Talk:President of the United States

I have removed a reference to Bush leaving office in 2009. I do not believe that anyone can forsee the next four years. Although it is likely that he will serve a full second term, the possibility still exists that he may leave office by resignation, impeachment and removal, physical incapacity, etc. Since Wikipedia is supposed to report facts only, shouldn't it be listed that Bush's presidency is until "present"? Jwinters

I agree wholeheartedly with this - Wikipedia is not a political platform - it's an encyclopedia ; at the moment, we should simply be stating that Bush is still in office. I have put this page on my watch list and shall continue to revert any reference to 2009 back to "In Office" ; this is the way the table presents data for the List of British Prime Ministers - this page should be no different. -- Zaphod Beeblebrox 17:00, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

That is nonsensical. The standard way to deal with this is to state that his term will run until 2009. That leaves open the possibility that the term may be aborted due to death, resignation or removal from office. It is fundamentally wrong to state simply that someone is 'in office' as that blurs two distinct categories of people - those like presidents elected for specific terms, and those like the UK PM who once s/he kisses hands (ie., are appointed) remain continually in office until they resign or die. (The holding of general elections is of no consequence in so far as parliament does not elect the PM, let alone elect them after each general election. They continue on automatically until they resign, die or are dismissed.) Bush is not in that situation. He has a definite cut off point, January 2009, so that needs to be made clear, just as it needs to be made clear that Blair if he chooses and he does not lose a general election, could be in power well beyond 2009. (In theory he could be there in 2019 or even 2029, whereas Bush cannot be there after January 2009. That's the difference). FearÉIREANN 17:45, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

That is nonsensical : the column on the table is labelled "Left Office" ; past tense. How can you label a column in the table with a date in the future if it's meant to designate an occasion that occured in the past? -- Zaphod Beeblebrox 17:58, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Saying that Bush "left office" in 2009 is as nonsensical as saying that Bush, then Gore, then Bush won Florida in 2000. If the timeline says "present" under "left office", and Bush leaves office early, the timeline would only be out-of-date. If the timeline says "2009" under "left office", and Bush leaves office early, the timeline would be inaccurate. I'm trying to prevent the possibility of an inaccuracy. The whole point is to report what is, or what has happened, not what is likely to happen. The fact that he cannot serve past 2009 can br inferred from the rest of the article (1 - Bush took office in 2001, 2 - He can only be elected to a maximum of 2 four-year terms). Jwinters 19:47, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Featured article status and miscellaneous objections

This was once a featured article.

See Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates#President_of_the_United_States to learn what needs to be done to re-establish this article's status.

It isn't there anymore. I finally found it but since it took so long I will copy the debate here:

Article should make more prominent mention of how presidents get their position in the first place (preferably at the beginning and nicely integrated with the flow of the text). Currently we have to make do with obscure links at the end to U.S. presidential election and U.S. Electoral College. -- Dissident 04:44, 3 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Done. jengod 01:34, Mar 12, 2004 (UTC) This objection seems to have been addressed. What's the procedure for re-listing the article? Can anyone just add it back if there are no further objections? --Minesweeper 22:27, Mar 19, 2004 (UTC) I beg to make an objection (or rather, objections). Firstly, the Article does not seem to mention that the term limit does not apply in the case of terms lasting less than two years. Furthermore, it does not note that the term limits are relevant in the case of elections; an individual who has previously served two terms may suceed to the Presidency in the case of a vacancy. Secondly, the Article misrepresents the facts relating to the Twelfth Amendment. It states, "Since the ratification of Amendment XII in 1804 clarified the electoral process, the President and Vice President have been elected together as a ticket through the constitutionally mandated U.S. Electoral College." After the ratification of the Amendment, despite the statement in the article to the contrary, the President and Vice President are elected separately - not as a joint ticket. Thirdly, the article states, "The winning candidate must receive a majority of electoral votes." I object because the article does not state that a winning candidate can win in the House of Representatives if there is no majority in the Electoral College. Fourthly, I object to the structure of a sentence: " Thus, in order to raise the salaries of other federal employees, the President's salary had to be raised to avoid surpassing the President." It would seem, reading the sentence, that the President's salary was surpassing his own, and therefore had to be raised - which of course does not appear logical. -- Emsworth 03:33, Mar 20, 2004 (UTC)

[unsigned qn by User:Mullickprashant moved from near top to bottom, where it is morelikely to be read & answered. --Jerzy (t) 02:39, 2004 May 15 (UTC)~]

Form of address for presidents

I have an OLD book here (can't seem to locate a date on it) that says one of the "official" ways to refer to the President is "His Excellency, The President of the United States." I may be American (and proud!) but I'm not calling any president "His Excellency," that's just too much for me.

I asked a question about this before in a different forum after having seen an original death announcement for Lincoln, which referred to him as His Excellency. It seems that some effusive people, unaware that the president has no such title, would refer to him as Excellency. From time to time, some people from other parts of the world will address the president as Your Excellency (in letters and suchlike). Of course, this has never been formal usage (although for a while, they did consider whether the president should have some title, such as "Elective Majesty".) - user:Montrealais

His Excellency is actually not a title but a Style, ie a formal manner of address. There is no written Style for the US president but there is a spoken one, 'Mr. President' , which is the same as 'Your Majesty' (UK), 'President' (Ireland), 'Your Holiness' (Holy See). 'Excellency' is a standard style applied to heads of state in republics. It may have been that one was introduced once and then dropped, or people just presumed like everyone else that the US president was addressed that way. If you get an invitation to the White House to meet some visiting head of state, the WH Protocol people will tell you to address them by their appropiate Style. JTD 08:17 Feb 22, 2003 (UTC)

- Under the Congress of Vienna and generally recognnized forms of address, ANY head of state carries the title of "excellency" as well as the head of government (e.i. prime minister, premier, etc.) in some non English speaking monarchies. The fact that American protocol does not officially reserve "excellency" to the president does not mean he or she can not be address as such without breaking American social etiquette. It is a title of courtesy (which means it is not official or required. The style "excellency" is also an appropriate courtesy title when addressing state governors and several states have officially reserved the style to the governor including Massachusetts and Vermont. The Congress of Vienna also reserves "excellency" for ambassadors and other high ranking diplomats, this title is NOT accredited to the ambassador by his or her government but by the government and people of the host nation in which the ambassador is stationed in. Officially American protocol is to address any ambassador or high ranking diplomat (e.g. foreign minister, European Union head of delegation, Secretary General of U.N., etc.)as "excellency.

As for not addressing a president etc. as "excellency" remember that it goes with the office not the person. You are honouring the highest office in the land or showing respect for an elected official by addressing him or her as "excellency."

Sorry for the poor formatting; I got the list from http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/presidents/. Looks like they've got more info, and I'd bet that info is in the public domain and therefore copyable?

An important question. Could you research this and report back?

The info at that site seems to come from copyrighted sources. information here: http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/copyright.html

I can find no link between that address and http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/presidents/, however they are in the same folder and clearly contain information on the same subjects mentioned in the book on the U.S. presidents. The info above may fall under the Feist v. Rural decision, i.e. that factual information, even in collections, in many instances is not copyrightable. I guess the question would be whether any of the "expressive" content of the author is present here; you should probably ask Lee Daniel Crocker, as it seems to be an area he's knowledgeable in.

The actual text of the biographies there is indeed copyrighted by the WHHA, a non-governmental entity that is entitled to own copyrights, and so you can't copy any of that text. Simple factual information like where a president was born, what other offices he may have held, the names of his family members, etc. can certainly be learned from that site and written up here in your own words. There is no "creative selection" or "creative presentation" problem because we're including every president, in natural order, and presenting the information in our own way. Copyrights apply to "creativity", not "research". --LDC

Andrew Johnson's party

Is Andrew Johnson considered a Republican?

Johnson's political allegiance was complex. - Woodrow 22:59, 20 Mar 2004 (UTC)

The Republican party made a shrewd political move when they brought a Democrat in as Vice-President to Lincoln. That didn't change Johnson's party affiliation, though, nor his ideals (as is clear from the later struggles between the Republicans and President Johnson). Although he ran on a Republican ticket, he remained a Democrat. Most histories ([1] (http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/presidents/aj17.html), [2] (http://www.americanpresidents.org/presidents/president.asp?PresidentNumber=17), [3] (http://www.ipl.org/div/potus/ajohnson.html) for example) list him as a Democrat. SWAdair | Talk 07:42, 8 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Is there a reason why he's given the republican colour in the timeline table? And shouldn't John Tyler be treated the same way - also a Democrat VP elected on Whig ticket who then succeeds and falls out with his nominating party.

Would it help to have another colour for such Presidents to distinguish them from those elected onb that party's ticket? Timrollpickering 20:13, 3 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Johnson should be a listed as something like independant. He was a unionist in 1864 and when he ran with Lincoln it was a republican ticket. Due to the fact that it is complex we should make it independant.

Presidents under the Articles of Conf.?

So, it seems to me that it would be nice for this list to be in chronological order. That would require the presidents under the Articles to come before the presidents under the Constitution. Does anyone have any objections? -- EdwardOConnor

Well, since those guys weren't really Presidents of the United States (under the most common interpretation of what it means to really be the President of the United States), it makes sense to have them listed as they are, in a side-note. Perhaps they should even be moved to a separate page. --Jimbo Wales

I guess I don't understand the common interpretation then. What it not the United States that won indepenence from Britain? It seems strange to think that it came about upon ratification of the Constitution, many years later. Mere anarchy was not loosed upon the land in the interim. (Note that it would be correct to say that I'm attacking a strawman here. :]) It seems to me that any reasonable interpretation of the phrase "president of the United States of America" has to take into account that both American governments have had such a position. Would it be correct to not list Arthur Griffith before Eamon de Valera on a hypothetical "Presidents of Ireland" page, merely because he was not president under the current Constitution? -- EdwardOConnor

Actually it would.

Griffith wasn't President of Ireland, his title was President of Dáil Éireann, and deV would still go ahead of him because deV was his immediate predecessor in that office, though from August 22, 1921 to Griffith's election, it has been called President of the Republic.

The 'Irish Republic' Griffith was president over was a different state, with a different name, covering a different land-mass. So Griffith was not President of Ireland, the head of state of the Republic of Ireland, he was Arthur Griffith, President of Dáil Éireann of the Irish Republic. JTD 08:17 Feb 22, 2003 (UTC)

The "presidents" under the Articles of Confederation were not the chief executives of the United States. They were the presiding officers of the Congress; the better analogy under the Constitution is to the Speaker of the House (or to the President pro tempore of the Senate). In other words, we do not list Presidents of the United States before George Washington because there were none, only Presidents of the Congress. Mateo SA 05:24, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Perhaps keep them in a separate list, but put that separate list before the "traditional" president listing? Aitchison was really briefly the President, so he should probably stay on this page no matter what ultimately happens to the others.

This sounds reasonable to me. -- EdwardOConnor

Presidents' religious affiliations

Why are religious affiliations on the main list page? On a president's own page, sure, but on the main page? Party affiliation makes sense, but here, religion is no more relevant than shoe size, IMO. -- RjLesch

Agreed. -- EdwardOConnor

Religious affiliation is indeed more relevant than shoe size or boxers or briefs (MTV viewers' voting criteria notwithstanding :-). One's religion can give insight into one's philosophy, worldview, etc. As for why I added them -- I did it because I happened to have collected the list out of an almanac several years ago. <>< tbc

I think this claim needs to be shown, not merely told. I'd be interested to see an explanation of how Nixon's Quakerism influenced his decision to bomb Cambodia, for example. But until then, I think religious affiliation should be removed or moved somewhere else. - Tim

<AOL>Me too!</AOL>. Seriously, I think this gives prominence to a politician's religious beliefs beyond what they deserve. In any case, just listing somebody as, say, Catholic, says nothing about whether they were actually devout or just turned up to church on Sunday for the cameras. Oh, and if I recall my American history correctly wasn't Lincoln Jewish (thus making "none" more than slightly inaccurate)- another example of why this listing shouldn't be here. --Robert Merkel

No, Lincoln became a Christian at Gettysberg. See Tbc/Abraham Lincoln.

But in the same vein, listing someone as "Republican" doesn't tell you if he was a devoted party hack or just someone in whose lap the nomination fell because nobody else was available/willing to run at the time - see Zachary Taylor for an example.

Here's an analogy for you. When listing the winners of a season MVP award, do you list the team they play for, or their religion? --Robert Merkel

Al Smith lost a presidential election in the 1920s because he was Roman Catholic. John F. Kennedy faced accusations that as a Catholic president he would do as Pope John XXIII would tell him to do. Joseph Lieberman may not be elected president in 2004 on account of his jewish faith, because just as Smith lost on account of the 'fear' that he would do a 'foreign power's bidding' (ie the Vatican) as a catholic president, just as Kennedy faced similar accusations in 1960 but just about overcome them, so Lieberman if he becomes the Democratic nominee will face accusations that he would be the 'Israeli man' in the White House, 'giving' his allegiance to a foreign state. So religion is not as irrelevant as shoe size. Religion matters a hell of a lot; look at born-again baby Bush and his policy agenda. It may

shape the vision a leader has of society and how he wants to lead it;

affect his electability;

positively or negatively shape his stance on policy matters.

No accurate article on the POTUS can possibly leave out religion, if it wants to be credible, because apart from anything else, it gives a interesting indication of American attitudes to the religious backgrounds of its leaders; what does the fact that only one president out of forty plus was a Roman Catholic? Is that more or less than proportionately should be the case? I may be wrong, but I don't think there has been a single jewish president. Yet there is a sizable jewish population in the US? So why no jewish president? You cannot possibly ignore questions like that in this article. They are key indicators of public attitudies that helped shape the office of POTUS. JTD 08:17 Feb 22, 2003 (UTC)

Moving to "President of the United States"

Are there any objections against moving this to President of the United States? The "of America" seems like unnecessary overkill, given that we probably rarely want to link to the page using that text, and it doesn't add any valuable disambiguation. ---Eloquence 13:32 Jan 24, 2003 (UTC)

I guess it depends whether we're thinking of "english" wikipedia as UK/US english or what people call "international english". The usage of "United states" or just "the States" to mean USA is pretty common in the Anglo-Saxon countries, but not really standard for people who use English as their second language.

I oppose it because the United States is not the name of the country. The correct name of the country is the United States of America. Rmhermen 13:46 Jan 24, 2003 (UTC)

Well, I am in Germany, and here we often just call the US the "Vereinigte Staaten", so it's not really that much different. I'm not aware of another entity that is referred to as the "United States". There are, of course, the United Arab Emirates, but that's not even close. As for "correct name", even the White House website routinely refers to the "President of the United States" and rarely to the USA. The CIA World Factbook also calls the country the United States. Also see Google: United States: 6.5 million hits, United States of America: 2 million hits. --Eloquence

I agree. There is no need for 'of America'. Our article on the US is at United States due to the fact that 'United States' is the conventional short form of the name of the nation. It is also the common name which conforms nicely with our naming conventions. --mav 14:12 Jan 24, 2003 (UTC)

I am a stickler for technical accuracy, but I do think in this case 'of America' is going to far. There is accuracy and there is ludicrously cumbersome accuracy.

- - - - OK, The OFFICIAL NAME of the UNITED STATES IS the United States of America, referring to the United States of America as the United States is short version for the name of the country. As for "technical accuracy" in the entry above, technicially the next time you talk or write about England under your logic you should refer to it by its official name of "the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland," I don't think most people refer to Great Britain with it's official name, but just U.K., United Kingdom, Britain, Great Britain, etc. Remember most nations of the world have a long official name, it is used on money, passports, government offices, embassies, documents, etc. Only a few such as Canada and Japon offically refer to their country just with its name, but still Canada unofficially uses "Canadian confederation and it's the same with Japan and "Japanese empire." One could even make the argument that "United States" is more politically correct because America/American can ably to ALL of the Americas (NORTH AND SOUTH) as well as any person from the Americas (Candians, Peruvians, Brasilians, etc.)

Par Example of official country names: Federal Republic of Germany, Russian Federation, Peopele's Republic of China, Arab Republic of Egypt, Commonwealth of Australia, Union of the Republics of Serbia & Montenegro, etc.

One question: re the Continental Congress. Did any international states have diplomatic representation with the new American state? If so, to whom did they accredit their ambassadors? If it was the President of the Continental Congress, that would mean that he was a head of state. You don't have to be an executive figure to be head of state. If you are the diplomatic representative of your state on the international stage, even if your 'day job' was simply to chair congress, you are still a head of state. Does anyone know if the presidents of the Continental Congress fulfilled that role? JTD 08:17 Feb 22, 2003 (UTC)

"Ranking" the presidents?

The standard table for each of the presidential entries has a "Rank:" field (e.g. Grover Cleveland, the 22nd and 24th president), which refers to their order of succession. This has been annoying me for some time, because I'm pretty convinced that "Rank" is the wrong word to use here (as it implies a qualitative judgement). However, I'm not sure that I have a useful replacement. If forced at gunpoint, I'd say "Order of succession:", but I'm not sure I like that either. Anybody have thoughts or suggestions here? -- RobLa 20:19 Apr 20, 2003 (UTC)

How about "Number"? dml

Hmmm...not bad. I think it's better than "rank". I'm going to hold out and see if someone has a better suggestion, but that's the best one I've heard. -- RobLa 23:05 Apr 20, 2003 (UTC)

A rank is a list of numbers ranked in order. As each president in turn increased the number by one, that list of presidents here as elsewhere is described as a rank, starting at number 1 and increasing in order by one. Number doesn't indicate order so is inaccurate. Rank isn't. That is why, for example, one refers to a taxi rank, a row of taxis each of which increases the total number preceding by one. So rank is the most accurate word to describe their position in the line of presidents. ÉÍREman 00:16 Apr 21, 2003 (UTC)

I reccomend Order of succession:", "rank" is inappropriate. Iesuf Taitsevski

Order of Succession is unworkable. 1. it is too look. 2. Monarchies use the 'word' succession; republics don't. Rank is the normal word used to describe a president's position in a list of presidents, not just in the US but France, Germany, Italy, Ireland and many other states. ÉÍREman 00:23 Apr 21, 2003 (UTC)

Order of Succession could be confused with Presidential line of succession. Rank could be confused with comparison polls (most noteably one done by the Chicago Tribune in 1982 and one done by Arthur Schlesinger in 1962, in which historians were asked to rank the presidents. Personally, I don't see anything wrong with number, but instead of having the result be 9th, it should read 9th President of the United States. IMHO, Kingturtle 00:38 Apr 21, 2003 (UTC)

You point about rank has some merit. It shouldn't be interpreted that way, but someone might. I think 9th President is enough. The full version I think would be too long. ÉÍREman 00:46 Apr 21, 2003 (UTC)

Both the Oxford Dictionary and Webster's Dictionary attribute a value judgement to "rank". Specifically, from Webster 1913 (since I can copy it): "Degree of dignity, eminence, or excellence; position in civil or social life; station; degree; grade; as, a writer of the first rank; a lawyer of high rank". I have to say I've never heard the term "taxi rank", though I don't doubt it's commonly used in Europe. That particular usage implies the definition of "rank" which is "To place abreast, or in a line", as in "rank and file", and thus "first rank" would mean "first line" rather than "first in line".

Based on this conversation, I think I would prefer "Order: 21st President" -- RobLa 06:29 Apr 21, 2003 (UTC)

Trivia - related presidents

How about an addition to the trivia section? Familial relationships between Presidents? The Adams' the Roosevelts and the Bushs spring to mind. If any Presidents are related to OTHER heads of state (from other countries) that should probably go in as well. Are any of them descended from royalty? --Dante Alighieri 02:37 14 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Bush apparently was a distant relative of Diana, Princess of Wales. FearÉIREANN 06:11 15 Jul 2003 (UTC)

See [4] (http://www.namibian.com.na/2000/October/world/00AD186050.html) --Jiang

As mentioned above, this page (and Vice President of the United States of America should be moved just as the main US article is at United States and not United States of America. --Jiang 10:42, 31 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Is it necessary for the lists of President of the Continental Congress and President of the United States in Congress assembled to be on this page? Currently the sections on this page are at least as long as the actual articles on those topics. Rmhermen 00:04, Oct 8, 2003 (UTC)

Yes. The "United States" was not created by the current constitution. It is an important footnote to mention that a different style of president existed in the United States prior to the current office. FearÉIREANN 18:38, 8 Oct 2003 (UTC)

How about adding a section on the lines of how the electoral college system works in the US? It seems strange that the article makes no mention of how the President is elected. -- Alex.tan 13:33, 18 Nov 2003 (UTC)

First Ladies

The change of wife to spouse when referring to First Lady is incorrect. To date no non-marital spouse of a president has existed. If they did the US would then have to decide if they would be First Lady. However given the power of the religious right, it is questionable whether a president would decide to give the title to a girlfriend. As to what happens when a female president has a male husband, or a male president has a boyfriend, that is something that will only become an issue if and when it happens. As of now FL refers to only the wife of a president or to another family member so designated. It does not apply to a non-marital sexual partner and this article should not imply in language that it does. I have put back in wife as it is correct, spouse prejudges what may happen in other senarios. As we don't know, stating that FL is the President's spouse is imprecise, of questionable accuracy and POV. (BTW IMHO I see no reason why it should not be applied to a non-marital female partner but that would require a policy decision that has not as of yet been taken and is not likely to be until the issue arises in practice.) FearÉIREANN 22:17, 13 Dec 2003 (UTC)

I don't think it's POV, just inaccurate. Other than that I agree, though. Onebyone 22:18, 13 Dec 2003 (UTC)

It is stating as fact that non-marital and marital spouses both could be called FL. Personally I have no problem with that, but it is inaccurate and redefined the sentence to suggest an equality, which is a POV and inaccurate. :-) FearÉIREANN 22:22, 13 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Wife is definitely the word to use for this particular sentence. Spouse would imply that, in the event of a woman president, her husband would be the First Lady. Although I like the idea of a man being a lady, I don't think the idea would fly well with the rest of the nation. Kingturtle 22:37, 13 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Titles??

My friends and I were debating:

When a female becomes President of the United States of America, what will be the title of her husband?

Separate and aside from that question, if Hillary Clinton were to become President, what would Bill be referred to as? Well he still be call President Clinton? or The former President? or The President First?

I don't know. Maybe 'First Man'? But probably just Mr. Clinton. --mav 05:33, 19 Jan 2004 (UTC)

In some states with female governors, the husband is usually referred to as "First Gentleman." --pm06420 21:51, 7 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Hillary would be called Madam President; Bill would be called President Clinton. I think the title "First Lady" would fall into disuse at that point. Gender neutrality is typically adopted as official parlance once the gender barrier is broken in a particular position or office. For example, until 1981 the Supreme Court of the United States used the honorific "Mr. Justice Lastname" to refer to an Associate Justice. When Sandra Day O'Connor was appointed to the bench, the Court started using "Justice Lastname." --68.226.91.122 03:06, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

"First Gentleman" seems reasonable to me, though I'm sure that "Mr. First Gentleman" will never be used as a form of address the way that "Madam First Lady" is today.

Executive branch: 4 million people?

I believe that, in discussing the size of the Executive Branch over which the President presides, this article makes an inaccurate statement:

To carry out this responsibility, the president presides over the executive branch of the federal government — a vast organization numbering about 4 million people, including 1 million active-duty military personnel.

There are two problems with this statement. First, according to the U.S. Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics, there are only about 2.7 million Federal workers — 1.87 million in "Federal Government, Excluding the Postal Service" (http://www.bls.gov/oco/cg/cgs041.htm) plus 845,000 in "Postal Service Workers" (http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos141.htm). Also, the military is listed as numbering 664,000 in the first report, although some larger numbers from 2001 in DefenseLink's "Active Duty Military Personnel Strengths" (http://www.defenselink.mil/pubs/almanac/almanac/people/serve.html) make me question how BuLabor counts US employees. (I also suspect that National Guard personnel serving overseas are not counted as Federal employees, although they are presumably reporting ultimately to the President as Commander-in-Chief while in this capacity.)

Second, the wording leaves it unclear whether its the Executive Branch or the entire Federal government that is being counted. Only the former is presided over by the President. On the other hand, the Department of Labor says that 98% of Federal workers are employed by the Executive Branch, so that ambiguity is not all that significant. -- Jeff Q 14:27, 21 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Natural-born-citizen requirement

Article II doesn't strictly require a president to be US born, it allows a "citizen of the United States at the time of the Adoption of [the] Constitution". All thought this is no longer relevent, do you think it should be mentioned in the Requirements to hold office section? Dmn 22:23, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Why does a candidate for US President have to be a natural born citizen? I am trying to find information on what the arguments for this are? [unsigned qn by User:Mullickprashant moved from near top to bottom, where it is morelikely to be read & answered. --Jerzy (t) 02:39, 2004 May 15 (UTC)~]

(For the sake of precision, i think you might find that others could theoretically be put on the ballot in some places. (Not clear offhand whether that would be illegal in itself, but presumably the Electoral College's action, in voting them in would be found to have been invalid.) It sounds like you already realize it's in the Constitution, which is the short answer. [wink] Check out Federalist Papers for an idea as to which of those essays might discuss the original reasoning. As for today, the best reason is bcz it would take a constitutional amendment to change it, even if the old reasons were bad or no longer to apply. And that is a big deal; much more so i believe than in most other countries. --Jerzy (t) 02:39, 2004 May 15 (UTC)

The "natural born citizen" requirement was included to prevent the newly founded United States of America from being sabotaged, so to speak. It was a new, young country, using a new system of government. They had gained their independence through war. The last thing they wanted was for someone with allegiances to Britain or elsewhere to have access to the presidency, and potentially destroy what they had fought so hard to create.

Many people, by the way, misquote this requirement by saying that the president must be a "native born citizen" or that the president must be "US born." The requirement is to be a "natural born citizen". The Constitution, however, never defines what "natural born" means. Based on other laws drawn up at the time which make reference to the term "natural born", most Constitutional experts agree that a "natural born citizen" is a person who is a US citizen from the moment of his birth. This would include someone born in the US AND someone born abroad who received his US citizenship through his parents, by descent. Ultimately, it would take the US Supreme Court to decide.

There's talk abuzz of amending the Constitution to allow naturalized citizens to become president. I think that the US is mature enough to allow this, personally. At the current time, it would probably face significant opposition from many in the Democratic party, as it would open the presidency to Arnold Schwarzenegger. Steggall 23:50, 31 Oct 2004 (UTC)

There was considerable controversy when George Romney was running for President because he was born in Mexico to US citizen parents, but there was absolutely no discussion when John McCain was running, even though he was born in the Panama Canal Zone. So nothing has been decided about this. Though at the time, many people said Alexander Hamilton couldn't be President because he wasn't born in what became the United States, though he was an citizen at the time of the creation of the Constitution. Rick K 23:17, Oct 31, 2004 (UTC)

Presidential photos

Hi, I have received somme comments about why have I been replecing the photos of the presidents with the Official Portraits of them that are hanging on the White House. I think it is much more elegant to have the portrait of the Presidents, since it is tradition that every president should have a portrait made. But if anyone has problems with it, please feel free to talk about this. If people believe it should be better to to have the photos, well so be it. Cheers. Coburnpharr04

I have no objections to this, but we should not be orphaning photos so I've kept the photograph on top and the painting linked below. Of course,we can do it the other way around. Comments? --Jia ng 02:37, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)

How about a compromise? We put the White House portrait in the table, and the photograph in the section of 'Presidency'. Mos encyclopedias do have an area that a table with the presidential facts and the White House Portrait. What say you guys? User:Coburnpharr04

Both versions are headshots, so I don't see the value of displaying both. --Jia ng 05:23, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)

[from ]My opinion: The lead image in biographical articles of modern persons should be a photo, not a portrait. By all means include the portrait as well, but further down. Official portraits are inevitable idealized versions of what people look like, and readers should be given a realistic image. Adam 06:21, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)

A couple of things. 1) I prefer the photos at the top of the article as they more clearly identify the person (IMO). The portraits are somewhat idealized, and in some cases (Clinton and Reagan) just not very good. I've no objection to displaying the portraits lower in the article though. 2) Some of the images recently uploaded were in GIF and BMP formats. These are generally poor choices for photo/artistic type images. This type of image should be in JPEG format. (Isn't there advice on this in the style guide?) I realize the white house site may use GIFs, but for me that only argues in favor of using a higher quality photo JPEG. At the very least, the GIF and BMP images should be converted to PNG format. older≠wiser 14:44, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Format preference is found in Wikipedia:Image use policy among other places. Rmhermen 16:20, Jul 1, 2004 (UTC)

I add my opinion to those who are not overly fond of the whitehouse paintings replacing what has been there before. Some of them are good, and IMO would make a nice ADDITION to the article, but should not in all cases REPLACE what is there before. Many editors have contributed to the illustrations from many sources, I've scanned a few images from old public domain era sources which I otherwise have not seen on the web. I don't think these should be replaced with the copies of the exact same images that can be seen on whitehouse.gov. At the very least, I strongly urged that the old images be MOVED-- either down in the article, or to the talk page-- rather than removed from the article to become an orphan. -- Infrogmation 12:59, 4 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Dead presidents

The list of periods when there were five former presidents alive and the list of periods when there were no former presidents alive seem to me to be rather arbitrary and not very useful trivia that just polute the page. Maybe move them to a seperate page and link them from the presidential trivia lists section? -- SvdB 02:36, 2004 Jul 7 (UTC)

I second that emotion. jengod 03:04, Jul 7, 2004 (UTC)

Pollute the page? Why? It's no less arbitrary than any of the other trivia items. --68.226.91.122 02:55, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

These trivia are the result of coincidence, and never had nor ever will have any influence on anything in the world. SvdB 17:14, 2004 Jul 17 (UTC)

Hamilton and eligibility

The article says The natural-born citizenship requirement has been the subject of some controversy in recent years. The clause was apparently written by political enemies of Alexander Hamilton, who was born on the Caribbean island of Nevis, and was thus not a US citizen at birth. Can this be right? Wasn't Hamilton "grandfathered in" by the rest of the clause, that says "a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution"? -PRiis 20:05, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

be bold and change it. --Jia ng 23:25, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

OK, I've boldly removed this sentence: "The clause was apparently written by political enemies of Alexander Hamilton, who was born on the Caribbean island of Nevis, and was thus not a US citizen at birth." There's good info on the origins of the eligilbility clause at http://faculty.maxwell.syr.edu/jyinger/facfa/history.htm --PRiis 03:22, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Cabinets

If any of you have time and are interested in contributing to the President pages, I'm working on getting uniformly formatted lists of Presidential Cabinet members in each POTUS article, under the subhed ==Jefferson Administration== or ==Roosevelt Administration==, etc. If you have any time, there is a template below.

Sources of the material include:

Presidents, Vice Presidents, and Cabinet Members (http://college.hmco.com/history/us/norton/people_nation/7e/students/administrations/)
Internet Public Library: POTUS (http://www.ipl.org/div/potus/)

--Jengod

Please don't include the president in the list. It's redundant. If we add the VP, then it's no longer necessary to have the VP listed in the first biographical box on the upper right hand corner. the first few VPs (Jefferson under President Adams) can't really be considered members of the administration. --202.181.207.71 15:51, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Jefferson Administration


OFFICE	NAME	TERM

President	Thomas Jefferson	1801–1809
Vice President	Aaron Burr	1801–1805
	George Clinton	1805–1809

Secretary of State	James Madison	1801–1809
Secretary of the Treasury	Samuel Dexter	1801
	Albert Gallatin	1801–1809
Secretary of War	Henry Dearborn	1801–1809
Attorney General	Levi Lincoln	1801–1804
	Robert Smith	1805
	John Breckinridge	1805–1806
	Caesar A. Rodney	1807–1809
Postmaster General	Joseph Habersham	1801
	Gideon Granger	1801–1809
Secretary of the Navy	Benjamin Stoddert	1801
	Robert Smith	1801–1809

Timeline section

SNIyer1 made some changes to the Timeline section. I basically reverted his changes, then added some information to clarify the issue:

For example, before SNIyer1's edits, one line said:
- John F. Kennedy was the first president born in the 20th century.
SNIyer1 changed this to:
- Lyndon Johnson was the first president born in the 20th century, even though John F. Kennedy was the first 20th century born president.
What SNIyer1 was trying to point out was that LBJ was actually born before Kennedy. However, the first listing is more accurate. This can be seen if you add some implied words to the line:
- John F. Kennedy was the first person to become president who was born in the 20th century.

Mateo SA 00:53, Sep 22, 2004 (UTC)

Problem:

The page contains the following vandalism: Matt S 0wnz0rs j00 4ll. I was unable to edit it out.

Title for former Presidents

I seem to remember reading (somewhere!) that once a President leaves office, he (or she) is not allowed the title 'President' but instead reverts to the highest title he (or she) previously held - thus Bill Clinton is today Governor Clinton, and not President (or Ex-President) Clinton. If I am not mistaken, General George Washington specifically requested this, as it is the norm for all other official positions that the person who held them may use the title after they finish serving - could someone please confirm it? I am trying to find my source but I simply do not remember where (or for that matter when) I read it. Thanks, cevonia 13:44, Oct 27, 2004 (UTC)

According to some branch of the government (http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/politics/pres/oldpres.htm), when writing to former Presidents one should use 'The Honourable (President's name)'... does that imply that they should not be called 'President (name)'? cevonia 13:51, Oct 27, 2004 (UTC)
Ah-ha! I've found it... though I'm not sure as a source its entirely reliable... would you trust the Washington Post's Etiquette Maverick (http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&contentId=A8709-2000Oct25&notFound=true)? cevonia 14:12, Oct 27, 2004 (UTC)

I don't know what the precise rule is, but I've never heard Clinton referred to as "Governor Clinton" since he left office in 2001. "Former President Clinton" is the standard in the media. I'm not sure what he is called directly -- in office, it's "Mr. President;" not sure how you address a former president. Funnyhat 01:15, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)

CNN uses the "Former President Whoever" style. e.g. [5] (http://www.cnn.com/2005/HEALTH/03/10/clinton.surgery/), [6] (http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/06/05/reagan.health/). Reverting to a previous title is just silly, since they no longer hold that title, either. -- Dpark 01:27, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)

They are almost invariably called President <name>. However President is no longer a title. It is what is called a style, in effect an honorific prefix that shows a formal respect for them for holding the highest office in the land. Similarly deposed monarchs are often called King <name> even though they aren't officially king of anywhere. For example, the deposed Greek monarch is still called King Constantine of Greece. That is why at the papal funeral there were references to President George W. Bush being accompanied by "President Bush" and "President Clinton" and comment was made about the absence of "President Carter". The 'President' reference is purely honorary. But they can never ever be called 'President of the United States', just as King Constantine should not be called 'King of Greece'. FearÉIREANN 02:53, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)

CNN clearly doesn't use that style. Neither do a number of other news agencies. Some of them do, and I think that's the official whitehouse preference, but it's not the only accepted style. -- Dpark 03:55, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)

11 1/2th President

I distinctly remember seeing on the children's historical TV show a reference to an "11 1/2th President". The circumstances were that the guy who was to be named president wasn't on hand at the moment or something. There was this great song and everything. And the question is: does anyone here remember that guy's name? -Litefantastic 01:58, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I can't remember his name (David Atchison? I'm not sure), but he became President for a day when Zachary Taylor refused to take the oath on a Sunday. Since Polk's term ended at noon that day, the president pro tempore of the Senate became President until Taylor took the oath the next day. Apparently he slept all day. --Zakharov 19:17, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Nationally Elected?

"The President and the Vice President are the only two nationally elected officials in the United States."

This sentence characterizes the act of electing as a national act. Yet it is fair to say that the election of the President and Vice President has at least as many federal as national characteristics, a subtle, yet crucially important point politically. The apportionment of electors among the states is partly federal (treating each state with equal weight) and partly national (treating each citizen with equal weight); when the House and Senate exercise their contingent powers, each state is granted equal weight; in the manner of choosing the electors, each state conducts its own separate election, a federal, not national, arrangement; in the process of casting electoral votes, the electors meet separately in their respective state capitals, again a federal arrangement.

I suspect that what the author meant to convey is that the President and Vice President are the only elected officials in whose election citizens of all states participate, nationwide. Would it not be more correct to replace the words "nationally elected officials" with "officials elected nationwide"? Pgva 09:19, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Two sections both named "Presidential Elections"

Might it be worth merging the two together...? --Rebroad 16:18, 21 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Changed the second to "Past and future Presidential elections". I think putting that table at the top would be poor style, and moving the other section to the bottom would put things in a strange order. -- Dpark 04:02, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Problem with the Air Force One picture

Ok, is it just me, or does anyone else notice something wrong with this picture....?? --Rebroad 21:34, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)

What do you mean? It's a featured picture, comes fromn a government source, I added it to fill in the blank space and because I thought it was a strong symbol of the power of the presidency.--Pharos 21:45, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)

It's just that I've never seen the American flag with the stars at the top right before. Didn't know you could do that! --Rebroad 15:56, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Yes, this is actually the standard depiction of the flag when pictured on two sides of a moving object. The left-hand side will have a 'correct' orientation, and the right hand side is reversed. This gives an impression of a flag flying away from the direction of motion, as a real flag would. The same is done with flag shoulder patches on the uniforms of American soldiers. I imagine a similar thing is done with the flags of other countries.--Pharos 18:47, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Numbering

I've added a comment to the effect that the <n>th President is actually the <n-1>the person to hold the office, as Grover Cleveland is counted twice. This seems both true and relevant (although trivial). If strongly disagreed with, it can be removed. Transitional Events seems an appropriate place, but maybe there is a better.

This has been deleted from Transitional Events; maybe it is better in Other Facts? It has been deleted without comment, but I have reinstated it for the moment: is it considered incorrect, irrelevant, or misplaced?

Splitting this page up

This page is too large. Do you think it would be a good idea to move the list of presidents to a separate page and link to it? - Mpnolan 02:26, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Personally, I think the timeline, while a nice graphic, could be dropped. It seems redundant given that there is a complete list of presidents above it. Funnyhat 01:17, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Non-rich Presidents

Is anyone up to listing something about financial status of Presidents? It might be less than clear-cut, but it might also be interesting to many readers to read about how many Presidents have not been rich, or not born to rich families, or were not high-born gentlemen. Sivamo 02:32, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)

List of presidents

I really, really, really think the list of Presidents should be reposted in this article. It's where people expect to find it, and for most readers it's the core of the article. jengod 01:12, Jun 6, 2005 (UTC)

I made the list into a separate article because it was nominated on WP:FLC, where the general feedback was that it was only featurable as a stand-alone article. So I created Template:Presidents of the United States, which was then transcluded into both President of the United States as well as List of Presidents of the United States. However, someone subst:-ituted it into the list article, and the list article was subsequently edited. I've since nominated the template for deletion. One solution would be to withdraw that nomination and paste the changes made to List of Presidents of the United States back into Template:Presidents of the United States. On the other hand, transclusion for non-message text is generally frowned upon. I don't know what the best solution is, but what's wrong with having the list in a separate article? The POTUS article itself is quite long already. --MarkSweep 03:29, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I much prefer having the list of office holders in a separate article. I would also move the timeline into list of Presidents of the United States or its own separate article. -- ALoan (Talk) 10:29, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I just removed the entire list again from this article. The reason is consistency: Someone just fixed a mistake in list of Presidents of the United States (George Clinton was also VP under Madison), which is not reflected in the present list. I think it would be a major chore to keep the two lists consistent without using templates (as I originally did, before learning that use of templates for transclusion of text is discouraged). If anyone wants to revert my deletion, please also make sure that you keep the table here consistent with the separate list article. --MarkSweep 14:28, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Cheney missing from list

Why are we missing Cheney from the list of presidents? He served on June 29, 2002. Monkeyman 15:54, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Because Cheney never served as president. He assumed presidential powers during a Saturday afternoon while Bush was having a medical procedure done. Not the same. He wasn't sworn in. -- Dpark 16:48, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

There are several similar historical instances like this one, but it doesn't change the fact that the algorithm for counting presidents is as follows: whenever someone is sworn in as president, they become president; and when that person is different from the person most recently sworn in, the presidential counter is incremented. That didn't happen in Cheney's case (and in many other cases in history), so there's nothing to see here and we can all move along. --MarkSweep 17:19, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I'm sorry to see you both dismiss this interesting bit of history so quickly. Ok, so Cheney wasn't President but he was Acting President which carries all the powers of the President. And it looks like he will be the only person to act as President and not go on to become the President. (I'm not sure where you're getting your "many other cases in history" information.) Why pass up the opportunity to include this information within the article? It makes the article more interesting and invites the reader to ask more questions. Monkeyman 20:02, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

P.S. Let me clarify my intentions. I agree that Cheney should not be included on the list of presidents but I think his acting as president should be included somewhere in the article. Monkeyman 20:25, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Acting President of the United States. -- ALoan (Talk) 21:32, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Retrieved from "https://academickids.com:443/encyclopedia/index.php/Talk:President_of_the_United_States"