Vice President of the United States of America
- "Vice President" redirects here. For a more general article on vice presidents, please see Vice president.
The Vice President of the United States of America is first in the order of succession to the presidency. While the only duty spelled out for the position in the Constitution is to preside over the Senate, other duties have been assumed over time.
Incumbent
The current vice-president is Joseph Biden, who took office on January 20, 2009, together with President Barack Obama. His predecessor was Richard Cheney, who served under President George Bush.
Election
Currently, the vice-president is elected together with the president, each elector voting for one man for president and another for vice-president. This system was mandated by the Twelfth Amendment, ratified in 1804.
Previously, each elector had voted for two different people for president, and the runner-up had become vice-president. However, this system broke down in the election of 1800, when Thomas Jefferson, the Democratic-Republican Presidential candidate, tied with Aaron Burr, his running mate.
List of Vice-Presidents
Vice-presidents have included some "remarkable individuals"[1]:
Vice President | Years | State | Party | President(s) |
---|---|---|---|---|
1. John Adams | 1789-1797 | Massachusetts | Federalist[2] | Washington |
2. Thomas Jefferson | 1797-1801 | Virginia | Democratic-Republican[3] | Adams |
3. Aaron Burr | 1801-1805 | New York | Democratic-Republican | Jefferson |
4. George Clinton | 1805-1812 | New York | Democratic-Republican | Jefferson, Madison |
5. Elbridge Gerry | 1813-1814 | Massachusetts | Democratic-Republican | Madison |
6. Daniel D. Tompkins | 1817-1825 | New York | Democratic-Republican | Monroe |
7. John C. Calhoun | 1825-1832 | South Carolina | Democratic-Republican, Democratic | Adams, Jackson |
8. Martin van Buren | 1833-1837 | New York | Democratic | Jackson |
9. Richard M. Johnson | 1837-1841 | Kentucky | Democratic | van Buren |
10. John Tyler | 1841 | Virginia | Whig | Harrison |
11. George Dallas | 1845-1849 | Pennsylvania | Democratic | Polk |
12. Millard Fillmore | 1849-1850 | New York | Whig | Taylor |
13. William King | 1853 | Alabama | Democratic | Pierce |
14. John C. Breckinridge | 1857-1861 | Kentucky | Democratic | Buchanan |
15. Hannibal Hamlin | 1861-1865 | Maine | Republican | Lincoln |
16. Andrew Johnson | 1865 | Tennessee | Democratic[4] | Lincoln |
17. Schuyler Colfax | 1869-1873 | Indiana | Republican | Grant |
18. Henry Wilson | 1873-1875 | Massachusetts | Republican | Grant |
19. William Wheeler | 1877-1881 | New York | Republican | Hayes |
20. Chester Arthur | 1881 | New York | Republican | Garfield |
21. Thomas Hendricks | 1885 | Indiana | Democratic | Cleveland |
22. Levi P. Morton | 1889-1893 | New York | Republican | Harrison |
23. Adlai Stevenson | 1893-1897 | Illinois | Democratic | Cleveland |
24. Garret Hobart | 1897-1899 | New Jersey | Republican | McKinley |
25. Theodore Roosevelt | 1901 | New York | Republican | McKinley |
26. Charles Fairbanks | 1905-1909 | Indiana | Republican | Roosevelt |
27. James S. Sherman | 1909-1912 | New York | Republican | Taft |
28. Thomas R. Marshall | 1913-1921 | Indiana | Democratic | Wilson |
29. Calvin Coolidge | 1921-1923 | Massachusetts | Republican | Harding |
30. Charles Dawes | 1925-1929 | Illinois | Republican | Coolidge |
31. Charles Curtis | 1929-1933 | Kansas | Republican | Hoover |
32. John Nance Garner | 1933-1941 | Texas | Democratic | Roosevelt |
33. Henry Wallace | 1941-1945 | Iowa | Democratic | Roosevelt |
34. Harry Truman | 1945 | Missouri | Democratic | Roosevelt |
35. Alben Barkley | 1949-1953 | Kentucky | Democratic | Truman |
36. Richard Nixon | 1953-1961 | California | Republican | Eisenhower |
37. Lyndon Johnson | 1961-1963 | Texas | Democratic | Kennedy |
38. Hubert Humphrey | 1965-1969 | Minnesota | Democratic | Johnson |
39. Spiro Agnew | 1969-1973 | Maryland | Republican | Nixon |
40. Gerald Ford | 1973-1974 | Michigan | Republican | Nixon |
41. Nelson Rockefeller | 1974-1977 | New York | Republican | Ford |
42. Walter Mondale | 1977-1981 | Minnesota | Democratic | Carter |
43. George H. W. Bush | 1981-1989 | Texas | Republican | Reagan |
44. Dan Quayle | 1989-1993 | Indiana | Republican | Bush |
45. Al Gore | 1993-2001 | Tennessee | Democratic | Clinton |
46. Dick Cheney | 2001-2009 | Wyoming | Republican | Bush |
47. Joseph Biden | 2009- | Delaware | Democratic | Obama |
Notes
- ↑ [1]
- ↑ While Washington was elected unanimously, by 1792, the two parties were running separate candidates for vice-president.
- ↑ This was before the Twelfth Amendment; Jefferson was actually the losing candidate for president. President Adams was a Federalist.
- ↑ Lincoln and Johnson were officially running on a "National Union" ticket, formed of Republicans and War Democrats. Lincoln was a Republican; Johnson a Democrat.
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