After an American citizen has served as President of the United States, may he/she go on to serve an inferior position again? Specifically, can a former President serve as Vice President?

Arpeggionist

American presidents have gone on to serve in the US congress and in their own state legislatures. Sep 23 08, 3:30 PM

star_gazer

A former US President (eight years of service) may not run for Vice President because as Vice President they may have to step in and serve as President, this would violate the Constitution's eight year limit on people serving as President. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-second_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution Sep 23 08, 3:39 PM

sirfrank

to my knowledge- the 22nd amendment says no person shall be elected to the offoce of President more than twice- it says nothing about 8 years - so - as i understand it - after being elected twice- a person could run for vice president- achieve that - then become president again if the president died- he would NOT have been elected to president Sep 23 08, 10:44 PM

catfish3

Sorry sirfrank : The 22nd states no President can be elected to more than 2 terms or limited to one term after serving more than 2 years of a term to which he was not elected.-----Sooo after serving 2 terms he could not run for Vice Pres because he could possibly become President only days after the inauguration. Sep 23 08, 11:23 PM

queproblema

Wiki has a good discussion of the 22nd Amendment in light of the 12th, which says that "no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States." Bottom line: Nobody knows, not even constitutional lawyers, much less trivia geeks. (Oh, is there a difference?) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-second_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution While we're at it, I'm surprised no one offered the facts that John Quincy Adams became a very effective Congressman and Taft a chief justice on the Supreme Court. Oh, yes, and Co-President Hillary Clinton is now a senator. Sep 24 08, 12:13 AM

Baloo55th

Nice one, Qp.... My question is, simply, after two terms as President, who would really want to be a Vice? Time to move on to international roles (or to hide away...) Sep 24 08, 1:20 PM