early years of the New Deal, often provided liaison to
Congress. Although the Vice President was not among those formally designated to
attend the deliberations of the emergency coordinating councils successively created
2 9 Stat. 102.
3 Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., The Crisis of the Old Order, 1919-1933 (Boston: Houghton
Mifflin, 1957), p. 228.
4 Ibid., pp. 307-309.

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by the President,5 there is evidence that Garner was welcomed to, and did attend, a
few meetings of the National Emergency Council.6 In 1935, after traveling with a
congressional delegation—the first instance of a Vice President going abroad—for
the installation of Manuel Quezon as the president of the Philippine Islands and to
Japan to visit Emperor Hirohito, Garner undertook a foreign assignment for FDR,
journeying to Mexico.7
Henry A. Wallace
Twenty years younger than Garner, Henry A. Wallace, trained in agricultural
science, successor to his father as the editor of his family’s farm magazine, and a
former Republican, became an active supporter of FDR in 1932. He joined the
Roosevelt Administration as Secretary of Agriculture in 1933, remaining in that
position until September 1940, when he resigned to accept the Democratic
nomination for Vice President. Serving the entirety of Roosevelt’s third term,
Wallace found his presidential ambitions stymied by FDR’s decision to seek reelection
in 1944. Furthermore, Wallace’s liberal, internationalist views had produced strong
opposition among party leaders to his renomination as Roosevelt’s vice presidential
running mate. Three months after his vice presidential term ended, he was nominated
to be Secretary of Commerce, a position he held until September 1946, when
President Harry S. Truman asked him to resign because of a speech attacking the
administration’s foreign policy toward the Soviet Union.
FDR selected Wallace to join him on the Democratic ticket in 1940 largely
because he wanted a Vice President who was an internationalist, aware of world
conditions, and especially alert to the menace of Nazism. War had begun in Europe
in September 1939, but the United States remained officially neutral, even though
American weaponry was being sold to Great Britain and France. Vice President
Wallace could express critical views about the actions of Germany and Italy that the
President, in view of official neutrality policy, could not. Shortly after the election,
Roosevelt dispatched the Spanish-speaking Wallace to Mexico as his representative
at the presidential inauguration of Avila Camacho, a move designed to gain Mexican
support for Pan-Americanism and hemispheric defense.8 Later, in 1943, Wallace
5 These were the Executive Council, created by E.O. 6202-A of July 11, 1933; the National
Emergency Council, established by E.O. 6433-A of Nov. 17, 1933; and the reconstituted
National Emergency Council mandated by E.O. 6889-A of Oct. 29, 1934.
6 These include the meetings of Jan. 23, 1934; Jan. 8 and Feb. 5, 1935; and Jan. 28, 1936.
See Lester G. Seligman and Elmer E. Cornwell, Jr., eds., New Deal Mosaic: Roosevelt
Confers with His National Emergency Council, 1933-1936 (Eugene, OR: University of
Oregon Books, 1965), pp. 48, 68-69, 76, 400, 425, 426, 432-434, 437, 439-440, 502, 507,
516-517, 521.
7 Irving G. Williams, The Rise of the Vice Presidency (Washington, DC: Public Affairs,
1956), pp. 161-162.
8 Ibid., pp. 182-183.

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made a goodwill tour of Latin America.9 The following year, he served as FDR’s
emissary to Soviet Siberia and China.10
When the President established the Economic Defense Board (later known as the
Board of Economic Warfare) in July 1941, “for the purpose of developing and
coordinating policies, plans, and programs designed to protect and strengthen the
international economic relations of the United States in the interest of national
defense,” Wallace was made its chairman.11 Shortly thereafter, he was made chairman
of a related defense coordination entity, the Supply Priorities and Allocations Board.12
In October 1941, Wallace joined Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson, Army Chief of
Staff George C. Marshall, presidential science adviser Vannevar Bush, and Harvard
University president James B. Conant as a member of the President’s policy
committee on the development and use of atomic energy.13 A few weeks later, after
the attack on Pearl Harbor, Wallace “alone attended both of the conferences President
Roosevelt held that Sunday evening with the Cabinet and legislative leaders.”14
Harry S. Truman
A farmer, World War I veteran, small businessman, and county judge in his home
state of Missouri, Harry S. Truman was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1934 and served
there until 1945 when he took the vice presidential oath. As a Senator, he came to
be known as a man of personal integrity, a reputation that grew as a result of his
chairmanship of the Senate Special Committee to Investigate the National Defense
Program. The panel’s various inquiries and remedial recommendations resulted in
many economies and better equipment and conditions for armed services personnel.15
President Roosevelt selected Truman as his 1944 running mate after strong opposition
developed among some party leaders regarding the renomination of Vice President
Henry A. Wallace. In an ironic twist, Truman helped secure Senate approval of his
predecessor’s appointment to be Secretary of Commerce in 1945. After serving only
82 days as Vice President, Truman suddenly found himself elevated to the presidency
when FDR died on April 12, 1945. During his brief vice presidential tenure, Truman
had been told very little by the very ill and very preoccupied President—American
development of the atomic bomb being one of the more important nonadmissions.16
9 Michael Dorman, The Second Man (New York: Delacorte, 1968), p. 155.
10 Williams, The Rise of the Vice Presidency, pp. 202-204.
11 See E.O. 8839, 3 C.F.R., 1938-1943 Comp., pp. 972-973; Dorman, The Second Man, pp.
pp. 152-155; Williams, The Rise of the Vice Presidency, pp. 186-188, 191-199.
12 See E.O. 8875, 3 C.F.R., 1938-1943 Comp., pp. 993-995.
13 Williams, The Rise of the Vice Presidency, p. 188.
14 Ibid., p. 190.
15 See Donald H. Riddle, The Truman Committee: A Study in Congressional Responsibility
(New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1964).
16 Truman’s Senate committee investigators had come upon evidence of the so-called
Manhattan Project for developing the atomic bomb, but when he confronted the Secretary of
(continued...)

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Alben W. Barkley
Seven years older than President Truman, Alben Barkley practiced law in his
native Kentucky, serving both as a county prosecutor and judge for a few years prior
to being elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, where he served from 1913
through the early months of 1927. He successfully ran for the Senate in 1926, and
remained in that institution until being sworn in as Vice President on January 20,
1949. During his Senate tenure, Barkley was the Democratic majority leader during
1937-1947 and minority leader in 1947-1948. After his vice presidential service, he
was again elected to the Senate in 1954, serving there until his death in April 1956.
In the Senate, Barkley had admired Truman, instinctively, because he “voted
right.”17 That admiration did not dim when FDR selected Truman as his running mate
in 1944, a position Barkley himself sought. Actually, it was the President Roosevelt’s
maneuvering that angered Barkley, despite his selection to nominate FDR as the
party’s presidential candidate.18 Four years later, Barkley arrived at the position he
had sought. Although, by one estimate, “his term of office saw little significant
activity,” he did “provide a useful link to Congress at times.”19 Barkley also regularly
attended and participated in Cabinet deliberations; became the first Vice President to
sit on the National Security Council,20 which was “considered the most meaningful
advance in the vice presidency until that time;”21 and once flew to the front lines in
Korea to eat Thanksgiving dinner with American troops.22 Moreover, he “represented
Truman at all sorts of political meetings, community events and other occasions
throughout the United States and abroad.”23 Indeed, he thought well enough of
Barkley that, despite some misgivings regarding the Vice President’s age, Truman
was prepared to endorse him as the party’s presidential candidate in 1952.24
16(...continued)
War with their findings, he was strongly advised to drop his inquiry, which he did. See
Theodore Wilson, “The Truman Committee,” in Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., and Roger Bruns,
eds., Congress Investigates: A Documented History, 1792-1974, vol. 4 (New York: Chelsea
House, 1975), pp. 3134-3135.
17 David McCullough, Truman (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1992), pp. 220, 226.
18 Ibid., p. 313.
19 Joel K. Goldstein, The Modern American Vice Presidency (Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press, 1982), p. 137.
20 See 63 Stat. 578, adding the Vice President to the statutorily specified members of the
National Security Council.
21 Dorman, The Second Man, p. 193.
22 Ibid., pp. 193-194; Williams, The Rise of the Vice Presidency, p. 233.
23 Dorman, The Second Man, p. 194.
24 Harry S. Truman, Years of Trial and Hope (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1956), p. 495.

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Richard M. Nixon
The man who did receive the Democratic presidential nomination in 1952 was
Adlai E. Stevenson, Jr., not Alben Barkley. He was overwhelmed in the subsequent
election by the very popular Dwight D. Eisenhower, who had Richard M. Nixon as
his running mate. Trained as an attorney, Nixon had practiced law for a few years,
worked briefly for the Office for Emergency Management in Washington, DC, and
then entered naval service during World War II. Returning to civilian life in 1946,
Nixon successfully ran for the House of Representatives, serving there from 1947
through 1950. Successfully elected to the Senate in November 1950, he took his seat
early, the following month, with an appointment to fill a vacancy. He left the Senate
on January 20, 1953, to begin serving as Vice President.
By one estimate, Nixon “exercised greater power and responsibility in the 1953-
57 term than had any of his predecessors” as Vice President.25 An active presidential
liaison with Congress and presidential representative in Republican political
campaigns, he also served Eisenhower as a special envoy, undertaking seven such
missions, during which he visited 54 countries.26
Nixon also filled some important institutional roles. He attended 163 Cabinet
meetings, 19 of which, in accordance with President Eisenhower’s instructions, he
chaired; and of the 217 National Security Council sessions at which he was present,
Nixon presided over 26 of these gatherings.27 Other duties included chairing the
Government Contract Committee. Establishing by the President with E.O. 10479 of
August 13, 1953, the panel was mandated to enforce antidiscrimination clauses in
government contracts with private businesses.28 Reporting in early 1955, the
committee indicated it had secured compliance in 37 of 79 cases and continued its
efforts during the years of Eisenhower’s presidency until it was superseded by the
President’s Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity in 1961.29 Early in 1959,
when Eisenhower created the Cabinet Committee on Price Stability for Economic
Growth to recommend policies to control inflation, he made Nixon the panel’s
chairman.30
Lyndon B. Johnson
Although Nixon sought to succeed President Eisenhower, he narrowly lost the
1960 election to John F. Kennedy, who had selected Lyndon B. Johnson as his
25 Williams, The Rise of the Vice Presidency, p. 235.
26 Goldstein, The Modern American Vice Presidency, p. 159.
27 Ibid., p. 168.
28 3 C.F.R., 1949-1953 Comp., pp. 961-962.
29 Williams, The Rise of the Vice Presidency, p. 248; 3 C.F.R., 1959-1963 Comp., pp. 448-
454.
30 U.S. General Services Administration, National Archives and Records Service, Public
Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1959 (Washington:
GPO, 1961), p. 485.

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running mate. LBJ had begun his public service career in 1932 as a secretary to a
member of the U.S. House of Representatives, then became director of the National
Youth Administration for Texas in 1935, prior to being selected in 1937 to fill a
House vacancy. Reelected to the House five times, he saw active duty in the Navy
during 1941-1942, and, after an unsuccessful campaign in 1941, was elected to the
Senate in 1948. Becoming the Democratic leader in 1953, he was reelected to the
Senate in 1954 and 1960, serving as the Senate majority leader from 1955 until he
resigned in 1961 to become Vice President.
Johnson regularly attended Cabinet and National Security Council meetings, but
apparently did not chair sessions of the former, and President Kennedy convened an
executive committee of National Security Council members and other officials rather
than holding formal council deliberations. (LBJ was also a member of the
committee.) In addition, Johnson served the President as an adviser and a liaison to
Congress. As a special envoy, he made 10 trips during which he visited a total of 23
countries.31
While giving Johnson various institutional roles, Kennedy also assigned his Vice
President office space in the Executive Office Building next to the White House.32
For the first time, the Vice President had an executive office in addition to, and apart
from, his Senate facilities on Capitol Hill.33 Creating the President’s Committee on
Equal Employment Opportunity, the 1961 successor to Eisenhower’s Government
Contract Committee, Kennedy made Johnson its chairman.34 The President also
named Johnson to head the National Aeronautics and Space Council,35 an entity
within the Executive Office of the President, 36 and to lead the Peace Corps National
Advisory Council.37
Hubert H. Humphrey
The November 1963 assassination of President Kennedy elevated Johnson to the
presidency, and the nation was without a Vice President until 1965, when LBJ,
elected in a landslide, was joined by Hubert H. Humphrey. A former mayor of
Minneapolis, Humphrey was initially elected to the Senate in 1948, and was returned
31 Goldstein, The Modern American Vice Presidency, p. 159.
32 This development launched the institutionalization of the Vice President’s executive office,
which is reviewed in Appendix 2 of this report.
33 Paul C. Light, Vice-Presidential Power (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press,
1984), p. 68.
34 See E.O. 10925, 3 C.F.R., 1959-1963 Comp., pp. 448-454.
35 U.S. General Services Administration, National Archives and Records Service, Public
Papers of the Presidents of the United States: John F. Kennedy, 1961 (Washington: GPO,
1962), p. 309.
36 As originally chartered in 1958 (72 Stat. 427), the council was chaired by the President,
but, at Kennedy’s request, Congress assigned the panel’s leadership position to the Vice
President in 1961 (75 Stat. 46).
37 Dorman, The Second Man, pp. 254-255.

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in each of his successive election campaigns. Johnson reportedly was eager to have
his assistance, and, by one estimate, no previous Vice President “was used by his
President in such a broad variety of roles.”38 However, it has also been observed that
“Johnson showed little interest in his own Vice President,” and Humphrey’s
willingness to assume so many roles was not merely a result of his energy and
enthusiasm, but was more an antidote to his “increasing isolation from policy”—an
estrangement attributable, in large measure, to Humphrey’s desires to deescalate U.S.
military involvement in Vietnam and to negotiate a settlement of the hostilities in that
region.39
Like his immediate predecessors, Humphrey attended Cabinet meetings and
National Security Council sessions, but probably did not perform the same liaison to
Congress as Johnson had for Kennedy. As a special envoy, he took 12 trips to a total
of 31 countries.40 He chaired the National Aeronautics and Space Council and the
Peace Corps National Advisory Council, but the President’s Equal Employment
Opportunity Commission was abolished, and its responsibilities were assigned to the
Civil Service Commission and the Department of Labor.41 Humphrey headed a
related, short-lived coordination and policy-recommending panel, the President’s
Council on Equal Opportunity,42 and Congress created another statutory leadership
role for him by assigning the Vice President the chairmanship of the new National
Council on Marine Resources and Engineering Development.43 In the spring of 1967,
LBJ began assigning the Vice President responsibility for chairing various presidential
policy-planning and coordinating panels, including the President’s Council on Youth
Opportunity,44 the President’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports,45 the National
Council on Indian Opportunity,46 and the President’s Council on Recreation and
Natural Beauty.47
Spiro T. Agnew
When Johnson declined to seek his party’s presidential nomination in 1968,
Humphrey became the standard-bearer, but was defeated by Richard M. Nixon,
whose running mate, Spiro T. Agnew, became Vice President. An attorney and
38 Ibid., p. 274.
39 Light, Vice-Presidential Power, p. 32; also see Hubert H. Humphrey, The Education of a
Public Man (Garden City, NY: Doubleday,1976), pp. 314-353, 355-359.
40 Goldstein, The Modern American Vice Presidency, p. 159.
41 See E.O. 11246, 3 C.F.R., 1964-1965 Comp., pp. 339-348; Goldstein, The Modern
American Vice Presidency, p. 155.
42 See E.O. 11197, 3 C.F.R. 1964-1965 Comp., pp. 278-280.
43 See 80 Stat. 204.
44 See E.O. 11330, 3 C.F.R., 1966-1970 Comp., pp. 622-624.
45 See E.O. 11398, 3 C.F.R., 1966-1970 Comp., pp. 714-716.
46 See E.O. 11399, 3 C.F.R., 1966-1970 Comp., p. 717.
47 See E.O. 11402, 3 C.F.R., 1966-1970 Comp., p. 719.

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county government official, Agnew had been elected governor of Maryland in 1966.
As Vice President, he began presiding over the deliberations of the Senate with no
prior legislative experience, and he apparently devoted little of his time to this
responsibility.48 Agnew was also ill-prepared for congressional liaison duties on
behalf of the President, but he did undertake special envoy assignments, making seven
trips to a total of 28 countries.49
Agnew met with the Cabinet and the National Security Council, but other
leadership roles were eliminated or never offered. The National Council on Marine
Resources and Engineering Development became dormant and was eventually
terminated in June 1971.50 Nixon eliminated the President’s Council on Recreation
and Natural Beauty,51 and reconstituted the President’s Council on Physical Fitness
and Sports with the President’s consultant on physical fitness as the chair.52 Other
such panels apparently did not interest the Vice President. According to one account,
“Agnew was not an activist Vice-President and did not want many assignments,” two
exceptions being the National Aeronautics and Space Council, which was
subsequently abolished by presidential reorganization plan in 1973,53 and the new
Office of Intergovernmental Relations, but he “had trouble with both.”54 Established
less than a month after the inauguration as an Executive Office agency, the Office of
Intergovernmental Relations was placed under the immediate supervision of the Vice
President and was created to make use of Agnew’s experience in state and local
government matters.55 Nixon’s displeasure with the Vice President’s performance
prompted him to remove Agnew from intergovernmental affairs following the 1972
elections, and the Office of Intergovernmental Relations was abolished.56
The Vice President was made a member, but not the chair or the head, of some
other presidential entities, such as the Council for Urban Affairs,57 the Cabinet
48 Goldstein, The Modern American Vice Presidency, p. 142; Light, Vice-Presidential Power,
p. 43.
49 Goldstein, The Modern American Vice Presidency, p. 159; see also pp. 160, 166.
50 See 84 Stat. 865.
51 See E.O. 11472, 3 C.F.R., 1966-1970 Comp., pp. 792-795.
52 See E.O. 11562, 3 C.F.R., 1966-1970 Comp., pp. 970-972.
53 See 87 Stat. 1089.
54 Light, Vice-Presidential Power, p. 33.
55 See E.O. 11455, 3 C.F.R., 1966-1970 Comp., pp. 775-777.
56 See Light, Vice-Presidential Power, p. 33; E.O. 11690, 3 C.F.R., 1971-1975 Comp., pp.
732-734.
57 See E.O. 11452, 3 C.F.R., 1966-1970 Comp., pp. 772-773.

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Committee on Economic Policy,58 the Environmental Quality Council,59 the Council
for Rural Affairs,60 and the Domestic Council.61
There is evidence that the President and some of his senior assistants became
sufficiently disappointed with Agnew’s performance during Nixon’s first term that he
was almost replaced by former Texas governor John B. Connally as the Republican
vice presidential nominee for the 1972 campaign.62 Agnew, however, was retained
by Nixon and was reelected with him. Then, seven months after the inauguration,
Agnew received notice that he was under investigation by the U.S. attorney for
Maryland concerning alleged kickbacks from private architectural and engineering
firms that had been improperly awarded state and federal contracts during Agnew’s
county executive, gubernatorial, and vice presidential years. The investigation
continued, and, after other efforts to contend with the multiple charges against him
failed, Agnew agreed to resign and avoid imprisonment by pleading no contest to a
single charge of federal income tax evasion. His resignation occurred on October 10,
1973.
Gerald R. Ford
Under the terms of the 25th Amendment, Gerald R. Ford, a member of the House
of Representatives since 1949 and House minority leader since 1965, was nominated
by President Nixon on October 12, 1973, to succeed Agnew as Vice President. Ford
was subsequently confirmed by the Senate on November 27 and by the House on
December 6. He resigned from the House the same day his colleagues approved his
nomination, and was sworn in as Vice President.
As Ford began his new duties, revelations about the so-called Watergate
incident—the June 17, 1972, burglary at the Democratic National Committee
headquarters located in the Watergate office building in Washington, DC—had
already captured public attention. Five men had been arrested and were subsequently
brought to trial in January 1973. Revelations about the larger implications of the
break-in had been appearing in the Washington Post, which, in early October 1972,
had charged that “the Watergate bugging incident stemmed from a massive campaign
of political spying and sabotage conducted on behalf of President Nixon’s re-
election.”63 Subsequently, investigations by a Senate Select Committee on
Presidential Campaign Activities, the House Committee on the Judiciary, and federal
prosecutors revealed the truth of this allegation.
58 See E.O. 11453, 3 C.F.R., 1966-1970 Comp., pp. 773-774.
59 See E.O. 11472, 3 C.F.R., 1966-1970 Comp., pp. 792-795.
60 See E.O. 11493, 3 C.F.R., 1966-1970 Comp., pp. 876-877.
61 See 84 Stat. 2085.
62 See Goldstein, The Modern American Vice Presidency, p. 171; Light, Vice-Presidential
Power, pp. 33, 46, 107.
63 Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward, “FBI Finds Nixon Aides Sabotaged Democrats,”
Washington Post, Oct. 10, 1972, pp. A1, A14.

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Ford warily observed these unfolding disclosures as he moved from the House
to the vice presidency. Remaining largely “aloof from the executive branch” as Vice
President,64 he did chair the newly established Domestic Council Committee on the
Right of Privacy,65 which, among other pursuits, assisted with the development of the
Privacy Act of 1974.66 As the investigations of the Watergate incident and related
matters continued, Ford “spent little time in Washington as Vice President and rarely
interceded with Congress” on behalf of the President.67
On May 9, 1974, in closed session, members of the House Committee on the
Judiciary began considering the evidence concerning the President’s possible
involvement in the Watergate break-in and cover-up. At the end of the month, the
Supreme Court agreed to hear arguments on President Nixon’s claim of executive
privilege to withhold evidence subpoenaed by Special Prosecutor Leon Jaworski for
use in a Watergate-related trial. On the morning of July 24, a unanimous Court
upheld Jaworski’s subpoena to President Nixon.68 That evening, the Committee on
the Judiciary, in open session, began its discussion of the impeachment of the
President. Six days later, the panel approved three articles of impeachment,
recommending to the House that the President be impeached and removed from office
for violating his constitutional oath by obstruction of justice in the Watergate cover-
up, by abuse of his presidential powers in various ways, and by contempt of Congress
in refusing to comply with the committee’s subpoena.69
Conceding that the disclosure “may further damage my case,” Nixon, on August
8, released the transcripts of three conversations that he had held with White House
chief of staff H.R. Haldeman on June 23, 1972, shortly after the Watergate burglary.70
Congressional support for the President almost disappeared with the revelation of
these conversations. After meeting with congressional leaders on August 7 and 8,
1974, Nixon announced in a broadcast address to the nation on the evening of the
second day that he was resigning from office, saying, “it has become evident to me
that I no longer have a strong enough political base in the Congress to justify
64 Goldstein, The Modern American Vice Presidency, p. 156.
65 The committee was established by presidential announcement on Feb. 23, 1974; see Office
of the White House Press Secretary, “Fact Sheet: The President’s Address on the American
Right of Privacy,” Washington, DC, Feb. 23, 1974 (copy in author’s possession).
66 Ironically, by the time Congress cleared the Privacy Act for presidential approval, Ford had
succeeded to the presidency and he signed the measure; see 88 Stat. 1896.
67 Goldstein, The Modern American Vice Presidency, p. 180.
68 United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683 (1974).
69 See U.S. Congress, House Committee on the Judiciary, Impeachment of Richard M. Nixon,
President of the United States, 93rd Cong., 2nd sess., H.Rept. 93-1305 (Washington: GPO,
1974).
70 U.S. General Services Administration, National Archives and Records Service, Public
Papers of the Presidents of the United States, Richard Nixon, 1974 (Washington: GPO,
1975), pp. 621-623.

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continuing [the] effort” to withstand impeachment and stay in office.71 The following
day, his letter of resignation reached the Secretary of State shortly after 11:30 a.m.
and was accepted.72 Vice President Ford succeeded to the presidency.
Nelson A. Rockefeller
Pursuant to the terms of the 25th Amendment, President Ford nominated Nelson
A. Rockefeller to be Vice President on August 20, 1974. The Senate confirmed the
selection on December 10, and the House followed, giving its approval on December
19 and clearing the way for the administration of the oath of office in the Senate
chamber and that same day. Rockefeller had begun government service in 1940 as the
head of the Office for Coordination of Commercial and Cultural Relations between
the American Republics, which later became the Office of the Coordinator of Inter-
American Affairs in 1941. He left the leadership of this latter entity in 1944 to
become assistant secretary of state for American republics affairs, serving until August
1945. Rockefeller returned to the federal government in 1950, serving as the
chairman of President Truman’s International Development Advisory Board, which
reviewed the U.S. “Point four” program for technical assistance abroad.
Subsequently, in 1953, President Eisenhower appointed him chairman of the
President’s Advisory Committee on Government Organization, a position he held until
1958. In addition, Rockefeller was made undersecretary of health, education, and
welfare in 1953, then moved to the White House in 1954 to be a special assistant to
President Eisenhower. He was initially elected governor of New York in 1959 and,
with successive reelections, served through 1973. Rockefeller also was President
Nixon’s personal representative to Latin America in 1969, and he served on the
President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board during 1969-1974.
Rockefeller came to the vice presidency eager to assist the President, and the
formulation of domestic policy was a major area of interest to him. He began as “an
active participant” in the Ford Administration, but quickly “was frozen out of the
policy process” for several reasons, most of which concerned his assumption of
institutional roles.73 Shortly after his confirmation as Vice President, Rockefeller
sought to be the de facto head of the Domestic Council and, thereby, serve as the
primary conduit of domestic policy proposals to the President. Ford initially agreed
to this arrangement, then had second thoughts after conferring with some senior
White House assistants, but was finally swayed by Rockefeller. The incident,
however, won Rockefeller the enmity of some important White House aides, including
71 Ibid., pp. 626-629.
72 Ibid., p. 633.
73 See Light, Vice-Presidential Power, p. 180.

CRS-13
chief of staff Donald Rumsfeld.74 Moreover, Rockefeller was not an active or
effective promoter of administration policies with Congress.75
Rockefeller also accepted assignments involving significant commitments of
time, energy, and political capital, which not only subjected him to bureaucratic
conflicts, but also further involved him in policy disputes with White House assistants
and senior administration officials. Primary among these was his leadership of the
Domestic Council and his chairmanship of the Commission on CIA Activities within
the United States.76 In addition, Rockefeller headed such panels as the National
Commission on Productivity and Work Quality,77 the President’s Panel on Federal
Compensation,78 and the National Study Commission on Water Quality.79 He was a
member, as well, of the Commission on the Organization of the Government for the
Conduct of Foreign Policy.80
Walter F. Mondale
Although Rockefeller was not Ford’s running mate in the 1976 election
campaign, the contest was won by the opposition, bringing Jimmy Carter to the
presidency and Walter F. Mondale to the vice presidency. A practicing attorney and
former Minnesota attorney general, Mondale had been appointed to fill the Senate
seat of Hubert H. Humphrey, who had resigned in 1964 preparatory to becoming Vice
President. Mondale had remained in the Senate, being elected in 1966 and returned
in 1972.
At Carter’s insistence, Mondale was given an office in the West Wing of the
White House, in close proximity to the Oval Office.81 (Agnew was the first Vice
President to occupy space there, but, isolated from his own staff and pressured by the
White House chief of staff, moved out after a brief stay.) Furthermore, immediately
after the election, the two men had agreed that Mondale would not be burdened with
various secondary roles, but, in the President’s words, “would truly be second in
74 See Goldstein, The Modern American Vice Presidency, pp. 171-172; Robert T. Hartmann,
Palace Politics (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1980), pp. 304-311, 354-359; Light, Vice-
Presidential Power, pp. 183-184, 187-192.
75 Goldstein, The Modern American Vice Presidency, p. 180.
76 For the commission’s mandate, see E.O. 11828, 3 C.F.R., 1971-1975 Comp., pp. 933-934;
also see Light, Vice-Presidential Power, pp. 184-187.
77 See 85 Stat. 753; 88 Stat. 236.
78 See U.S. General Services Administration, National Archives and Records Service, Public
Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Gerald R. Ford, 1975 (Washington: GPO,
1977), p. 813.
79 See 86 Stat. 875.
80 See 86 Stat. 497.
81 Jimmy Carter, Keeping Faith (New York: Bantam, 1982), p. 40; Light, Vice-Presidential
Power, pp. 76-77.

CRS-14
command, involved in every aspect of governing.”82 The vitiation of the vice
presidency as a legislative position was now, if not before, complete: executive duties
were the priority of the office. Indeed, during his first year as Vice President,
Mondale devoted a total of only 18 hours to presiding over the Senate.83
Mondale made 14 trips to a total of 35 countries, often functioning as a
presidential policy agent.84 He functioned as the President’s “general adviser,” being,
in Carter’s view, “the only person that I have, with both the substantive knowledge
and political stature to whom I can turn over a major assignment.”85 Furthermore, the
Vice President’s role was enhanced by the respect accorded him and his staff by the
President’s senior assistants, by the “impressive and dignified assignments” given to
him by the President amid “conditions under which Mondale could be an effective
counselor,” by complete information sharing, and by structured meetings with the
President as well as the right to participate in any conference unless asked to leave.86
He also proved valuable concerning White House relations with Congress—initially,
in acquainting senior presidential aides with congressional structure, operations, and
culture, and also in providing some Members of Congress a trustworthy conduit to
the President.87
George H. W. Bush
The unsuccessful reelection effort of Carter and Mondale in 1980 brought
Ronald Reagan to the presidency, with George H. W. Bush as his Vice President. An
experienced public servant, Bush had been a two-term member of the House of
Representatives; ambassador to the United Nations and Republican National
Committee chairman during the Nixon Administration; U.S. diplomatic representative
to the People’s Republic of China and Director of Central Intelligence during the Ford
Administration; and a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 1980.
Reagan scarcely knew Bush before agreeing to his selection, almost as an
afterthought, as an acceptable running mate who would never become a confidant to
the President.88 However, even though the two men were not very well acquainted
with each other, Bush was “intensely loyal” to Reagan and remained in his shadow.89
82 Carter, Keeping Faith, p. 39; also see Goldstein, The Modern American Vice Presidency,
p. 157; Light, Vice-Presidential Power, pp. 47-48, 206-208.
83 Goldstein, The Modern American Vice Presidency, p. 142.
84 See Ibid., pp. 159, 161-162, 166.
85 See Ibid., pp. 172-173; also see Light, Vice-Presidential Power, pp. 201-202.
86 Goldstein, The Modern American Vice Presidency, pp. 150, 173-174, 221; Light, Vice-
Presidential Power, pp. 208-212, 218-220.
87 Goldstein, The Modern American Vice Presidency, pp. 180-181.
88 Bob Schieffer and Gary Paul Gates, The Acting President (New York: E.P. Dutton, 1989),
p. 313.
89 Ibid., p. 318.

CRS-15
For his part, Reagan “came to enjoy Bush’s company around the office,” but the two
men and their wives did not socialize.90
Bush retained Mondale’s West Wing office, had at least weekly private meetings
with the President, and enjoyed the added benefit of having his old friend and 1980
campaign manager, James Baker III, serving as White House chief of staff. He was
also more willing than Mondale had been to take on various secondary roles.91 Bush
was made a member of each of the five initial Cabinet councils formed at the outset
of the Reagan Administration,92 and also served on the subsequently created
Economic Policy Council and Domestic Policy Council.93 He also was made the
chairman of the Presidential Task Force on Regulatory Relief,94 the National Security
Council’s crisis management team,95 the South Florida Task Force on Drug Abuse
and Trafficking Prevention,96 an interagency action group on mitigating economic
hardship in the southwest border region,97 and the Vice President’s Task Force on
Combating Terrorism.98
Bush apparently retained the influential presidential advisory role established by
Mondale, but it was by no means a guaranteed status for future successors. Such
90 Ibid.; also see Light, Vice-Presidential Power, p. 266.
91 Light, Vice-Presidential Power, pp. 260-261, 264.
92 See U.S. General Services Administration, National Archives and Records Service, Public
Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Ronald Reagan, 1981 (Washington: GPO,
1982), pp. 166-167; on the work of the Cabinet councils, see Chester A. Newland, “Executive
Office Policy Apparatus: Enforcing the Reagan Agenda,” in Lester M. Salamon and Michael
S. Lund, eds., The Reagan Presidency and the Governing of America (Washington: Urban
Institute, 1985), pp. 153-161; James P. Pfiffner, The Strategic Presidency (Chicago, IL:
Dorsey, 1988), pp. 58-67.
93 See U.S. General Services Administration, National Archives and Records Service, Public
Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Ronald Reagan, 1985 (Washington: GPO,
1988), p. 419.
94 See U.S. General Services Administration, National Archives and Records Service, Public
Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Ronald Reagan, 1981, pp. 30-31; Light, Vice-
Presidential Power, p. 261.
95 See U.S. General Services Administration, National Archives and Records Service, Public
Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Ronald Reagan, 1981, p. 285; Light, Vice-
Presidential Power, pp. 261-262.
96 See U.S. General Services Administration, National Archives and Records Service, Public
Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Ronald Reagan, 1982 (Washington: GPO,
1983), pp. 1252, 1314, 1488-1491.
97 See U.S. General Services Administration, National Archives and Records Service, Public
Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Ronald Reagan, 1983 (Washington: GPO,
1985), p. 1160.
98 See U.S. General Services Administration, National Archives and Records Service, Public
Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Ronald Reagan, 1985, p. 800.

CRS-16
influence, it has been observed, “remains conditioned by factors that evolve with each
new administration.”99
Danforth Quayle
Elected to the presidency in 1988, Bush was joined by Dan Quayle as Vice
President. After working briefly as a journalist and Indiana state government official,
Quayle was elected in 1976 to the House of Representatives, where he served until
being elected to the Senate in 1980. Returned to the Senate in 1986, he was Bush’s
surprise choice as his running mate in 1988. The two men apparently had come to
know each other when the young Senator began to stop by Bush’s Capitol Hill office
to chat, but they were not particularly close or well acquainted.100 On the eve of the
opening of the Republican national convention, when Bush met with several major
senior campaign advisers to discuss the vice presidential candidate, Quayle was one
of seven top choices to be named as a possible running mate—“the one most often
proposed by this knowledgeable circle of political pros.”101 His subsequent selection
stunned many, and some considered it an impulsive decision by Bush.102 When he
invited him to join the ticket, Bush reportedly told Quayle that he was “the first
choice, and my only choice.”103 After the election, Bush offered some plausible
reasons for his decision, but the strong likelihood of Quayle’s giving unswerving
loyalty to the President probably was a crucially persuasive factor.104
Quayle retained a West Wing office, “only a few feet away from the Oval
Office,” and had a routine weekly luncheon meeting with the President.105 He also
regularly attended Cabinet and National Security Council meetings. Quayle’s other
institutional roles included chairing a task force that came to be known as the Council
on Competitiveness.106 An extension of the Presidential Task Force on Regulatory
Relief, which Bush had led during his vice presidential tenure, the new panel soon
became immersed in controversy concerning its alleged secrecy, interference in
various aspects of regulatory policy and practice, and transgressions of ethics
99 Light, Vice-Presidential Power, p. 268.
100 Jack W. Germond and Jules Witcover, Whose Broad Stripes and Bright Stars? (New
York: Warner, 1989), p. 374.
101 Ibid., p. 379.
102 Burt A. Rockman, “The Leadership Style of George Bush,” in Colin Campbell and Bert
A. Rockman, eds., The Bush Presidency: First Appraisals (Chatham, NJ: Chatham House,
1991), p. 30.
103 Germond and Witcover, Whose Broad Stripes and Bright Stars?, p. 385.
104 See Ibid., p. 387
105 Dan Quayle, Standing Firm (New York: HarperCollins, 1994), pp. 86, 103-107.
106 See U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, Public Papers of the Presidents
of the United States: George Bush, 1989 (Washington: GPO, 1990), pp. 76, 86; U.S.
National Archives and Records Administration, Public Papers of the Presidents of the United
States: George Bush, 1990 (Washington: GPO, 1991), pp. 333, 833, 1094-1095.

CRS-17
standards.107 Quayle also was active as the chairman of the National Space Council,108
which provided advice and assistance to the President on national space policy and
strategy.109
As Bush committed American armed forces to combat in the Persian Gulf region
in early 1991, Quayle’s meetings with the President became more frequent, but his
influence as an adviser in this area was not immediately clear.110 During the
prosecution of the Gulf War, Bush, by one assessment, “seemed increasingly mature
and self-assured,” while Quayle “seemed to some as commensurately less so.”111
Bush retained Quayle as his running mate in 1992, but their reelection effort proved
unsuccessful.
Albert Gore, Jr.
The 1992 elections brought William J. Clinton to the presidency, and with him,
Albert Gore, Jr., as Vice President. The son of a U.S. Senator, Gore arrived at the
vice presidency after having served four terms in the House of Representatives and
one term in the Senate. After mounting an unsuccessful bid to obtain the Democratic
presidential nomination in 1988, Gore had been reelected to the Senate in 1990. He
continued as Vice President during President Clinton’s second term of office.
Beyond his participation in Cabinet and National Security Council meetings,
Gore quickly became and remained one of the President’s “most influential
107 In chronological order, see, for example, Christine Triano, “Quayle and Co.,” Government
Information Insider, vol. 1, June 1991, pp. 6-8; Ann Devroy and David S. Broder, “Quayle
Pressured Agencies to Ease Rules on Business, Groups Say,” Washington Post, Sept. 8,
1991, p. A6; David S. Broder and Stan Hinden, “Quayle Requests Look at Breeden
Testimony,” Washington Post, Oct. 2, 1991, pp. C1, C3; “Still Meddling After All These
Months,” The OMB Watcher, vol. 9, Oct. 30, 1991, pp. 8-11; Dana Priest, “Competitiveness
Council Suspected of Unduly Influencing Regulators,” Washington Post, Nov. 18, 1991, p.
A19; Michael Weisskopf, “Regulatory Adviser Has Stake in Chemical Firm,” Washington
Post, Nov. 20, 1991, p. A21; Dana Priest, “Competitiveness Council Under Scrutiny,”
Washington Post, Nov. 26, 1991, p. A19; Michael Weisskopf, “Quayle Council Official Had
Role in Acid Rain Rule Action,” Washington Post, Dec. 6, 1991, p. A3; Michael Weisskopf,
“White House Defends Competitiveness Chief,” Washington Post, Dec. 10, 1991, p. A19;
“Conflict on the Quayle Council,” The OMB Watcher, vol. 9, Dec. 24, 1991, pp. 7-9;
Christine Triano, “Dan’s World,” Government Information Insider, vol. 2, March 1992, pp.
2-3; “The Council on Competitiveness: Executive Oversight of Agency Rulemaking,”
Administrative Law Journal of the American University, vol. 7, Summer 1993, pp. 297-343;
Charles Tiefer, The Semi-Sovereign Presidency (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1994), pp. 61-88.
108 See 102 Stat. 4102.
109 See U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, Public Papers of the Presidents
of the United States: George Bush, 1989, pp. 456-457; David C. Morrison, “Vice President
for Space,” National Journal, vol. 21, July 29, 1989, pp. 1910-1915.
110 See Paul G. Kengor, “The Role of the Vice President During the Crisis in the Persian
Gulf,” Presidential Studies Quarterly, vol. 24, Fall 1994, pp. 783-807.
111 Burt Solomon, “War Bolsters Quayle’s Visibility ... But Hasn’t Increased His Stature,”
National Journal, vol. 23, Mar. 2, 1991, pp. 522-523.

CRS-18
advisers.”112 One of the first special duties Clinton assigned his Vice President began
shortly after the inauguration. On March 3, 1993, the President indicated he was
initiating a National Performance Review (NPR) to be conducted by a task force
headed by Gore. The goal, said Clinton, “is to make the entire Federal Government
both less expensive and more efficient, and to change the culture of our national
bureaucracy away from complacency and entitlement toward initiative and
empowerment. We intend to redesign, to reinvent, to reinvigorate the entire National
Government.”113 Gore led the NPR—which went through various phases and resulted
in a multiplicity of assessments, initiatives, and reforms—to the final days of the
Clinton Administration.114
During June and July, the Vice President, at the President’s direction, worked
with the relevant departments and agencies to identify problems and recommend
solutions regarding border management and immigration policy.115 Later, Gore
represented the administration in a highly publicized November 1993 broadcast debate
with former independent presidential candidate H. Ross Perot, supporting
congressional approval of the North American Free Trade Agreement.116 He also was
designated by Clinton to lead a U.S. Russian Joint Commission on Energy and
Space117 and to chair the President’s Community Enterprise Board, which was created
to provide advice and coordination regarding various federal programs available to
distressed communities.118
In the early years of his vice presidency, Gore, in the words of the President, “led
the charge to make this administration a leader in the global environmental effort,”
and he continued to exert such leadership during his tenure.119 At Clinton’s direction,
Gore established a working group on Indian economic development in 1994, in
conjunction with the administration’s community enterprise initiatives.120 During the
year, the President also named Gore to lead a U.S.-Russian Joint Commission on
112 Elizabeth Drew, Showdown (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996), p. 224.
113 U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, Public Papers of the Presidents of
the United States: William J. Clinton, 1993 (Washington: GPO, 1994), pp. 233-235, 1944-
1948.
114 See U.S. Library of Congress, Congressional Research Service, The National Performance
Review and Other Government Reform Initiatives: An Overview, 1993-1999, by (name red
acted), (name redact ed)
,
and (name re dac ted), CRS Report RL30596
(Washington: June 14, 2000).
115 See U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, Public Papers of the Presidents
of the United States: William J. Clinton, 1993, pp. 1194-1196.
116 Ibid, pp. 1905, 1940-1941, 1944-1945.
117 Ibid., pp. 1429, 1448.
118 Ibid., pp. 1460-1462.
119 U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, Public Papers of the Presidents of
the United States: William J. Clinton, 1994 (Washington: GPO, 1995), p. 742.
120 Ibid., p. 802.

CRS-19
Economic and Technological Cooperation121 and the Ounce of Prevention Council,
which was charged with overseeing and coordinating the various crime prevention
programs governed by the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of
1994.122
The Vice President also assumed a major role regarding telecommunications and
electronic information infrastructure policy and development,123 aviation safety and
security matters,124 and electronic commerce strategy.125 Gore’s eight-year record of
performance as Vice President awaits thorough scholarly analysis. The popular
assessment of the man who sought to succeed President Clinton was seemingly
favorable, though close, in the 2000 election, but he lost the electoral vote contest.
Richard B. Cheney
Selected by Texas Governor George W. Bush to be his running mate, Richard
B. Cheney comes to the vice presidency with a varied public service background.
Gaining staff experience in a gubernatorial and congressional office before becoming
a special assistant to the director of the Office of Economic Opportunity during 1969-
1970, Cheney subsequently served as a White House staff assistant in1971, assistant
director of the Cost of Living Council during 1971-1973, deputy assistant to the
President during 1973-1975, and White House chief of staff during 1975-1976.
Elected to the House of Representatives in 1978, he served there until 1989, when he
was appointed Secretary of Defense during the Bush Administration. Returning to
private life in 1992, Cheney became an oil industry, construction, and insurance
company executive.
Having ruled out seeking the presidency for himself, Cheney reportedly has
begun his tenure with an integration of his vice presidential staff with that of the
President, allowing the White House to speak and act with leadership unity as it deals
with Congress and the public.126
Early assignments for Cheney include chairing a study commission on the
developing national energy crisis and serving as a liaison to Congress. For this latter
role, the Vice President has set up offices in the House as well as the Senate. The
President has also asked him to be a principal spokesman for the administration,
121 Ibid., pp. 1643, 1652, 1660.
122 Ibid., pp. 1542-2543.
123 See, for example, U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, Public Papers of
the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton, 1996 (Washington: GPO, 1997), pp.
186-187, 191, 243, 257, 261, 344, 346, 404, 1802.
124 Ibid., pp. 1201, 1219, 1259, 1289, 1416, 1506, 1650, 1728, 1750, 1794, 1796, 2193.
125 See, for example, U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, Public Papers of
the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton, 1998 (Washington: GPO, 2000), pp.
2095, 2101.
126 Dana Milbank, “For Number Two, the Future Is Now,” Washington Post, Feb. 3, 2001,
p. A1.

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making himself especially available to the broadcast media. Bush is giving
consideration to having Cheney chair the meetings of deputies from the Departments
of State and Defense and the National Security Council. The role, heretofore never
held by a Vice President, would give Cheney an opportunity to recommend and
influence foreign policy.127
127 Ibid., p. A14.

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Appendix 1: Presidents and Vice Presidents of the
United States
(with years of service)
George Washington (1789-1797)
John Adams (1789-1797)
John Adams (1797-1801)
Thomas Jefferson (1797-1801)
Thomas Jefferson (1801-1809)
Aaron Burr (1801-1805)
George Clinton (1805-1809)
James Madison (1809-1817)
George Clinton (1809-1817)
Elbridge Gerry (1813-1814)
James Monroe (1817-1825)
Daniel D. Tompkins (1817-1825)
John Quincy Adams (1825-1829)
John C. Calhoun (1825-1829)
Andrew Jackson (1829-1837)
John C. Calhoun (1829-1832)
Martin Van Buren (1833-1837)
Martin Van Buren (1837-1841)
Richard M. Johnson (1837-1841)
William Henry Harrison (1841)
John Tyler (1841)
John Tyler (1841-1845)*
vacant (1841-1845)
James K. Polk (1845-1849)
George M. Dallas (1845-1849)
Zachary Taylor (1849-1850)
Millard Fillmore (1849-1850)
Millard Fillmore (1850-1853)*
vacant (1850-1853)
Franklin Pierce (1853-1857)
William R. King (1853-1857)

CRS-22
James Buchanan (1857-1861)
John C. Breckenridge (1857-1861)
Abraham Lincoln (1861-1865)
Hannibal Hamlin (1861-1865)
Andrew Johnson (1865)
Andrew Johnson (1865-1869)*
vacant (1865-1869)
Ulysses S. Grant (1869-1877)
Schuyler Colfax (1869-1873)
Henry Wilson (1873-1875)
Rutherford B. Hayes (1877-1881)
William B. Wheeler (1877-1881)
James A. Garfield (1881)
Chester A. Arthur (1881)
Chester A. Arthur (1881-1885)*
vacant (1881-1885)
Grover Cleveland (1885-1889; 1893-1897)
Thomas A. Hendricks (1885-1889)
Adlai E. Stevenson (1893-1897)
Benjamin Harrison (1889-1893)
Levi P. Morton (1889-1893)
William McKinley (1897-1901)
Garret A. Hobart (1897-1901)
Theodore Roosevelt (1901)
Theodore Roosevelt (1901-1909)*
vacant (1901-1905)
Charles W. Fairbanks (1905-1909)
William H. Taft (1909-1913)
James S. Sherman (1909-1913)
Woodrow Wilson (1913-1921)
Thomas R. Marshall (1913-1921)
Warren G. Harding (1921-1923)
Calvin Coolidge (1921-1923)
Calvin Coolidge (1923-1929)*
vacant (1923-1925)
Charles G. Dawes (1925-1929)

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Herbert C. Hoover (1929-1933)
Charles Curtis (1929-1933)
Franklin D. Roosevelt (1933-1945)
John N. Garner (1933-1941)
Henry A. Wallace (1941-1945)
Harry S. Truman (1945)
Harry S. Truman (1945-1953)*
vacant (1945-1949)
Alben W. Barkley (1949-1953)
Dwight D. Eisenhower (1953-1961)
Richard M. Nixon (1953-1961)
John F. Kennedy (1961-1963)
Lyndon B. Johnson (1961-1963)
Lyndon B. Johnson (1963-1969)*
vacant (1963-1965)
Hubert H. Humphrey (1965-1969)
Richard M. Nixon (1969-1974)
Spiro T. Agnew (1969-1973)
Gerald R. Ford (1973-1974)
Gerald R. Ford (1974-1977)*
Nelson A. Rockefeller (1974-1977)
Jimmy Carter (1977-1981)
Walter Mondale (1977-1981)
Ronald Reagan (1981-1989)
George H. W. Bush (1981-1989)
George H. W. Bush (1989-1993)
Danforth Quayle (1989-1993)
William J. Clinton (1993-2001)
Albert Gore, Jr. (1993-2001)
George W. Bush (2001- )
Richard Cheney (2001- )
* Indicates succession from the vice presidency to the presidency pursuant to constitutional process.

CRS-24
Appendix 2: Institutionalization of the Vice
President’s Executive Office
As the presiding officer of the Senate, the Vice President has long maintained
offices on Capitol Hill. Currently, the Vice President has a ceremonial office in the
Capitol and a working office in the Dirksen Office Building.
The institutionalization of the Vice President’s executive office began in 1961,
when space was provided for the Vice President and his staff in what was then known
as the Executive Office Building situated adjacent to the White House.128 In 1970,
Congress established a federal budget line item for the Vice President’s executive
office in the form of “Special Assistance to the President,” as the account is
designated. Appropriations are provided “[f]or expenses necessary to enable the Vice
President to provide assistance to the President in connection with specially assigned
functions.”129 The funds, lately amounting to $3-4 million, allowed the Vice President
then, as well as today, to hire qualified staff and to acquire and maintain administrative
support.130 As a consequence, the Vice President not only was relieved from
borrowing employees from the departments and agencies to obtain staff assistance,
but also was under less compulsion to seek the leadership of temporary study or
coordination panels in order to acquire personnel.131 Soon, staff specialists began to
appear, making the Vice President’s office a replica, in microcosm, of the President’s
office. For example, Ford was the first Vice President to have his own national
security adviser and his own counsel;132 Mondale created his own staff for domestic
policy development.133 When a White House staff authorization was legislated in
1978, more detailed vice presidential staff employment structure was established,
along with more relaxed arrangements for making expenditures for certain authorized
expenses incurred by, or in connection with, assisting the Vice President and
requirements concerning reimbursements for, and the reporting of, executive branch
employees detailed to the Vice President’s office.134
128The Executive Office Building, built in five sections between 1871 and 1888, was initially
known as the State, War, and Navy Building, as it housed those three departments. In 1939,
with the establishment of the Executive Office of the President, two agencies of this new
enclave were located in the State, War, and Navy Building. By 1949, Executive Office
agencies completely occupied the structure, and it became known as the Executive Office
Building. Later, when a second edifice for Executive Office agencies was constructed on 17th
Street, just a short distance from the White House, the original building became known as the
Old Executive Office Building. In 1999, the structure was statutorily designated the Dwight
D. Eisenhower Executive Office Building, in honor of the 34th President (113 Stat. 1309).
129See 84 Stat. 76.
130Light, Vice-Presidential Power, pp. 69-70, 81-82.
131See Ibid., pp. 32-33.
132Ibid., pp. 72, 95.
133Ibid., p. 91.
134See 92 Stat. 2446-2448, 2449-2450.

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The Vice President’s executive office was formally recognized for the first time
in the pages of the United States Government Organization Manual 1972/73. The
entry, appearing at the end of the section profiling units of the Executive Office of the
President (EOP), listed the Vice President’s senior assistants and briefly described his
constitutional, statutory, and presidentially assigned responsibilities.135 Amounting to
“little more than a symbolic step toward institutionalization,” nonetheless, “the listing
helped define the boundaries of an executive agency” supporting the President.136
During the early months of his tenure, Vice President Ford declined presidential
offers of White House staff assistance and began recruiting his own support
personnel—a counsel, a national security adviser, speech writers, and administrative
aides. He began with a staff of 17, which, with an appropriations increase, grew to
70 by the time he succeeded to the presidency in August 1974. By one estimate, with
these developments, “the Vice President’s office became an independent source of
information and expertise.”137 Ford’s personnel practices also established “the Vice
President’s freedom to hire and fire the staffs of his choice.”138
The years of the Ford, Rockefeller, and Mondale vice presidencies also saw more
formal organization of their offices. “Instead of loose collections of individuals under
Humphrey,” comments one close observer, “the Ford and Mondale offices became
quite hierarchical, involving specific chains of command and functions.” As a result,
“this tighter organization allowed for better communication between the Vice
President’s office and the rest of the EOP.”139
Finally, the Mondale vice presidency brought some other important
developments. The first involved perquisites—the availability of “White House mess
privileges, better aircraft, better offices, fast printing support, and
limousines”—signaling institutional prestige.140 There was also an integration of the
Vice President’s staff into the White House policymaking process.141 Furthermore,
Mondale received an office in the West Wing, placing him in close proximity to the
Oval Office, to which he was readily welcomed. These developments produced “the
rise of an esprit de corps among the Vice President’s staff,” or, stated another way:
“No longer was it the worst moment of a career to work for the Vice President.” If
nothing else, this new attitude is a reflection of the institutional change that has
occurred in the Vice President’s executive office, with the result that vice presidential
135See U.S. General Services Administration, National Archives and Records Service, Office
of the Federal Register, United States Government Organization Manual 1972/73
(Washington: GPO, 1972), p. 89.
136Light, Vice-Presidential Power, p. 71.
137Ibid., pp. 71-72.
138Ibid., p. 73.
139Ibid., pp. 73, 79-100.
140Ibid., p. 74.
141Ibid., pp. 75-76, 209-210.

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staff “think of themselves as more valuable members of the presidential
establishment.”142
142Ibid., p. 77.

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